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<p>Part I of this essay is available <a href="" type="internal">here</a>.</p>
<p>For the greater part of human history, almost every society has been structured around the bonds of marriage and kinship. A man’s security, health, prosperity, and religious standing all traditionally depended on his relatives. We moderns continue to marry and trace our descent through our parents, especially our fathers. Yet in comparison to societies in other times and places, the bonds of kinship are now thin and watery things.</p>
<p>The Muslim world is different. Guided by powerful cultural rules and preferences, Muslims commonly arrange the marriages of their children. A Muslim family’s economic well-being, social standing, and much else typically depend upon those arrangements, and as we learned in “Marriage and the Terror War,” large sections of the Muslim world prefer to arrange marriages between “parallel cousins,” cousins who are members of the same paternal family line.</p>
<p>In the first part of this piece, I showed that, on a world scale, the radical form of in-marriage represented by the union of parallel cousins is highly unusual. Parallel-cousin marriage is confined almost exclusively to the region once ruled by the original eighth-century Islamic empire, and this involuted form of marriage stands in sharp contrast to the relative value placed on out-marriage, inter-group alliance, and interchange favored by almost every other culture in the world.</p>
<p>Anthropologists once identified exogamy — the tendency to form alliances with strangers by “marrying out” — as a core component of human nature. Of course, every society identifies boundaries outside of which legitimate marriage cannot take place. Nonetheless, within those boundaries, most societies frown on close marriages within existing family lines, and this sets a nearly universal value on the practice of alliance and interchange between insiders and outsiders.</p>
<p>Yet the very strong form of endogamy uniquely practiced throughout much of the Muslim world shows that it is possible to construct a human society on the basis of another fundamental strategy. Instead of cultural communication, adaptive development, and mutual trust, this strategy stresses intense in-group solidarity and unbreakable cultural continuity. Understanding the distinctive kinship principles around which Muslims structure their social life may tell us a good deal about why we’re engaged in a war against terror — and what we must do over the long term to win it. In particular, we want to understand the “functional connection” between the marriage practices prevalent in the Muslim world and Islam itself. How do Muslim religion and social life fit together, and what is it about both that makes the Muslim adjustment to modernity so difficult?</p>
<p>Problem SolvedRecognizing the anomalous nature of parallel-cousin marriage on a worldwide scale, as well as its importance for Muslim society, students of Middle Eastern culture puzzled over the phenomenon for a century. By the mid-1970s, however, anthropologists had grown tired of Muslim parallel-cousin marriage. Some complained that the preoccupation with this single exotic practice was diverting attention from other important forms of marriage and kinship in the Middle East. And increasingly, scholars despaired of making sense of parallel-cousin marriage at all.</p>
<p>The most popular explanation of parallel-cousin marriage treated it as a way of keeping wealth within the family line. And while an economic motive is clearly in play in many cases of parallel-cousin marriage, there are plenty of other instances that have nothing to do with wealth. The economic circumstances of Middle Eastern societies differ widely, yet parallel-cousin marriage is practiced across the region. In some places, the poor prefer parallel-cousin marriage every bit as much as the rich. The more anthropologists learned about these exceptions, the more they were inclined to drop the issue of parallel-cousin marriage as a false or insoluble problem.</p>
<p>Then, in 1989, Czech anthropologist Ladislav Holy published Kinship, Honour, and Solidarity: Cousin Marriage in the Middle East. After a century of unresolved puzzlement, Holy offered an credible general explanation of the Muslim preference for parallel-cousin marriage. Holy showed how cousin marriage serves as a fail-safe protective device to secure collective family honor, and linked the honor-based function of cousin marriage to a broader appreciation of super-charged, in-group solidarity as a social strategy. No society can do without some form of in-group solidarity. But once you understand how Muslims construct society as a collection of counterbalanced, sometimes allied, sometimes feuding, closed-off, and self-sufficient family cells, the problem of Muslim cultural persistence begins to make sense. Holy also allows us to appreciate that the Muslim seclusion of women (another critical barrier to modernization and assimilation) is part and parcel of a larger complex of practices, at the center of which is parallel-cousin marriage. (Unfortunately, Holy’s book is difficult for non-specialists to follow, but see especially pp.110-123. See also a classic 1959 essay making some of these points by R. Murphy and L. Kasden, “The structure of parallel cousin marriage,” American Anthropologist 61:17-29.)</p>
<p>Holy argues that the high value placed on endogamy sharply sets Muslim society apart from the rest of the world. The loyalties of women who marry within their own family lines remain undivided. Negatively, therefore, parallel-cousin marriage sacrifices the “integrative” advantages of exogamy. Yet in a positive sense, parallel-cousin marriage serves as a powerful tool for preserving the internal solidarity and cultural continuity of the group. True, no real society is, or can be, entirely composed of sealed-off, perpetually in-marrying family lines. Many Muslims do “marry out,” and economic exchanges and strategically forged marriage alliances counter-balance the tendency of parallel-cousin marriage to divide Muslim society into a series of closed, self-sustaining family cells. Yet Muslim society’s leading theme is set and reinforced by the preference for parallel-cousin marriage — that theme being the creation of closed-off, secluded, and intensely loyal “solidarities,” and harsh dealing with any insider who would endanger or desert the charmed circle.</p>
<p>Parallel-cousin marriage is often practiced as a way of keeping wealth within a particular family line. Yet it isn’t wealth that turns Muslim families into the ultimate in sealed-off, self-perpetuating in-groups, Holy argues; it’s the other way around. The pre-existing value placed on in-group solidarity dictates that, when serious wealth is in play, it needs to be kept in the family line.</p>
<p>Rather than wealth, Holy argues, the real key to the puzzle of Muslim parallel-cousin marriage is family honor. With all the economic and social diversity in the Middle East, one factor remains constant. Wherever parallel-cousin marriage is practiced, the notion that the honor of the male family-line depends upon the sexual conduct of women is strong. For this reason, a woman’s father’s brother’s son (her parallel cousin) has the right-of-first-refusal in the matter of her marriage. To protect against the possibility of a woman’s shameful marriage (or other dangerous sexual conduct) damaging the honor of the men of her lineage, male relatives have the right to keep her safely within the family line by marrying her off to her parallel cousin.</p>
<p>As I’ll show in a follow-up piece, all of these kinship mechanisms are much at work in Europe today. Muslim immigrants in Europe use cousin marriage to keep wealth within already tight family lines, and to prevent girls from entering “shameful” marriages with cultural outsiders. All this serves to reinforce family “solidarity,” thereby blocking the assimilation of Muslim immigrants into society at large. We’ve all heard about full-body veiling, the seclusion of women, forced marriage, honor killing, and the like. Europe is struggling with the question of how to handle these practices. What we’ve missed up to now is the sense in which cousin marriage tends to organize and orchestrate all of these controversial practices, thereby serving as the lynch-pin of a broader pattern of resistance to assimilation and modernization. In effect, parallel-cousin marriage in Europe acts as a social “sealing mechanism” to block cultural interchange — just as, over a century ago, Sir Edward Tylor theorized it would.</p>
<p>No EscapeLet’s return to Dinesh D’Souza’s novel plan for winning the war on terror. D’Souza wants to isolate the secular Left at home, and Muslim radicals abroad, by forging an alliance between America’s Christian conservatives and cultural traditionalists (including peaceful Muslim traditionalists) across the globe. All the world’s traditional cultures, says D’Souza, while differing on details, share a belief in external moral standards — a belief that sharply contrasts with the expressive individualism and relativism of America’s secular Left. As I pointed out in “War of Cultures,” however, D’Souza’s focus on what the world’s traditionalists have in common glosses over immense differences between moral and social systems, thereby telling us little or nothing about why some traditionalists are attacking us, while others are not.</p>
<p>While it’s possible to lump the world’s “traditionalists” together by contrasting them all with the secular Left, there’s another and more productive way to cut the cake. Once your subject is the social meaning and function of kinship, the Muslim world stands in stark contrast to every other society in the world — traditional or modern. This contrast, I argue, has everything to do with why Muslim societies have difficulty accommodating modernity, why Muslim immigrants resist assimilation, and why some Muslims are attacking us.</p>
<p>The key “functional connection” between Middle Eastern marriage practices (which are not religiously dictated, although they are sometimes justified in religious terms) and Islam itself would appear to be the creation and reinforcement of a pervasive cultural tendency to form in-groups with tightly monitored boundaries. A male parallel cousin’s right-of-first-refusal in marriage serves to prevent a woman from threatening lineage honor and solidarity by entering into a low or dishonorable out-marriage. By the same token, as we saw in the case of Afghan convert to Christianity, Abdul Rahman, Islam itself functions as a kind of closed in-group on a grand scale, welcoming converts, yet punishing apostasy with death. Explaining this Muslim practice, D’Souza says that, “Apostasy in Islam is less a matter of ‘wrong beliefs’ or heresy and more a matter of treason, of betraying the Muslim community.” Precisely. Yet D’Souza fails to see that this is the heart of the problem. Instead of serving as a religious creed that individuals are free to accept or reject, Islam itself functions more like a gigantic in-marrying lineage, whose solidarity is threatened by any individual member’s dishonorable exit. This, in turn, puts us in mind of the case of Salman Rushdie.</p>
<p>However well-known the Rushdie affair may be, we have arguably missed its larger significance. As D’Souza notes, given that sharia law punishes apostasy with death, “Khomeini’s fatwa against Rushdie was entirely in line with Islamic teaching, and even traditional Muslims could not disagree with the ayatollah’s verdict.” Westerners see the Rushdie case as an attack on free speech, and that it is. More deeply, however, the Rushdie affair was a triumph for the built-in enforcement mechanism that seals off Islam from adaptation to the modern world.</p>
<p>D’Souza gives the example of the Taliban’s notorious execution by stoning of two adulterers. Recently, notes D’Souza, Maulvi Qalamuddin, former head of the Taliban’s Department for the Prevention of Vice and the Promotion of Virtue, defended that stoning: “Just two people, that’s all, and we ended adultery in Kandahar.” By the same token, Ayatollah Khomeini might with justice have said of Salman Rushdie: “Just one writer, that’s all, and we killed off the possibility of a reformist Islam growing up in Europe.” Rushdie may not have been a religious reformer himself, yet the death sentence pronounced upon him sent out a powerful message to any European Muslim who might be planning to lead a movement for reform.</p>
<p>Compare the Rushdie affair to the development the Conservative and Reform movements within American Judaism, and the parallel rise of American Jewish intermarriage with non-Jews. Judaism, like Islam, was once less a religious creed than a tight community constituted by a set of laws and practices extending into areas well beyond matters of pure “belief.” Yet without the intense form of lineage endogamy favored by Muslim society, and in the absence of the in-group policing mechanisms found in Islam, Judaism adapted to modernity, and Jews assimilated into American life (arguably to a fault, since Jewish identity is now seriously threatened by intermarriage). To put it simply, early followers of Conservative and Reform Judaism didn’t have to worry about being executed for intermarriage or apostasy by angry Orthodox Jews.</p>
<p>So D’Souza’s notion of a grand coalition of the world’s religious traditionalists completely glosses over specific cultural characteristics that have blocked any reconciliation between Islam and modernity. D’Souza doesn’t directly endorse Islam’s harsh enforcement mechanisms. Instead he argues that the intolerant secularism of the cultural Left is forcing Muslims into an all-or-nothing choice between their harshest traditions, on the one hand, and total repudiation of Islam, on the other.</p>
<p>What D’Souza can’t see is that, far more than America’s secular Left, it is the distinctive nature of Islam itself, and of Middle Eastern social life generally, that forces this all-or-nothing choice. A non-creedal religion whose jurisdiction extends to vast areas of social life; a communal religious identity that punishes disloyalty with death; and a marriage system that generates (and harshly polices) a pervasive ethos of in-group solidarity: these are the real sources of the all-or-nothing choice between Muslim tradition and modernity. This is why the current alternatives in the Muslim world sometimes seem to be boiling down to an untenable choice between Iranian theocracy, on the one hand, and Turkish secularism, on the other.</p>
<p>If we want to change any of this, it will be impossible to restrict ourselves to the study of religious Islam. The “self-sealing” character of Islam is part and parcel of a broader and more deeply rooted social pattern. And parallel-cousin marriage is more than just an interesting but minor illustration of that broader theme. If there’s a “self-sealing” tendency in Muslim social life, cousin marriage is the velcro. In contemporary Europe, perhaps even more than in the Middle East, cousin marriage is at the core of a complex of factors blocking assimilation and driving the war on terror. So I shall take up the question of cousin marriage in Europe in the next in this series of essays.</p>
<p>— Stanley Kurtz is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p> | false | 1 | part essay available greater part human history almost every society structured around bonds marriage kinship mans security health prosperity religious standing traditionally depended relatives moderns continue marry trace descent parents especially fathers yet comparison societies times places bonds kinship thin watery things muslim world different guided powerful cultural rules preferences muslims commonly arrange marriages children muslim familys economic wellbeing social standing much else typically depend upon arrangements learned marriage terror war large sections muslim world prefer arrange marriages parallel cousins cousins members paternal family line first part piece showed world scale radical form inmarriage represented union parallel cousins highly unusual parallelcousin marriage confined almost exclusively region ruled original eighthcentury islamic empire involuted form marriage stands sharp contrast relative value placed outmarriage intergroup alliance interchange favored almost every culture world anthropologists identified exogamy tendency form alliances strangers marrying core component human nature course every society identifies boundaries outside legitimate marriage take place nonetheless within boundaries societies frown close marriages within existing family lines sets nearly universal value practice alliance interchange insiders outsiders yet strong form endogamy uniquely practiced throughout much muslim world shows possible construct human society basis another fundamental strategy instead cultural communication adaptive development mutual trust strategy stresses intense ingroup solidarity unbreakable cultural continuity understanding distinctive kinship principles around muslims structure social life may tell us good deal engaged war terror must long term win particular want understand functional connection marriage practices prevalent muslim world islam muslim religion social life fit together makes muslim adjustment modernity difficult problem solvedrecognizing anomalous nature parallelcousin marriage worldwide scale well importance muslim society students middle eastern culture puzzled phenomenon century mid1970s however anthropologists grown tired muslim parallelcousin marriage complained preoccupation single exotic practice diverting attention important forms marriage kinship middle east increasingly scholars despaired making sense parallelcousin marriage popular explanation parallelcousin marriage treated way keeping wealth within family line economic motive clearly play many cases parallelcousin marriage plenty instances nothing wealth economic circumstances middle eastern societies differ widely yet parallelcousin marriage practiced across region places poor prefer parallelcousin marriage every bit much rich anthropologists learned exceptions inclined drop issue parallelcousin marriage false insoluble problem 1989 czech anthropologist ladislav holy published kinship honour solidarity cousin marriage middle east century unresolved puzzlement holy offered credible general explanation muslim preference parallelcousin marriage holy showed cousin marriage serves failsafe protective device secure collective family honor linked honorbased function cousin marriage broader appreciation supercharged ingroup solidarity social strategy society without form ingroup solidarity understand muslims construct society collection counterbalanced sometimes allied sometimes feuding closedoff selfsufficient family cells problem muslim cultural persistence begins make sense holy also allows us appreciate muslim seclusion women another critical barrier modernization assimilation part parcel larger complex practices center parallelcousin marriage unfortunately holys book difficult nonspecialists follow see especially pp110123 see also classic 1959 essay making points r murphy l kasden structure parallel cousin marriage american anthropologist 611729 holy argues high value placed endogamy sharply sets muslim society apart rest world loyalties women marry within family lines remain undivided negatively therefore parallelcousin marriage sacrifices integrative advantages exogamy yet positive sense parallelcousin marriage serves powerful tool preserving internal solidarity cultural continuity group true real society entirely composed sealedoff perpetually inmarrying family lines many muslims marry economic exchanges strategically forged marriage alliances counterbalance tendency parallelcousin marriage divide muslim society series closed selfsustaining family cells yet muslim societys leading theme set reinforced preference parallelcousin marriage theme creation closedoff secluded intensely loyal solidarities harsh dealing insider would endanger desert charmed circle parallelcousin marriage often practiced way keeping wealth within particular family line yet isnt wealth turns muslim families ultimate sealedoff selfperpetuating ingroups holy argues way around preexisting value placed ingroup solidarity dictates serious wealth play needs kept family line rather wealth holy argues real key puzzle muslim parallelcousin marriage family honor economic social diversity middle east one factor remains constant wherever parallelcousin marriage practiced notion honor male familyline depends upon sexual conduct women strong reason womans fathers brothers son parallel cousin rightoffirstrefusal matter marriage protect possibility womans shameful marriage dangerous sexual conduct damaging honor men lineage male relatives right keep safely within family line marrying parallel cousin ill show followup piece kinship mechanisms much work europe today muslim immigrants europe use cousin marriage keep wealth within already tight family lines prevent girls entering shameful marriages cultural outsiders serves reinforce family solidarity thereby blocking assimilation muslim immigrants society large weve heard fullbody veiling seclusion women forced marriage honor killing like europe struggling question handle practices weve missed sense cousin marriage tends organize orchestrate controversial practices thereby serving lynchpin broader pattern resistance assimilation modernization effect parallelcousin marriage europe acts social sealing mechanism block cultural interchange century ago sir edward tylor theorized would escapelets return dinesh dsouzas novel plan winning war terror dsouza wants isolate secular left home muslim radicals abroad forging alliance americas christian conservatives cultural traditionalists including peaceful muslim traditionalists across globe worlds traditional cultures says dsouza differing details share belief external moral standards belief sharply contrasts expressive individualism relativism americas secular left pointed war cultures however dsouzas focus worlds traditionalists common glosses immense differences moral social systems thereby telling us little nothing traditionalists attacking us others possible lump worlds traditionalists together contrasting secular left theres another productive way cut cake subject social meaning function kinship muslim world stands stark contrast every society world traditional modern contrast argue everything muslim societies difficulty accommodating modernity muslim immigrants resist assimilation muslims attacking us key functional connection middle eastern marriage practices religiously dictated although sometimes justified religious terms islam would appear creation reinforcement pervasive cultural tendency form ingroups tightly monitored boundaries male parallel cousins rightoffirstrefusal marriage serves prevent woman threatening lineage honor solidarity entering low dishonorable outmarriage token saw case afghan convert christianity abdul rahman islam functions kind closed ingroup grand scale welcoming converts yet punishing apostasy death explaining muslim practice dsouza says apostasy islam less matter wrong beliefs heresy matter treason betraying muslim community precisely yet dsouza fails see heart problem instead serving religious creed individuals free accept reject islam functions like gigantic inmarrying lineage whose solidarity threatened individual members dishonorable exit turn puts us mind case salman rushdie however wellknown rushdie affair may arguably missed larger significance dsouza notes given sharia law punishes apostasy death khomeinis fatwa rushdie entirely line islamic teaching even traditional muslims could disagree ayatollahs verdict westerners see rushdie case attack free speech deeply however rushdie affair triumph builtin enforcement mechanism seals islam adaptation modern world dsouza gives example talibans notorious execution stoning two adulterers recently notes dsouza maulvi qalamuddin former head talibans department prevention vice promotion virtue defended stoning two people thats ended adultery kandahar token ayatollah khomeini might justice said salman rushdie one writer thats killed possibility reformist islam growing europe rushdie may religious reformer yet death sentence pronounced upon sent powerful message european muslim might planning lead movement reform compare rushdie affair development conservative reform movements within american judaism parallel rise american jewish intermarriage nonjews judaism like islam less religious creed tight community constituted set laws practices extending areas well beyond matters pure belief yet without intense form lineage endogamy favored muslim society absence ingroup policing mechanisms found islam judaism adapted modernity jews assimilated american life arguably fault since jewish identity seriously threatened intermarriage put simply early followers conservative reform judaism didnt worry executed intermarriage apostasy angry orthodox jews dsouzas notion grand coalition worlds religious traditionalists completely glosses specific cultural characteristics blocked reconciliation islam modernity dsouza doesnt directly endorse islams harsh enforcement mechanisms instead argues intolerant secularism cultural left forcing muslims allornothing choice harshest traditions one hand total repudiation islam dsouza cant see far americas secular left distinctive nature islam middle eastern social life generally forces allornothing choice noncreedal religion whose jurisdiction extends vast areas social life communal religious identity punishes disloyalty death marriage system generates harshly polices pervasive ethos ingroup solidarity real sources allornothing choice muslim tradition modernity current alternatives muslim world sometimes seem boiling untenable choice iranian theocracy one hand turkish secularism want change impossible restrict study religious islam selfsealing character islam part parcel broader deeply rooted social pattern parallelcousin marriage interesting minor illustration broader theme theres selfsealing tendency muslim social life cousin marriage velcro contemporary europe perhaps even middle east cousin marriage core complex factors blocking assimilation driving war terror shall take question cousin marriage europe next series essays stanley kurtz senior fellow ethics public policy center | 1,376 |
<p>Watch | Warrior PATHH is helping military veterans with post combat conditions transform their struggle into profound strength and growth. The Warrior PATHH documentary is brought to you in part by <a href="https://www.newdayusa.com/" type="external">NewDay USA</a>.</p>
<p>More than 2.7 million American men and women have deployed to war zones since the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, making this the longest stretch of military conflict in U.S. history.</p>
<p>This era of war is responsible for injuries to members of our armed forces that are both visible and invisible. Those being traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) that often leave a person disabled, and post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) that is sometimes more difficult to detect. These acronyms are now part of the American lexicon.</p>
<p>The transition to civilian life can be daunting for some veterans. Recent statistics from the Department of Veterans Affairs show that an average of 20 veterans commit suicide every day.</p>
<p>Compounding this troubling statistic is that traditional treatments for PTSD, a combination of medication and counseling, are not effective for all veterans. Fear of being stigmatized is also an issue with more than 50 percent of those in need of help declining to seek it. Of those who do, fewer than 20 percent complete their treatment program. Ultimately, only 2 percent of those diagnosed will successfully complete their rehabilitation.</p>
<p>In August 2015, the Journal of the American Medical Association published a comprehensive review of all clinical studies for PTSD and found that none were getting the job done. They called for a “new and innovative approach.”</p>
<p>A New and Innovative Approach: PTG not PTSD</p>
<p>In 2012, the first signs of that new approach began to emerge in Bluemont, Virginia, a rural town 50 miles west of Washington D.C., located in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. It was there that a retired Navy bomb disposal technician, Ken Falke, and his wife Julia began devising plans for the nation’s first-ever privately funded wellness center dedicated exclusively to combat veterans and their families.</p>
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<p>“We opened in September 2013 and started hosting leading organizations focused on PTSD, and it quickly became clear that more needed to be done," Falke told Circa. "Far too many programs were catch-and-release in nature, and didn’t enable veterans and their family members to live the great lives they deserved at home.”</p>
<p>Harnessing the training he received during his Navy career and a successful stint as an entrepreneur, Falke traveled the country and met with experts from the military psychology, trauma, PTSD, and treatment fields. What he learned left him stunned. “They told me that nothing was working for PTSD, and that they used the existing protocols because they were reimbursable, and quite frankly, was all they had,” he said.</p>
<p>But it's what the experts didn't say that troubled Falke even more. “The implication was that war breaks people. That the best that was possible for combat veterans was to live lives as diminished – and often medicated – versions of themselves.”</p>
<p>Being a combat veteran himself, Falke refused to accept the status quo. A meeting with a UNC Charlotte-based psychologist would prove to be the breakthrough he was looking for.</p>
<p>“I met Dr. Richard Tedeschi through a friend, and we began talking about the research he has been doing since the 1980s," Falke told Circa. "Rich and his colleague Lawrence Calhoun had coined the term Posttraumatic Growth in 1995, and had studied and documented how people grow after trauma. Those people often create lives that are more authentic, fulfilling, and purposeful in the aftermath of tragic events.”</p>
<p>Falke and Dr. Tedeschi began more intensive discussions, which soon included Boulder Crest’s Director of Strategy Josh Goldberg and Dr. Bret Moore, a twice-deployed Army psychologist.</p>
<p>“It was clear that this notion of Posttraumatic Growth (PTG) was inherently powerful because it created hope, possibility, and opportunity," said Goldberg. "It flew in the face of the idea that PTSD is a death sentence. The real question was whether we could leverage military-style training to enable people who were struggling with PTSD to achieve PTG, and to sustain that PTG permanently."</p>
<p>In May 2014, Falke gathered the best and brightest from the programs he had observed to create a Posttraumatic Growth-based program called Warrior PATHH, which stands for Progressive and Alternative Training for Healing Heroes. The Warrior PATHH would be the first-ever program designed specifically to cultivate and facilitate Posttraumatic Growth.</p>
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<p>The curriculum starts with a 7-day intensive and immersive initiation. This is followed by 18-months of training, support and accountability.</p>
<p>After a year-and-a-half of research, development and testing, Goldberg began work on a program that would ensure Warrior PATHH could be effectively put into place. Dr. Tedeschi and Dr. Moore began a comprehensive longitudinal study to evaluate the effectiveness of the program. The study focused on three critical areas: symptom reduction, quality of life improvement, and Posttraumatic Growth. Nearly 12 months into the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGkE8krQAKQ" type="external">study</a>, it became clear that Warrior PATHH delivered results that far surpassed traditional treatments.</p>
<p>“We knew that we had to get away from the idea of helping people learn to live with a diminished version of themselves. We had to ensure that they could live great lives, filled with passion, purpose and service," said Goldberg. "The results show that the transformation they experience is nothing short of remarkable. And the best part is that it is sustained over the long haul."</p>
<p>What’s Next: Expanding Warrior PATHH</p>
<p>Falke and Goldberg say that PTG is becoming increasingly well-known. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis is one of its most high-profile proponents, even going as far as referencing PTG in a 2015 speech.</p>
<p>“We have the opportunity to turn the tide in a suicide epidemic that has gone from bad to worse over the past 15 years," said Falke. "Expanding Warrior PATHH and training people about Posttraumatic Growth are the key areas of our focus in 2018 and beyond, and we are working collaboratively with VA, DoD, and supportive communities across the nation to that end."</p>
<p>In May 2017, Boulder Crest acquired a 130-acre, fully constructed property outside of Tucson, Arizona. Boulder Crest Retreat Arizona will open on December 1st, 2017. In addition, Boulder Crest is working with partners in Florida, South Carolina, Texas and Washington State to establish Warrior PATHH programs. Boulder Crest has also begun development of the Family PATHH curriculum initiative, which will be ready by December 2018.</p>
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<p>Boulder Crest is also planning to launch the Boulder Crest Institute for Posttraumatic Growth in the fall of 2018, focusing on spreading the notion of Posttraumatic Growth globally, and developing programs to support a range of communities, including first responders.</p>
<p>For more information about Boulder Crest, visit <a href="http://www.bouldercrestretreat.org/" type="external">BoulderCrest.org</a>Click here to follow the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/LocastroBrothers/?ref=br_rs" type="external">Locastro Brothers</a>.</p> | false | 1 | watch warrior pathh helping military veterans post combat conditions transform struggle profound strength growth warrior pathh documentary brought part newday usa 27 million american men women deployed war zones since september 11 2001 terrorist attacks making longest stretch military conflict us history era war responsible injuries members armed forces visible invisible traumatic brain injuries tbis often leave person disabled post traumatic stress disorder ptsd sometimes difficult detect acronyms part american lexicon transition civilian life daunting veterans recent statistics department veterans affairs show average 20 veterans commit suicide every day compounding troubling statistic traditional treatments ptsd combination medication counseling effective veterans fear stigmatized also issue 50 percent need help declining seek fewer 20 percent complete treatment program ultimately 2 percent diagnosed successfully complete rehabilitation august 2015 journal american medical association published comprehensive review clinical studies ptsd found none getting job done called new innovative approach new innovative approach ptg ptsd 2012 first signs new approach began emerge bluemont virginia rural town 50 miles west washington dc located foothills blue ridge mountains retired navy bomb disposal technician ken falke wife julia began devising plans nations firstever privately funded wellness center dedicated exclusively combat veterans families opened september 2013 started hosting leading organizations focused ptsd quickly became clear needed done falke told circa far many programs catchandrelease nature didnt enable veterans family members live great lives deserved home harnessing training received navy career successful stint entrepreneur falke traveled country met experts military psychology trauma ptsd treatment fields learned left stunned told nothing working ptsd used existing protocols reimbursable quite frankly said experts didnt say troubled falke even implication war breaks people best possible combat veterans live lives diminished often medicated versions combat veteran falke refused accept status quo meeting unc charlottebased psychologist would prove breakthrough looking met dr richard tedeschi friend began talking research since 1980s falke told circa rich colleague lawrence calhoun coined term posttraumatic growth 1995 studied documented people grow trauma people often create lives authentic fulfilling purposeful aftermath tragic events falke dr tedeschi began intensive discussions soon included boulder crests director strategy josh goldberg dr bret moore twicedeployed army psychologist clear notion posttraumatic growth ptg inherently powerful created hope possibility opportunity said goldberg flew face idea ptsd death sentence real question whether could leverage militarystyle training enable people struggling ptsd achieve ptg sustain ptg permanently may 2014 falke gathered best brightest programs observed create posttraumatic growthbased program called warrior pathh stands progressive alternative training healing heroes warrior pathh would firstever program designed specifically cultivate facilitate posttraumatic growth curriculum starts 7day intensive immersive initiation followed 18months training support accountability yearandahalf research development testing goldberg began work program would ensure warrior pathh could effectively put place dr tedeschi dr moore began comprehensive longitudinal study evaluate effectiveness program study focused three critical areas symptom reduction quality life improvement posttraumatic growth nearly 12 months study became clear warrior pathh delivered results far surpassed traditional treatments knew get away idea helping people learn live diminished version ensure could live great lives filled passion purpose service said goldberg results show transformation experience nothing short remarkable best part sustained long haul whats next expanding warrior pathh falke goldberg say ptg becoming increasingly wellknown defense secretary jim mattis one highprofile proponents even going far referencing ptg 2015 speech opportunity turn tide suicide epidemic gone bad worse past 15 years said falke expanding warrior pathh training people posttraumatic growth key areas focus 2018 beyond working collaboratively va dod supportive communities across nation end may 2017 boulder crest acquired 130acre fully constructed property outside tucson arizona boulder crest retreat arizona open december 1st 2017 addition boulder crest working partners florida south carolina texas washington state establish warrior pathh programs boulder crest also begun development family pathh curriculum initiative ready december 2018 boulder crest also planning launch boulder crest institute posttraumatic growth fall 2018 focusing spreading notion posttraumatic growth globally developing programs support range communities including first responders information boulder crest visit bouldercrestorgclick follow locastro brothers | 655 |
<p>In August 2004, according to this <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/printables/fact/041018fa_fact3" type="external">article</a> in the liberal New Yorker, “a clandestine summit meeting took place at the Aspen Institute, in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains. The participants, all Democrats, were sworn to secrecy” and included five billionaires who “shared a common goal: to use their fortunes to engineer the defeat of President George W. Bush in the 2004 election.” The wealthiest of these “hard-core partisans” was George Soros, who had been a “leading crusader for campaign-finance reform.”</p>
<p>Soros, through his Open Society Institute, provides support for the Aspen Institute, which runs various activities in support of its stated mission of “foster[ing] enlightened leadership and open-minded dialogue.” Among these activities are its “ <a href="http://www.aspeninstitute.org/site/c.huLWJeMRKpH/b.612085/k.ACA2/Justice_and_Society_Seminars.htm" type="external">Justice and Society Seminars</a>,” which often have federal judges as participants. The Aspen Institute has waived the steep seminar fee (currently up to $6,950) for participating federal judges, and also has covered their expenses for travel, lodging, and meals.</p>
<p>Soros has also been a major funder of the Community Rights Counsel, a left-wing “public interest law firm.” In addition to its activist litigation efforts, the Community Rights Counsel has been the most vocal opponent of educational seminars for judges operated by anyone other than federal bureaucrats or bar associations. Soros’s left hand apparently knows what his other left hand is doing: The Community Rights Counsel has not criticized the Aspen Institute’s seminars for judges. Instead, one of its primary targets has been the academic programs in economics, philosophy, and history offered by the George Mason University Law and Economics Center.</p>
<p>In a recent defense of this disparate treatment, Douglas Kendall, executive director of the Community Rights Counsel, asserted that the Aspen Institute has “a much more balanced profile” than George Mason does. That claim of balance would seem belied by the Aspen Institute’s own list of past moderators of its seminars: “U.S. Supreme Court Justices Harry A. Blackmun, William J. Brennan, Jr., John Paul Stevens, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg; Judges Rosemary Barkett, William Fletcher, Abner Mikva, Jon Newman, and Myron Thompson; Dean Kathleen Sullivan, and Professors Peter Edelman, Louis Henkin, Harold Koh, Burt Neuborne, and Michael Sandel.” In any event, the relevant distinctions between George Mason and the Aspen Institute cut precisely in the opposite direction — in George Mason’s favor. Consider:</p>
<p>1. George Mason is part of an accredited university — indeed, a public university. The Aspen Institute is not.</p>
<p>2. George Mason’s programs, which, along with its reading lists, are posted on its <a href="http://www.law.gmu.edu/lawecon/programs.php" type="external">website</a>, have distinguished lecturers and are nonpartisan and academically intensive. (A five-day program typically involves 21 hours of class time, and participants are assigned hundreds of pages of difficult reading.) The quality and integrity of its programs are amply attested by the fact that, this year alone, three federal courts of appeals and nine state court systems have enlisted George Mason to provide the academic content for their annual conferences. It is far less clear that the Aspen Institute’s seminars meet the same very high standard. Compare, for example, George Mason’s program on “Origins of the American Revolution” with Gordon Wood to, say, the Aspen Institute’s seminar on “Gender and Justice” and instructors (or, rather, mere “moderators”) like <a href="http://bench.nationalreview.com/post/?q=MDdiOGRhNTFiMmZkMmY0NTRhMWE2NGMyMzEyYWFmZmY=" type="external">Judge Barkett</a>.</p>
<p>3. No representatives of corporations or of other special interests attend the George Mason programs. It appears that anyone willing to pay the steep seminar fee might find himself rubbing shoulders with judges at the Aspen Institute seminars.</p>
<p>4. George Mason does not provide any entertainment or recreation at its programs. The Aspen Institute trumpets: “Participants can relax and enjoy Aspen[‘]s beautiful setting in the Rocky Mountains, work out in the well[-]equipped health center, or join in afternoon activities such as white-water rafting, hiking, tennis and horseback riding. Evening activities include The Aspen Music Festival, BalletAspen, public lectures, and films.”</p>
<p>5. Although ethics rules would permit it, George Mason does not reimburse the expenses of accompanying spouses. According to a Community Rights Counsel’s database, the Aspen Institute apparently has done so.</p>
<p>Last month, responding to concerns about possible conflicts of interest, the Judicial Conference of the United States — the body of judges that sets administrative policies for the federal courts — adopted a policy that effectively requires that entities like George Mason and the Aspen Institute that provide free educational seminars to federal judges disclose their sources of funding. On the sensible premise that judges who did not know the identity of its supporters could not be partial to them, George Mason had previously kept its sources of support confidential. But upon the Judicial Conference’s adoption of the new policy, George Mason immediately disclosed its donors on its <a href="http://www.law.gmu.edu/lawecon/donations.php" type="external">website</a>.</p>
<p>Support from corporations and corporate foundations accounted for less than 10 percent of George Mason’s budget for its most recent fiscal year, and no corporation or corporate foundation accounted for more than 2 percent of its budget. In addition, no support is earmarked for particular programs. The list of donors also reveals a striking fact: Of the thirty or so federal judges who made donations to George Mason, at least a dozen were appointees of Democratic presidents. That fact provides further refutation of the Community Rights Counsel’s tendentious slandering of the George Mason programs as ideologically biased.</p>
<p>The Aspen Institute’s annual report lists its many supporters, including over 150 corporations. So far as I could discern, its website does not make clear whether and to what extent any corporations or other special interests provide support for specific seminars that include judges.</p>
<p>For the Community Rights Counsel’s Kendall, the Judicial Conference’s new disclosure policy doesn’t go far enough. Kendall supports a pending bill, introduced by Senator Leahy, that would end the George Mason programs. Kendall has slyly left the impression that the legislation would likewise bar federal judges from taking part, gratis, in Aspen Institute seminars. But in fact the Leahy bill appears to have been drafted — or, rather, gerrymandered — to punish George Mason and to spare the Aspen Institute. In a bizarre exception to the prohibition that it would impose, the bill would permit judges to take part in a “private judicial seminar” if the judge is a “panel participant” — the Aspen Institute’s seminars are “roundtable sessions” — and if federal judges are “not the primary audience at the private judicial seminar.” In other words, the less likely it is that judges are actually learning something, and the more they’re mixing with potential litigants, the more they can avail themselves of the Leahy bill’s exception.</p>
<p>It would be interesting to discover what role Kendall had in drafting Leahy’s bill. But don’t expect any such revelations from this purported champion of transparency and disclosure. The Community Rights Counsel doesn’t even disclose its support from Soros on its website.</p>
<p>Soros, the erstwhile champion of campaign-finance reform, tried to use his fortune to decide the 2004 presidential election. Through Kendall and the Community Rights Counsel, he now purports to oppose judicial education that is not controlled by federal bureaucrats or bar activists, but he in fact is appl ying an ideological litmus test that favors the Aspen Institute and penalizes George Mason.</p>
<p>In <a href="http://www.uscourts.gov/Press_Releases/judicialconference091906.html" type="external">announcing</a> its new disclosure policy, the Judicial Conference emphasized that there is a “compelling need” for “continuing education of judges in law, science, history, economics, sociology, philosophy, and other disciplines.” This compelling need, the Judicial Conference has recognized, cannot be fully satisfied by the Federal Judicial Center. Programs like George Mason’s therefore perform an important public service. In a comment evidently directed at the Leahy bill, the Judicial Conference embraced the position that anyone who “seek[s] to limit judges’ access to knowledge” disserves this compelling need.</p>
<p>There is, in short, no reason to believe that any further restrictions on judicial seminars would serve the public interest. But one real test of the soundness of any proposal is whether it treats the George Mason programs at least as favorably as the Aspen Institute’s.</p>
<p>—Edward Whelan is president of the <a href="" type="internal">Ethics and Public Policy Center</a> and is a regular contributor to NRO’s <a href="http://bench.nationalreview.com/" type="external">Bench Memos blog</a>.</p> | false | 1 | august 2004 according article liberal new yorker clandestine summit meeting took place aspen institute colorados rocky mountains participants democrats sworn secrecy included five billionaires shared common goal use fortunes engineer defeat president george w bush 2004 election wealthiest hardcore partisans george soros leading crusader campaignfinance reform soros open society institute provides support aspen institute runs various activities support stated mission fostering enlightened leadership openminded dialogue among activities justice society seminars often federal judges participants aspen institute waived steep seminar fee currently 6950 participating federal judges also covered expenses travel lodging meals soros also major funder community rights counsel leftwing public interest law firm addition activist litigation efforts community rights counsel vocal opponent educational seminars judges operated anyone federal bureaucrats bar associations soross left hand apparently knows left hand community rights counsel criticized aspen institutes seminars judges instead one primary targets academic programs economics philosophy history offered george mason university law economics center recent defense disparate treatment douglas kendall executive director community rights counsel asserted aspen institute much balanced profile george mason claim balance would seem belied aspen institutes list past moderators seminars us supreme court justices harry blackmun william j brennan jr john paul stevens ruth bader ginsburg judges rosemary barkett william fletcher abner mikva jon newman myron thompson dean kathleen sullivan professors peter edelman louis henkin harold koh burt neuborne michael sandel event relevant distinctions george mason aspen institute cut precisely opposite direction george masons favor consider 1 george mason part accredited university indeed public university aspen institute 2 george masons programs along reading lists posted website distinguished lecturers nonpartisan academically intensive fiveday program typically involves 21 hours class time participants assigned hundreds pages difficult reading quality integrity programs amply attested fact year alone three federal courts appeals nine state court systems enlisted george mason provide academic content annual conferences far less clear aspen institutes seminars meet high standard compare example george masons program origins american revolution gordon wood say aspen institutes seminar gender justice instructors rather mere moderators like judge barkett 3 representatives corporations special interests attend george mason programs appears anyone willing pay steep seminar fee might find rubbing shoulders judges aspen institute seminars 4 george mason provide entertainment recreation programs aspen institute trumpets participants relax enjoy aspens beautiful setting rocky mountains work wellequipped health center join afternoon activities whitewater rafting hiking tennis horseback riding evening activities include aspen music festival balletaspen public lectures films 5 although ethics rules would permit george mason reimburse expenses accompanying spouses according community rights counsels database aspen institute apparently done last month responding concerns possible conflicts interest judicial conference united states body judges sets administrative policies federal courts adopted policy effectively requires entities like george mason aspen institute provide free educational seminars federal judges disclose sources funding sensible premise judges know identity supporters could partial george mason previously kept sources support confidential upon judicial conferences adoption new policy george mason immediately disclosed donors website support corporations corporate foundations accounted less 10 percent george masons budget recent fiscal year corporation corporate foundation accounted 2 percent budget addition support earmarked particular programs list donors also reveals striking fact thirty federal judges made donations george mason least dozen appointees democratic presidents fact provides refutation community rights counsels tendentious slandering george mason programs ideologically biased aspen institutes annual report lists many supporters including 150 corporations far could discern website make clear whether extent corporations special interests provide support specific seminars include judges community rights counsels kendall judicial conferences new disclosure policy doesnt go far enough kendall supports pending bill introduced senator leahy would end george mason programs kendall slyly left impression legislation would likewise bar federal judges taking part gratis aspen institute seminars fact leahy bill appears drafted rather gerrymandered punish george mason spare aspen institute bizarre exception prohibition would impose bill would permit judges take part private judicial seminar judge panel participant aspen institutes seminars roundtable sessions federal judges primary audience private judicial seminar words less likely judges actually learning something theyre mixing potential litigants avail leahy bills exception would interesting discover role kendall drafting leahys bill dont expect revelations purported champion transparency disclosure community rights counsel doesnt even disclose support soros website soros erstwhile champion campaignfinance reform tried use fortune decide 2004 presidential election kendall community rights counsel purports oppose judicial education controlled federal bureaucrats bar activists fact appl ying ideological litmus test favors aspen institute penalizes george mason announcing new disclosure policy judicial conference emphasized compelling need continuing education judges law science history economics sociology philosophy disciplines compelling need judicial conference recognized fully satisfied federal judicial center programs like george masons therefore perform important public service comment evidently directed leahy bill judicial conference embraced position anyone seeks limit judges access knowledge disserves compelling need short reason believe restrictions judicial seminars would serve public interest one real test soundness proposal whether treats george mason programs least favorably aspen institutes edward whelan president ethics public policy center regular contributor nros bench memos blog | 819 |
<p>With massive amounts of money pouring into candidates’ coffers, one thing is clear:</p>
<p>The 2018 Nevada governor’s race will be expensive.</p>
<p>Both Attorney General Adam Laxalt and state Treasurer Dan Schwartz are seeing an influx of campaign donations from other states. California-based Facebook has given the maximum $10,000 to Laxalt, who has benefited from a number of outside-Nevada donations.</p>
<p>Laxalt raised $2.61 million last year, highest among gubernatorial candidates. His campaign reported that it has about $3 million in cash on hand.</p>
<p>The deadline to submit campaign reports was 11:59 p.m. Tuesday.</p>
<p>Seven members of the Fertitta family donated the maximum $10,000 to Laxalt’s campaign, which also received $10,000 each from Miriam and Sheldon Adelson.</p>
<p>Clark County Commission Chairman Steve Sisolak, a Democratic candidate for governor, has more money overall — about $5.75 million — but $2.58 million of that came in the last year.</p>
<p>That includes more than $250,000 from the gaming industry, including donations from MGM Resorts International properties, <a href="http://www.hotels.vegas/Las-Vegas-Hotels/THE-COSMOPOLITAN-OF-LAS-VEGAS,-AUTOGRAPH-COLLECTION,-A-Marriott-Luxury-&amp;-Lifestyle-Hotel" type="external">The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas</a>, <a href="http://www.hotels.vegas/" type="external">Boyd Gaming</a> Corp. and <a href="http://www.hotels.vegas/" type="external">Station Casinos</a>. Sisolak also saw a windfall from Nevada’s budding marijuana industry, with more than $250,000 of donations coming from cannabis businesses and executives.</p>
<p>County Commissioner Chris Giunchigliani, also a Democratic candidate for governor, reported a haul of $832,000 in 2017, with most of the money coming after she announced her campaign in mid-October.</p>
<p>Two sitting Clark County School Board trustees have donated to Giunchigliani’s bid for governor, despite the local teachers union’s <a href="" type="internal">endorsement of Sisolak</a>.</p>
<p>Lola Brooks donated $300 to Giunchigliani’s campaign and Carolyn Edwards gave $500. Giunchigliani is the former head of both the local teachers union, the Clark County Education Association, and the state teachers union, the Nevada State Education Association.</p>
<p>Schwartz raised $431,000 — the bulk of that coming from his $355,000 loan to the campaign — but received big donations from individuals in Illinois, New York and Ohio.</p>
<p>The majority of Republican candidate Jared Fisher’s donations are coming from Nevada, with a sprinkling of donations from Colorado. Fisher has raised $586,000, including his own loan of more than $500,000 to the campaign.</p>
<p>Attorney general</p>
<p>Republican Wes Duncan, Laxalt’s former first assistant attorney general and an assemblyman before that, hauled in $516,000 in donations. Of that, $160,000 came from maximum donations of $10,000 from various Nevada resort groups, businesses and business owners.</p>
<p>Craig Mueller, a Republican and Las Vegas attorney, raised $102,000, with $100,000 of it coming from a personal loan to the campaign.</p>
<p>On the Democratic side, state Senate Majority Leader Aaron Ford reported $400,000 in campaign donations, with notable donors including <a href="http://www.hotels.vegas/Las-Vegas-Hotels/Caesars-Palace-Las-Vegas" type="external">Caesars</a> Entertainment, <a href="http://www.hotels.vegas/" type="external">MGM Resorts</a> and <a href="http://www.hotels.vegas/" type="external">Boyd Gaming,</a> along with Ford’s employer, the Eglet Prince law firm.</p>
<p>Lieutenant governor</p>
<p>Senate Minority Leader Michael Roberson, R-Henderson, reported raising $200,000 last year, while Democrat and former two-term state Treasurer Kate Marshall brought in $172,000.</p>
<p>Secretary of state</p>
<p>Assemblyman Nelson Araujo, D-Las Vegas, raised approximately $120,000 in his push to unseat Republican Barbara Cegavske, who raised $105,000 for her re-election campaign.</p>
<p>Treasurer</p>
<p>Republican Bob Beers, a former Las Vegas city councilman and state lawmaker, raised more than $456,000 last year, but more than 90 percent of that was raised for his unsucessful council re-election bid. From the day after the June 13 municipal election to the end of 2017, Beers raised about $34,000.</p>
<p>His Republican challenger, Derek Uehara, who previously ran for Henderson City Council in 2015, reported $53,000 in donations, with $26,000 coming as loans from himself.</p>
<p>Democrat Andrew Martin is also investing his own money in his campaign. Of the $25,696 Martin raised last year, $25,146 was a loan from himself.</p>
<p>Controller</p>
<p>Incumbent Republican Ron Knecht raised $44,400 last year, $26,000 of which was a personal loan. Democratic challenger Catherine Byrne reported raising $2,925.</p>
<p>Clark County Commission</p>
<p>For the most part, Democratic candidates for Clark County Commission continued a tradition of outraising and outspending Republicans.</p>
<p>District G incumbent Jim Gibson raised the most, more than $475,000. The former Henderson mayor, who was appointed to the seat last year after Mary Beth Scow resigned, is far ahead of former county Republican Party Chairwoman Cindy Lake, who raised $2,050.</p>
<p>But Republican Tisha Black kept her promise of raising big bucks for the District F seat. She netted more than $250,000, outraising Democrat opponent Justin Jones. The former state senator raised about $160,000. Perennial Republican candidate Mitchell Tracy got $3,000.</p>
<p>The Review-Journal is owned by the Adelson family.</p>
<p>Contact Meghin Delaney at 702-383-0281 or <a href="" type="internal">[email protected].</a> Follow <a href="https://twitter.com/MeghinDelaney" type="external">@MeghinDelaney</a> on Twitter. Staff writers Colton Lochhead and Michael Scott Davidson contributed to this report.</p>
<p>Money Mattters</p>
<p>Biggest loans from candidates to their own campaigns in 2017</p>
<p>Jared Fisher – $568,231</p>
<p>Dan Schwartz – $335,000</p>
<p>Craig Mueller – $100,000</p>
<p>Most maxed-out donations (totaling $10,000) received in 2017:</p>
<p>Steve Sisolak: 139</p>
<p>Adam Laxalt: 122</p>
<p>Joe Lombardo: 29</p>
<p>Most money raised in 2017 without an announced opponent:</p>
<p>Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo: $705,465</p>
<p /> | false | 1 | massive amounts money pouring candidates coffers one thing clear 2018 nevada governors race expensive attorney general adam laxalt state treasurer dan schwartz seeing influx campaign donations states californiabased facebook given maximum 10000 laxalt benefited number outsidenevada donations laxalt raised 261 million last year highest among gubernatorial candidates campaign reported 3 million cash hand deadline submit campaign reports 1159 pm tuesday seven members fertitta family donated maximum 10000 laxalts campaign also received 10000 miriam sheldon adelson clark county commission chairman steve sisolak democratic candidate governor money overall 575 million 258 million came last year includes 250000 gaming industry including donations mgm resorts international properties cosmopolitan las vegas boyd gaming corp station casinos sisolak also saw windfall nevadas budding marijuana industry 250000 donations coming cannabis businesses executives county commissioner chris giunchigliani also democratic candidate governor reported haul 832000 2017 money coming announced campaign midoctober two sitting clark county school board trustees donated giunchiglianis bid governor despite local teachers unions endorsement sisolak lola brooks donated 300 giunchiglianis campaign carolyn edwards gave 500 giunchigliani former head local teachers union clark county education association state teachers union nevada state education association schwartz raised 431000 bulk coming 355000 loan campaign received big donations individuals illinois new york ohio majority republican candidate jared fishers donations coming nevada sprinkling donations colorado fisher raised 586000 including loan 500000 campaign attorney general republican wes duncan laxalts former first assistant attorney general assemblyman hauled 516000 donations 160000 came maximum donations 10000 various nevada resort groups businesses business owners craig mueller republican las vegas attorney raised 102000 100000 coming personal loan campaign democratic side state senate majority leader aaron ford reported 400000 campaign donations notable donors including caesars entertainment mgm resorts boyd gaming along fords employer eglet prince law firm lieutenant governor senate minority leader michael roberson rhenderson reported raising 200000 last year democrat former twoterm state treasurer kate marshall brought 172000 secretary state assemblyman nelson araujo dlas vegas raised approximately 120000 push unseat republican barbara cegavske raised 105000 reelection campaign treasurer republican bob beers former las vegas city councilman state lawmaker raised 456000 last year 90 percent raised unsucessful council reelection bid day june 13 municipal election end 2017 beers raised 34000 republican challenger derek uehara previously ran henderson city council 2015 reported 53000 donations 26000 coming loans democrat andrew martin also investing money campaign 25696 martin raised last year 25146 loan controller incumbent republican ron knecht raised 44400 last year 26000 personal loan democratic challenger catherine byrne reported raising 2925 clark county commission part democratic candidates clark county commission continued tradition outraising outspending republicans district g incumbent jim gibson raised 475000 former henderson mayor appointed seat last year mary beth scow resigned far ahead former county republican party chairwoman cindy lake raised 2050 republican tisha black kept promise raising big bucks district f seat netted 250000 outraising democrat opponent justin jones former state senator raised 160000 perennial republican candidate mitchell tracy got 3000 reviewjournal owned adelson family contact meghin delaney 7023830281 mdelaneyreviewjournalcom follow meghindelaney twitter staff writers colton lochhead michael scott davidson contributed report money mattters biggest loans candidates campaigns 2017 jared fisher 568231 dan schwartz 335000 craig mueller 100000 maxedout donations totaling 10000 received 2017 steve sisolak 139 adam laxalt 122 joe lombardo 29 money raised 2017 without announced opponent clark county sheriff joe lombardo 705465 | 547 |
<p>Thirteen malnourished siblings <a href="http://wjla.com/news/nation-world/parents-arrested-after-police-find-13-people-including-children-shackled-with-chains" type="external">allegedly kept captive</a> in filthy conditions by their parents in a Perris, California home lived a strict existence with no social lives and no contact with extended family, two of their aunts said Wednesday.</p>
<p>"They weren't allowed to watch TV. They weren't allowed to have friends over — the normal things that kids do," the children's aunt, Teresa Robinette, told NBC's "Today" show.</p>
<p>Robinette is the sister of Louise Turpin, 49, who along with her husband, 57-year-old David Allen Turpin, were jailed on $9 million bail each. Charges that may include <a href="http://wjla.com/news/nation-world/mom-of-malnourished-children-was-perplexed-by-police-visit-01-16-2018" type="external">torture and child endangerment</a> could come Wednesday and a court appearance is scheduled for Thursday, authorities said.</p>
<p>Deputies said <a href="http://wjla.com/news/nation-world/kids-chained-in-calif-house-of-horrors-parents-arrested" type="external">some siblings were shackled to furniture</a> in the foul-smelling home in suburban Riverside County. They were so malnourished that the older ones still looked like children.</p>
<p>Robinette said she voiced concerns to her sister about the children's health.</p>
<p>"I always made comments to Louise when I did talk to her, about, gosh, they are so skinny," Robinette said. "She would laugh it off and say David's so tall and lanky, they are going to be like him."</p>
<p>The arrests Sunday came after a 17-year-old daughter who looked closer to 10 jumped out a window and called 911. Her parents had made the home a private school, a prison, and a veritable torture chamber for the siblings aged 2 to 29, authorities said during a press conference Tuesday.</p>
<p>Until the girl fled with photographic evidence, it appears no one, neither neighbors nor public officials, knew anything about what was happening inside.</p>
<p>Few details have been released about how the parents kept them captive despite what appeared to be opportunities for them to leave.</p>
<p>Another aunt, Elizabeth Jane Flores, told ABC News' "Good Morning America" that she tried for years to get in touch with her sister, Louise Turpin, but Turpin shut her out.</p>
<p>"I want to reach out to the kids, I want them to know that for years we begged to Skype, we begged to see them, the whole family," she said.</p>
<p>Flores tearfully said she and Turpin didn't have a relationship for two decades beyond the odd phone call. She said she was shocked by her sister's arrest.</p>
<p>In one of many surreal details that emerged as the investigation grew, it appears that an Elvis impersonator who performs weddings in Las Vegas is one of the few people who had direct dealings with the family, and he saw a different side.</p>
<p>"It's very disturbing because I felt like I did know them," said Kent Ripley, the Elvis impersonator who led the parents through at least three vow renewal ceremonies in recent years, most recently on Halloween, 2015.</p>
<p>He looked back at YouTube videos of the ceremonies after hearing the news, including two that show all the children dancing and smiling, with matching outfits and similar haircuts.</p>
<p>"Watching them now it's kind of haunting and disturbing," Ripley told The Associated Press in an interview Tuesday. "They all looked young and thin but I figured it was just their lifestyle. Maybe the activities they did, maybe because of their religious beliefs. I didn't get that in depth with them but I knew they were a fun family."</p>
<p>Numerous photos on the couple's Facebook page show the children dancing at the Elvis Chapel, visiting an amusement park that appears to be Disneyland and going on other outings, always looking thin but often smiling.</p>
<p>It was a normal public face the family put on that included the ordinary outward appearance of their house, one of many brown-and-beige homes that lined a residential street. Four vehicles were parked in their driveway Tuesday, with a horde of international media surrounding the house.</p>
<p>Neighbors, just a few steps away in either direction, said the family kept to themselves and never so much as waved. No calls about trouble ever came to police or child welfare officials.</p>
<p>But inside it was a stinking mess, the conditions "horrific," Riverside County Sheriff's Capt. Greg Fellows said Tuesday.</p>
<p>"If you can imagine being 17 years old and appearing to be a 10-year-old, being chained to a bed, being malnourished and injuries associated with that, I would call that torture," Fellows said.</p>
<p>He said there was no indication any of the children were sexually abused, although that was still being investigated.</p>
<p>The couple, married 32 years, sometimes dressed their children alike in pink dresses or Dr. Seuss T-shirts, kept them away from outsiders and cut the boys' hair in a Prince Valiant-style resembling that of their graying father. Photos show nearly all the girls with shoulder-length brown hair parted in the middle.</p>
<p>The Turpins moved to Southern California from the Dallas area in 2011, and bought the home in 2014 in the rapidly growing city of Perris 70 miles (113 kilometers) southeast of Los Angeles with their 12 children. They lived there quietly for at least three years and had another baby.</p>
<p>Turpin worked as an engineer at the Northrop Grumman aerospace company and earned $140,000 annually and his wife was a homemaker, records showed.</p>
<p>Their house doubles as the Sandcastle Day School, where David Turpin is listed as principal and its enrollment of six includes only the couple's younger children, Fellows said.</p>
<p>No state agency regulates or oversees private schools in California, and they are not licensed by the state Education Department.</p>
<p>Mark Uffer, CEO at Corona Regional Medical Center, said seven of the couple's children were there Tuesday.</p>
<p>The children are "very friendly," he said. "They're very cooperative, and I believe that they're hopeful that life will get better for them after this event."</p>
<p>Dr. Donald Kirby, director of the Center for Human Nutrition at Ohio's Cleveland Clinic, said the siblings' pale complexions could reflect a lack of sunshine and iron deficiencies caused by insufficient vitamins.</p>
<p>He said their small stature and childlike appearance also indicates they were probably undernourished for many years.</p>
<p>"What that means is this has been a very long process and that during the real growth spurt years that the needed nutrients weren't given," Kirby said. "At some point the body locks in and you're not able to grow anymore. This didn't happen last week, last month or even last year. This has been going on probably a very long time."</p>
<p>Kirby said the siblings' physical and emotional recovery period will likely be long and arduous.</p>
<p>"Lots of things are going to need to be done for these poor people," he said.</p>
<p><a href="http://wjla.com/news/nation-world/aunt-13-captive-children-denied-contact-with-relatives" type="external">The Associated Press</a> contributed to this report.</p> | false | 1 | thirteen malnourished siblings allegedly kept captive filthy conditions parents perris california home lived strict existence social lives contact extended family two aunts said wednesday werent allowed watch tv werent allowed friends normal things kids childrens aunt teresa robinette told nbcs today show robinette sister louise turpin 49 along husband 57yearold david allen turpin jailed 9 million bail charges may include torture child endangerment could come wednesday court appearance scheduled thursday authorities said deputies said siblings shackled furniture foulsmelling home suburban riverside county malnourished older ones still looked like children robinette said voiced concerns sister childrens health always made comments louise talk gosh skinny robinette said would laugh say davids tall lanky going like arrests sunday came 17yearold daughter looked closer 10 jumped window called 911 parents made home private school prison veritable torture chamber siblings aged 2 29 authorities said press conference tuesday girl fled photographic evidence appears one neither neighbors public officials knew anything happening inside details released parents kept captive despite appeared opportunities leave another aunt elizabeth jane flores told abc news good morning america tried years get touch sister louise turpin turpin shut want reach kids want know years begged skype begged see whole family said flores tearfully said turpin didnt relationship two decades beyond odd phone call said shocked sisters arrest one many surreal details emerged investigation grew appears elvis impersonator performs weddings las vegas one people direct dealings family saw different side disturbing felt like know said kent ripley elvis impersonator led parents least three vow renewal ceremonies recent years recently halloween 2015 looked back youtube videos ceremonies hearing news including two show children dancing smiling matching outfits similar haircuts watching kind haunting disturbing ripley told associated press interview tuesday looked young thin figured lifestyle maybe activities maybe religious beliefs didnt get depth knew fun family numerous photos couples facebook page show children dancing elvis chapel visiting amusement park appears disneyland going outings always looking thin often smiling normal public face family put included ordinary outward appearance house one many brownandbeige homes lined residential street four vehicles parked driveway tuesday horde international media surrounding house neighbors steps away either direction said family kept never much waved calls trouble ever came police child welfare officials inside stinking mess conditions horrific riverside county sheriffs capt greg fellows said tuesday imagine 17 years old appearing 10yearold chained bed malnourished injuries associated would call torture fellows said said indication children sexually abused although still investigated couple married 32 years sometimes dressed children alike pink dresses dr seuss tshirts kept away outsiders cut boys hair prince valiantstyle resembling graying father photos show nearly girls shoulderlength brown hair parted middle turpins moved southern california dallas area 2011 bought home 2014 rapidly growing city perris 70 miles 113 kilometers southeast los angeles 12 children lived quietly least three years another baby turpin worked engineer northrop grumman aerospace company earned 140000 annually wife homemaker records showed house doubles sandcastle day school david turpin listed principal enrollment six includes couples younger children fellows said state agency regulates oversees private schools california licensed state education department mark uffer ceo corona regional medical center said seven couples children tuesday children friendly said theyre cooperative believe theyre hopeful life get better event dr donald kirby director center human nutrition ohios cleveland clinic said siblings pale complexions could reflect lack sunshine iron deficiencies caused insufficient vitamins said small stature childlike appearance also indicates probably undernourished many years means long process real growth spurt years needed nutrients werent given kirby said point body locks youre able grow anymore didnt happen last week last month even last year going probably long time kirby said siblings physical emotional recovery period likely long arduous lots things going need done poor people said associated press contributed report | 624 |
<p>Fifty years ago this month, my wife and I were living in the cramped servants’ quarters of a grand 19th-century villa above the city of Florence. Early in the morning of Nov. 4, I left there for the Kunsthistorisches Institut, the great German research library for Italian Renaissance art where I was a graduate fellow. Rain was cascading from a slate-gray sky, just as it had done for days before. As I nosed my Volkswagen Beetle toward the center of the city, I saw a torrent of water in the street. “Big water-main break,” I thought, and turned toward a bridge farther upstream.</p>
<p>As the Beetle crossed the Piazzale Michelangelo, I glanced toward the city below, horrified to see its historic center swamped by water from the swollen river Arno. Alarmingly the water had reached the second stories of many of its ancient buildings. There would be no crossing the Arno that day. Clearly this was a monster flood of the river that one of the souls in Dante’s Purgatorio calls that “damned and accursed ditch.”</p>
<p>Early on Nov. 6 I could finally enter the city. I made my way in via the Ponte Vecchio, the oldest and most famous of Florence’s bridges, and the only one to escape destruction by the Nazis during World War II. Hitler had a sentimental attachment to it, and so ordered it left intact.</p>
<p>But what Hitler had saved, nature had now shattered. The jewelry shops on the bridge were gutted, some of them pierced by large trees that had been uprooted upstream and hurtled through the structures like giant javelins. From the Ponte Vecchio, one could see that some of the roads on the far bank had collapsed, tumbling parked automobiles into the Arno or leaving them dangling from its embankments.</p>
<p>Once I was on the other side of the bridge, things looked even worse. By this time the flood had mostly receded, leaving the streets filled with sticky, brown Arno muck. Hundreds of thousands of tons of water had poured into the city and, mixed with the heating oil from the basements of countless apartment buildings, it had stained the walls of churches and palazzos, in some places up to 20 feet high. And it left an unforgettable, acrid stench in its wake.</p>
<p>Arriving at the Piazza del Duomo, the site of Florence’s medieval cathedral, I saw a scene of devastation. The whole area looked more like the site of some great explosion, or the aftermath of a battle, than a flood. Cars were tossed aside and overturned like so many matchsticks. Vehicles had hit the nearby Baptistery, ricocheted off, and were now sprawled on the steps of the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore. The water had burst open Lorenzo Ghiberti’s famous bronze Baptistery doors, dubbed the “Gates of Paradise” by Michelangelo. Some of their beautiful gilded bronze panels, masterpieces of early Renaissance sculpture, had been knocked out of their frames. Others were still intact but covered in mud.</p>
<p>From the cathedral, I headed for the church of Santa Croce. I was worried about the fate of the frescoes there by the little-known 14th-century painter Agnolo Gaddi, the subject of the dissertation I was researching in Florence. Gaddi’s paintings were unharmed, but in time other frescoes in the church, and throughout the city, were peeled from their walls to protect them from water damage.</p>
<p>Though the Gaddis had been spared, the racing Arno had blown off the doors of the church’s museum, an old refectory housing some of its greatest art. Its contents, most famously the magnificent wooden “Crucifix” (c. 1265) by Cimabue were now submerged. As the wood swelled with water, the artwork’s thin tempera paint crumbled, leaving large empty areas in what was one of the city’s most important paintings: a medieval work whose moving depiction of human pain and suffering foreshadows the realism of the Renaissance and, its creator, Giotto.</p>
<p>Making my way back home, I walked by the Uffizi Gallery. Its treasures on the upper floors were spared, but the Archivio di Stato, the State Archive, on its ground floor, was not so fortunate. Thousands of unique notary, tax and other civic and religious documents dating back to the Middle Ages were housed in the flooded quarters of the archive’s rooms. These, along with other rare manuscripts relating to the city’s economic, social and demographic history, were of great importance, for Florence was not only the cradle of Renaissance art, but of much of the subsequent development of European merchant banking and trade. I knew the archive well, having spent many a frustrating day there puzzling out ledgers in Latin and Italian listing Gaddi’s residences and taxes, among other records of his life.</p>
<p>In the next weeks, I met many conservators and scholars from all over the world who, along with the Florentine and other Italian professionals, had flocked to the city, bringing their technical know-how to rescue the city’s art. Many other volunteers came simply because they loved the storied city. It was an international rescue mission that affirmed the universal importance of art for all humanity, something worth recalling in these days of its wanton destruction by the enemies of civilization.</p>
<p>Eventually, the city was cleaned up, stores and cafes opened, a trickle of tourists appeared, city services resumed. Over a number of years, many of the damaged masterpieces were skillfully restored. Panels from the Gates of Paradise are now displayed in the cathedral’s museum along with other works that were damaged by the flood, most notably Donatello’s harrowing wooden statue of the emaciated Mary Magdalene (c. 1455), whose original bright gold surface was revealed during its restoration. To preserve Cimabue’s “Crucifix” as the symbol of the flood’s devastation it had become, experts stabilized the entire artwork, conserved and repaired as much of the painted surface as possible, but left the rest in its scarred state.</p>
<p>Several months later, I returned to the Institut to continue my research. Compared with many other inhabitants of Florence, I had lost comparatively little—nothing but time. Yet, for me, and the others who witnessed nature’s force cause suffering, death and the destruction of many of the city’s treasures, the flood was a parenthesis in one’s life, a break between the past and the future, a momentous, unforgettable physical and psychological shock.</p>
<p>I have been back to Florence many times since, but as the train up from Rome speeds toward the city and the great dome of the cathedral comes into view, it’s those dark days of a November half a century ago that first flood my memory.</p>
<p>Mr. Cole, a former chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities, is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p> | false | 1 | fifty years ago month wife living cramped servants quarters grand 19thcentury villa city florence early morning nov 4 left kunsthistorisches institut great german research library italian renaissance art graduate fellow rain cascading slategray sky done days nosed volkswagen beetle toward center city saw torrent water street big watermain break thought turned toward bridge farther upstream beetle crossed piazzale michelangelo glanced toward city horrified see historic center swamped water swollen river arno alarmingly water reached second stories many ancient buildings would crossing arno day clearly monster flood river one souls dantes purgatorio calls damned accursed ditch early nov 6 could finally enter city made way via ponte vecchio oldest famous florences bridges one escape destruction nazis world war ii hitler sentimental attachment ordered left intact hitler saved nature shattered jewelry shops bridge gutted pierced large trees uprooted upstream hurtled structures like giant javelins ponte vecchio one could see roads far bank collapsed tumbling parked automobiles arno leaving dangling embankments side bridge things looked even worse time flood mostly receded leaving streets filled sticky brown arno muck hundreds thousands tons water poured city mixed heating oil basements countless apartment buildings stained walls churches palazzos places 20 feet high left unforgettable acrid stench wake arriving piazza del duomo site florences medieval cathedral saw scene devastation whole area looked like site great explosion aftermath battle flood cars tossed aside overturned like many matchsticks vehicles hit nearby baptistery ricocheted sprawled steps cathedral santa maria del fiore water burst open lorenzo ghibertis famous bronze baptistery doors dubbed gates paradise michelangelo beautiful gilded bronze panels masterpieces early renaissance sculpture knocked frames others still intact covered mud cathedral headed church santa croce worried fate frescoes littleknown 14thcentury painter agnolo gaddi subject dissertation researching florence gaddis paintings unharmed time frescoes church throughout city peeled walls protect water damage though gaddis spared racing arno blown doors churchs museum old refectory housing greatest art contents famously magnificent wooden crucifix c 1265 cimabue submerged wood swelled water artworks thin tempera paint crumbled leaving large empty areas one citys important paintings medieval work whose moving depiction human pain suffering foreshadows realism renaissance creator giotto making way back home walked uffizi gallery treasures upper floors spared archivio di stato state archive ground floor fortunate thousands unique notary tax civic religious documents dating back middle ages housed flooded quarters archives rooms along rare manuscripts relating citys economic social demographic history great importance florence cradle renaissance art much subsequent development european merchant banking trade knew archive well spent many frustrating day puzzling ledgers latin italian listing gaddis residences taxes among records life next weeks met many conservators scholars world along florentine italian professionals flocked city bringing technical knowhow rescue citys art many volunteers came simply loved storied city international rescue mission affirmed universal importance art humanity something worth recalling days wanton destruction enemies civilization eventually city cleaned stores cafes opened trickle tourists appeared city services resumed number years many damaged masterpieces skillfully restored panels gates paradise displayed cathedrals museum along works damaged flood notably donatellos harrowing wooden statue emaciated mary magdalene c 1455 whose original bright gold surface revealed restoration preserve cimabues crucifix symbol floods devastation become experts stabilized entire artwork conserved repaired much painted surface possible left rest scarred state several months later returned institut continue research compared many inhabitants florence lost comparatively littlenothing time yet others witnessed natures force cause suffering death destruction many citys treasures flood parenthesis ones life break past future momentous unforgettable physical psychological shock back florence many times since train rome speeds toward city great dome cathedral comes view dark days november half century ago first flood memory mr cole former chairman national endowment humanities senior fellow ethics public policy center | 611 |
<p />
<p>Years ago when I described the George W. Bush regime as a police state, right-wing eyebrows were raised.&#160; When I described the Obama regime as an even worse police state, liberals rolled their eyes.&#160; Alas!&#160; Now I am no longer controversial.&#160; Everybody says it.&#160;</p>
<p>&lt;img class="size-full wp-image-14896 alignleft" style="margin: 5px;" src="https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Paul-Craig-Roberts.jpg" alt="Paul Craig Roberts" width="256" height="180" srcset="https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Paul-Craig-Roberts.jpg 256w, https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Paul-Craig-Roberts-150x105.jpg 150w" sizes="(max-width: 256px) 100vw, 256px" /&gt;</p>
<p>According to the UK newspaper, The Guardian, the Chancellor of Germany, Angela Merkel, had an angry exchange with Obama in which Merkel <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/17/merkel-compares-nsa-stasi-obama" type="external">compared</a> Obama’s National Security Agency (NSA) with the East German Communist Stasi, which spied on everyone through networks of informers.</p>
<p>Merkel grew up in Communist East Germany where she was spied upon by the Stasi, and now that she has risen to the highest political office in Europe’s most powerful state, she is spied upon by “freedom and democracy” America.</p>
<p>A former top NSA official, William Binney, <a href="http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/12/former-top-nsa-official-now-police-state.html" type="external">declared</a> that “We (the US) are now in a police state.”&#160; The mass spying conducted by the Obama regime, Binney says “is a totalitarian process.”</p>
<p>Perhaps my best vindication, after all the hate mail from “super patriots,” who wear their ignorance on their sleeves, and Obama-worshipping liberals, whose gullibility is sickening, came from federal judge Richard Leon, who declared the Obama-sanctioned NSA&#160; spying to be “almost Orwellian.”&#160; As the American Civil Liberties Union realized, federal judge Leon’s decision vindicated Edward Snowden by ruling that the NSA spying is likely outside what the Constitution permits, “labeling it ‘Orwellian’—adding that James Madison would be ‘aghast.’”</p>
<p>If only more Americans were aghast.&#160; I sometimes wonder whether Americans like being spied upon, because it makes them feel important. “Look at me!&#160; I’m so important that the government spends enough money to wipe out US poverty spying on me and my Facebook, et. al., friends. I bet they are spending one billion dollars just to know who I connected with today.&#160; I hope it didn’t get lost in all the spam.”</p>
<p>Being spied upon is the latest craze of people devoid of any future but desperate for attention.</p>
<p>Jason Ditz at the FBI-spied-upon <a href="http://Antiwar.com" type="external">Antiwar.com</a> says that Judge Leon’s ruling is a setback for Obama, who was going to restore justice and liberty but instead created the American Stasi Spy State.&#160; Congress, of course, loves the spy state, because all the capitalist firms that make mega-millions or mega-billions from it generously finance congressional and senatorial campaigns for those who support the Stasi state.</p>
<p>The romance that libertarians and “free market economists” have with capitalism, which buys compliance with its greed and cooperates with the Stasi state, is foolish.</p>
<p>Let’s move on.&#160; It was only a few weeks ago that Obama and his Secretary of State John Kerry were on the verge of attacking Syria on the basis of faked evidence that&#160;Syria had crossed the “red line” and used weapons of mass destruction against the American organized, armed, and financed “rebels,” almost all of whom come from outside Syria.</p>
<p>Only the bought-and-paid-for-by-Washington French president made a show of believing a word or Washington’s lies against the Assad goverUnment in Syria.&#160; The British Parliament, long a puppet of Washington, gave Obama the bird and voted down participating in another American war crime.&#160; That left UK prime minister, David Cameron, hanging.&#160; Where do the British get prime ministers like Cameron and Blair?</p>
<p>Washington’s plan for Syria, having lost the cover of its British puppet, received a fatal blow from Russian President Putin, who arranged for Syria’s chemical weapons to be delivered to foreign hands for destruction, thus putting an end to the controversy.</p>
<p>In the meantime, it became apparent that&#160; the “Syrian rebellion” organized by Washington has been taken over by al-Qaeda, an organization allegedly responsible for 9/11. Even Washington was able to figure out that it didn’t make sense to put al-Qaeda in charge of Syria.&#160; Now the headlines are: “West tells Syria rebels: Assad must stay.”</p>
<p>Meanwhile, Washington’s arrogance has managed to make an enemy of India. The TSA, a component of Homeland Security, <a href="http://news.nationalpost.com/2013/12/18/devyani-khobragade-reveals-how-she-broke-down-after-stripping-and-cavity-searches-as-row-between-u-s-and-india-deepens/" type="external">subjected</a> a female diplomat from India to multiple strip searches, cavity searches and ignored her protestations of consular immunity.</p>
<p>There was no justification whatever for this abuse of an Indian diplomat. To indicate its displeasure, the Indian government has removed barriers that prevent truck bombs from being driven into the US embassy.</p>
<p>Washington has managed to recreate the arms race.&#160; More profits for the military/security complex, and less security for the world. Provoked by Washington’s military aggressiveness, Russia has announces a $700 billion upgrade of its nuclear ballistic missiles. China’s leaders have also made it clear that China is not intimidated by Washington’s intrusion into China’s sphere of influence. China is developing weapon systems that make obsolete Washington’s large investment in surface fleets.</p>
<p>Recently, Pat Buchanan, Mr. Conservative himself, <a href="http://www.unz.com/pbuchanan/is-putin-one-of-us/b" type="external">made a case</a> that Russia’s Putin better represents traditional American values than does the President of the United States.</p>
<p>Buchanan has a point. It is Washington, not Moscow or Beijing, that threatens to bomb countries into the stone age, that forces down airplanes of heads of state and subjects them to searches, and that refuses to honor grants of political asylum.</p>
<p>Certainly, Washington’s claim to be “exceptional” and “indispensable” and, therefore, above law and morality contrasts unfavorably with Putin’s statement that “we do not infringe on anyone’s interests or try to teach anyone how to live.”</p>
<p>Washington’s arrogance has brought America disrepute.&#160; What damage will Washington next inflict on us?</p>
<p>This article was originally published at <a href="http://www.paulcraigroberts.org" type="external">PaulCraigRoberts.org</a> and has been used here with permission.</p> | false | 1 | years ago described george w bush regime police state rightwing eyebrows raised160 described obama regime even worse police state liberals rolled eyes160 alas160 longer controversial160 everybody says it160 ltimg classsizefull wpimage14896 alignleft stylemargin 5px srchttpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201204paulcraigrobertsjpg altpaul craig roberts width256 height180 srcsethttpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201204paulcraigrobertsjpg 256w httpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201204paulcraigroberts150x105jpg 150w sizesmaxwidth 256px 100vw 256px gt according uk newspaper guardian chancellor germany angela merkel angry exchange obama merkel compared obamas national security agency nsa east german communist stasi spied everyone networks informers merkel grew communist east germany spied upon stasi risen highest political office europes powerful state spied upon freedom democracy america former top nsa official william binney declared us police state160 mass spying conducted obama regime binney says totalitarian process perhaps best vindication hate mail super patriots wear ignorance sleeves obamaworshipping liberals whose gullibility sickening came federal judge richard leon declared obamasanctioned nsa160 spying almost orwellian160 american civil liberties union realized federal judge leons decision vindicated edward snowden ruling nsa spying likely outside constitution permits labeling orwellianadding james madison would aghast americans aghast160 sometimes wonder whether americans like spied upon makes feel important look me160 im important government spends enough money wipe us poverty spying facebook et al friends bet spending one billion dollars know connected today160 hope didnt get lost spam spied upon latest craze people devoid future desperate attention jason ditz fbispiedupon antiwarcom says judge leons ruling setback obama going restore justice liberty instead created american stasi spy state160 congress course loves spy state capitalist firms make megamillions megabillions generously finance congressional senatorial campaigns support stasi state romance libertarians free market economists capitalism buys compliance greed cooperates stasi state foolish lets move on160 weeks ago obama secretary state john kerry verge attacking syria basis faked evidence that160syria crossed red line used weapons mass destruction american organized armed financed rebels almost come outside syria boughtandpaidforbywashington french president made show believing word washingtons lies assad goverunment syria160 british parliament long puppet washington gave obama bird voted participating another american war crime160 left uk prime minister david cameron hanging160 british get prime ministers like cameron blair washingtons plan syria lost cover british puppet received fatal blow russian president putin arranged syrias chemical weapons delivered foreign hands destruction thus putting end controversy meantime became apparent that160 syrian rebellion organized washington taken alqaeda organization allegedly responsible 911 even washington able figure didnt make sense put alqaeda charge syria160 headlines west tells syria rebels assad must stay meanwhile washingtons arrogance managed make enemy india tsa component homeland security subjected female diplomat india multiple strip searches cavity searches ignored protestations consular immunity justification whatever abuse indian diplomat indicate displeasure indian government removed barriers prevent truck bombs driven us embassy washington managed recreate arms race160 profits militarysecurity complex less security world provoked washingtons military aggressiveness russia announces 700 billion upgrade nuclear ballistic missiles chinas leaders also made clear china intimidated washingtons intrusion chinas sphere influence china developing weapon systems make obsolete washingtons large investment surface fleets recently pat buchanan mr conservative made case russias putin better represents traditional american values president united states buchanan point washington moscow beijing threatens bomb countries stone age forces airplanes heads state subjects searches refuses honor grants political asylum certainly washingtons claim exceptional indispensable therefore law morality contrasts unfavorably putins statement infringe anyones interests try teach anyone live washingtons arrogance brought america disrepute160 damage washington next inflict us article originally published paulcraigrobertsorg used permission | 557 |
<p>Today marks the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from Iraqi urban areas, the result of a deadline contained in the Status of Forces Agreement (SoFA) that the Bush administration negotiated and the Obama administration embraced. It is a milestone on the road to Iraqi sovereignty and a useful moment, I think, to consider three widespread — and to some extent inter-related — arguments that were made about Iraq in recent years.</p>
<p>The first is that the difficulties in Iraq proved that the underlying theory behind President Bush's “Freedom Agenda” was wrong. It was said that the effort to promote liberty in the Arab world was a fool's errand; the cultural soil was too hard and forbidding. There is no existing undemocratic culture that will allow liberty to succeed. Some peoples and cultures are destined for despotism and unsuited for self-government. Tribal and sectarian allegiances are much stronger than national identity, especially in an artificial state like Iraq. Elections merely deepened sectarian ties and brought radicals to power. They are worse than useless. The 2005 “Arab Spring” was a mirage. Et cetera. But then the wheel of time turned again. As Michael Gerson <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/25/AR2009062503359.html" type="external">has written</a>:</p>
<p>Now spring is returning. January ' s local elections in Iraq favored secular nationalists instead of clerical parties. In Lebanon , Hezbollah was defeated in an open and vigorous vote. Kuwaiti women have been elected to parliament for the first time. And in Iran , brave women and men have demonstrated that democracy, not just nihilism, counts martyrs in the Muslim world… Taken together — a constitutional Iraqi democracy, a powerful reform movement in Iran , democratic achievements from the Gulf sheikdoms to Lebanon — this is the greatest period of democratic progress in the history of the region. Given consistent outbreaks, it seems clear that the broader Middle East is not immune to the democratic infection.</p>
<p>The democratic uprising in Iran touched people in a particularly deep way. Protest signs written in English, asking “Where Is My Vote?” started springing up. Supporting democratic aspirations in oppressed lands, which was passé during the last few years, is once again fashionable. <a href="http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Joan+Baez&amp;site=wnews&amp;client=wnews&amp;proxystylesheet=wnews&amp;output=xml_no_dtd&amp;ie=UTF-8&amp;oe=UTF-8&amp;filter=p&amp;getfields=wnnis&amp;sort=date:D:S:d1" type="external">Joan Baez</a> posted a message on her <a href="http://www.joanbaez.com/latestnews.html" type="external">Web site</a>, with a video of her “We Shall Overcome” <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601088&amp;sid=ark0wElQcU3s" type="external">dedicated to the people of Iran</a>. Jon Bon Jovi also did a duet in Farsi with exiled Iranian singer Andy Madadian; they are singing a new version of “Stand By Me,” the purpose of which is to send “a musical message of worldwide solidarity” <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/entertainmentNews/idUSTRE55S6YT20090629" type="external">to the</a> <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/entertainmentNews/idUSTRE55S6YT20090629" type="external">Iran</a> <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/entertainmentNews/idUSTRE55S6YT20090629" type="external">ian people</a>. People are rediscovering the virtues of liberty.</p>
<p>The second argument we heard ad nauseum was that the real winner from the war in Iraq was Iran. “Iran has emerged as the dominant regional power in the Persian Gulf once the U.S. removed its major rival from the scene and put its Shiite clients into power in Baghdad,” <a href="http://www.commentarymagazine.com/blogs/index.php/wehner/20502" type="external">Francis Fukuyama wrote</a> in an August 2008 Wall Street Journal op-ed the conclusions of which, even at the time, were dramatically out of sync with reality on the ground.</p>
<p>In fact, Iran was already back on its heels when Fukuyama wrote his piece. Iraq's “Shiite client,” Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, gave the orders to go after the Mahdi Army, which was overseen by Iran's real man in Iran, Moqtada al-Sadr. The Mahdi Army was smashed by Iraqi security forces in Basra, Sadr City, Baghdad, and Mosul so definitely that al-Sadr announced plans to disarm and remake the Mahdi Army into a social-services organization. Major Shiite parties assured the passage of the strategic alliance Iraq signed with the United States, a deveoplment Iran fought hard to undermine. And in Iraq's provincial elections earlier this year, secular and moderately religious parties (like the Dawa Party) did well; sectarian parties (like the Iranian-backed Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq) did not.</p>
<p>Things have not only gotten worse for Iran in Iraq; things have gotten worse for Iran in Iran. In the aftermath of the democratic Iranian uprising earlier this month, <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124597231749357065.html" type="external">we find that</a> “Unrest in Iran has opened a theological rift within the Shiite sect of Islam, undermining the Iranian regime's founding dogma that is shared by millions of fellow Shiites across the Middle East.”</p>
<p>The third argument we heard repeatedly is that global jihadists in general, and al Qaeda in particular, were massively aided by the Iraq war. It was the greatest recruiting mechanism possible. The appeal of bin Ladenism was stronger than ever. A typical proponent of this view was Peter Bergen, who, in October 2007, wrote a lead article for the New Republic, entitled “War of Error: How Osama bin Laden Beat George W. Bush.” In it Bergen <a href="http://www.newamerica.net/publications/articles/2007/war_error_6154" type="external">wrote</a>,</p>
<p>America's most formidable foe — once practically dead — is back. This is one of the most historically significant legacies of President Bush. At nearly every turn, he has made the wrong strategic choices in battling Al Qaeda. To understand the terror network's resurgence — and its continued ability to harm us — we need to reexamine all the ways in which the administration has failed to crush it. . . . If, as the president explained in a speech [in 2006], the United States is today engaged “in the decisive ideological struggle of the twenty-first century,” right now we are on the losing side of the battle of ideas.</p>
<p>Bergen and most of the foreign policy establishment had things exactly wrong. A study released last year by American intelligence agencies, “ <a href="http://www.dni.gov/nic/PDF_2025/2025_Global_Trends_Final_Report.pdf" type="external">Global Trends 2025: A Transformed World</a>,” <a href="http://www.dni.gov/nic/PDF_2025/2025_Global_Trends_Final_Report.pdf" type="external">concluded that</a>:</p>
<p>Al-Qa'ida's weaknesses — unachievable strategic objectives, inability to attract broad-based support, and self-destructive actions — might cause it to decay sooner than many people think… Despite sympathy for some of its ideas and the rise of affiliated groups in places like the Mahgreb, al-Qa'ida has not achieved broad support in the Islamic World. Its harsh pan-Islamist ideology and policies appeal only to a tiny minority of Muslims.</p>
<p>According to one study of public attitudes toward extremist violence, there is little support for al Qaeida in any of the countries surveyed — Algeria, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Morocco, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, or Yemen. The report also found that majorities in all Arab countries oppose jihadi violence, by any group, on their own soil.</p>
<p>We have also seen prominent voices within t he jihadist movement turn against bin Ladenism and Islamic extremism, a huge (if largely under-reported) development. Among the events catalyzing such shift of attitude was the “Anbar Awakening,” a Sunni uprising against al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI), and the devastating military pounding AQI was subjected to at the hands of both the Iraqi and the American militaries. For a movement that believed it had the mandate of Allah and depended on the perception of strength to win recruits and support, the decimation al Qaeda experienced in the Iraq war — which it declared to be the central battleground in the war for jihad — has been pivotal.</p>
<p>The ultimate wisdom in initiating the Iraq war is still to be validated by contingent events still to unfold. What is happening today is a transition, not a final triumph. And while Iraq is today a legitimate, representative, and responsible democracy, it remains fragile. Hard-earned progress can still be undone. The Iraqi military will have to prove it can provide security to its citizens. Relations between the Iraqi government and the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government in the north, particularly over the oil-rich province of Kirkuk, are tense. None of us can foretell the future, and almost all of us have been wrong about some aspect of the war or another.</p>
<p>Still, it is worth pointing out that those who wrote off the war as unwinnable and a miserable failure, who made confident, sweeping arguments that have been overturned by events, and who had grown so weary of the conflict that they were willing to consign Iraqis to mass slaughters and America to a historically consequential defeat — they were thankfully, blessedly wrong. And the Land between the Rivers, which has known too much tyranny and too many tears, may yet bind up its wounds.</p>
<p>— Peter Wehner is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center in&#160; Washington, D.C. He served in the Bush White House as director of the office of strategic initiatives.</p> | false | 1 | today marks withdrawal us combat troops iraqi urban areas result deadline contained status forces agreement sofa bush administration negotiated obama administration embraced milestone road iraqi sovereignty useful moment think consider three widespread extent interrelated arguments made iraq recent years first difficulties iraq proved underlying theory behind president bushs freedom agenda wrong said effort promote liberty arab world fools errand cultural soil hard forbidding existing undemocratic culture allow liberty succeed peoples cultures destined despotism unsuited selfgovernment tribal sectarian allegiances much stronger national identity especially artificial state like iraq elections merely deepened sectarian ties brought radicals power worse useless 2005 arab spring mirage et cetera wheel time turned michael gerson written spring returning january local elections iraq favored secular nationalists instead clerical parties lebanon hezbollah defeated open vigorous vote kuwaiti women elected parliament first time iran brave women men demonstrated democracy nihilism counts martyrs muslim world taken together constitutional iraqi democracy powerful reform movement iran democratic achievements gulf sheikdoms lebanon greatest period democratic progress history region given consistent outbreaks seems clear broader middle east immune democratic infection democratic uprising iran touched people particularly deep way protest signs written english asking vote started springing supporting democratic aspirations oppressed lands passé last years fashionable joan baez posted message web site video shall overcome dedicated people iran jon bon jovi also duet farsi exiled iranian singer andy madadian singing new version stand purpose send musical message worldwide solidarity iran ian people people rediscovering virtues liberty second argument heard ad nauseum real winner war iraq iran iran emerged dominant regional power persian gulf us removed major rival scene put shiite clients power baghdad francis fukuyama wrote august 2008 wall street journal oped conclusions even time dramatically sync reality ground fact iran already back heels fukuyama wrote piece iraqs shiite client prime minister nouri almaliki gave orders go mahdi army overseen irans real man iran moqtada alsadr mahdi army smashed iraqi security forces basra sadr city baghdad mosul definitely alsadr announced plans disarm remake mahdi army socialservices organization major shiite parties assured passage strategic alliance iraq signed united states deveoplment iran fought hard undermine iraqs provincial elections earlier year secular moderately religious parties like dawa party well sectarian parties like iranianbacked supreme council islamic revolution iraq things gotten worse iran iraq things gotten worse iran iran aftermath democratic iranian uprising earlier month find unrest iran opened theological rift within shiite sect islam undermining iranian regimes founding dogma shared millions fellow shiites across middle east third argument heard repeatedly global jihadists general al qaeda particular massively aided iraq war greatest recruiting mechanism possible appeal bin ladenism stronger ever typical proponent view peter bergen october 2007 wrote lead article new republic entitled war error osama bin laden beat george w bush bergen wrote americas formidable foe practically dead back one historically significant legacies president bush nearly every turn made wrong strategic choices battling al qaeda understand terror networks resurgence continued ability harm us need reexamine ways administration failed crush president explained speech 2006 united states today engaged decisive ideological struggle twentyfirst century right losing side battle ideas bergen foreign policy establishment things exactly wrong study released last year american intelligence agencies global trends 2025 transformed world concluded alqaidas weaknesses unachievable strategic objectives inability attract broadbased support selfdestructive actions might cause decay sooner many people think despite sympathy ideas rise affiliated groups places like mahgreb alqaida achieved broad support islamic world harsh panislamist ideology policies appeal tiny minority muslims according one study public attitudes toward extremist violence little support al qaeida countries surveyed algeria egypt jordan kuwait lebanon morocco qatar saudi arabia united arab emirates yemen report also found majorities arab countries oppose jihadi violence group soil also seen prominent voices within jihadist movement turn bin ladenism islamic extremism huge largely underreported development among events catalyzing shift attitude anbar awakening sunni uprising al qaeda iraq aqi devastating military pounding aqi subjected hands iraqi american militaries movement believed mandate allah depended perception strength win recruits support decimation al qaeda experienced iraq war declared central battleground war jihad pivotal ultimate wisdom initiating iraq war still validated contingent events still unfold happening today transition final triumph iraq today legitimate representative responsible democracy remains fragile hardearned progress still undone iraqi military prove provide security citizens relations iraqi government semiautonomous kurdistan regional government north particularly oilrich province kirkuk tense none us foretell future almost us wrong aspect war another still worth pointing wrote war unwinnable miserable failure made confident sweeping arguments overturned events grown weary conflict willing consign iraqis mass slaughters america historically consequential defeat thankfully blessedly wrong land rivers known much tyranny many tears may yet bind wounds peter wehner senior fellow ethics public policy center in160 washington dc served bush white house director office strategic initiatives | 783 |
<p>Catholicism is not a “religion of the book,” but rather a faith built around word and sacrament — or, if you prefer, text and demonstration. Symbolic acts that convey the truths the Church teaches are of the essence of Catholic practice; this is true of the Church’s public life as well as of its worship. The Church teaches an ethic of charity toward the poor and marginalized; the Church embodies that teaching in its hospitals, schools, and social-service agencies. The Church teaches that the just society is composed of a democratic political community, a free economy, and a vibrant public moral culture; the Church embodies that teaching in its support for the institutions of civil society that make free politics and free economics possible — even when that requires challenging the existing political order, as it did during the pontificate of John Paul II in countries as diverse as Poland, Chile, Argentina, and the Philippines.</p>
<p>Viewed through this prism of word-and-sacrament, or text-and-demonstration, Pope Benedict XVI’s March 26-28 pilgrimage to the island prison of Cuba was a rather Protestant exercise: brilliant in word but deficient in “sacramentality.” The pope’s time in Santiago and Havana was by no means wasted. But it could have been used better by demonstrating in action the truths Benedict XVI taught with conviction; such a demonstration would have strengthened the hand of the civil-society associations on which the transition to a free Cuba ultimately depends. The gap between “text” and “demonstration” during the pope’s Cuban voyage is also instructive through the light it sheds on the Catholic future in a Cuba-in-transition, and on a crucial issue in the conclave that will choose Pope Benedict’s successor.</p>
<p>THE TEXTS Benedict XVI’s addresses in Cuba were vintage Joseph Ratzinger: richly informed by Biblical and theological wisdom, and lucidly expressed. Despite his pre-papal reputation as a fierce defender of orthodoxy, Ratzinger’s papacy has consistently shown the world the real man his friends and colleagues knew and admired: a man who doesn’t raise his voice as a matter of habit (or tactic), but who makes his arguments calmly, drawing on an unmatched fund of knowledge in a variety of fields. Benedict XVI, on occasion, has had to use somewhat more elliptical constructions than is his wont. But his meaning is never much in doubt.</p>
<p>Thus, in a airborne press conference en route to Latin America, the pope who, a quarter-century ago, once referred to the “impossible compromise between Christianity and Marxism,” now spoke of Cuban Marxism as something that “no longer corresponds to reality” — a slightly less edgy formulation, one might think, except that it was a polite papal way of saying that Castroite Communism is crazy, mad, completely-out-of-touch-with-the-real-world: which is another way of saying that it’s hellish. There is little chance that what the pope meant was missed by Raúl Castro and the rest of Cuba’s jailer-class.</p>
<p>Then, in Santiago, which is both the devotional center of Cuban Catholicism (centered on the small icon of Our Lady of Charity of El Cobre) and the heartland of the Castroite revolution, Benedict XVI insisted in his Mass homily that Christianity “opens the doors of the world to truth,” especially the truth that “apart from God we are alienated from ourselves and hurled into the void” — an explicit inversion (and thus rejection) of the Marxist theory of Biblical religion’s “alienating” role in history. This truth the Church bears, the pope concluded, has “crushed the power of evil which darkens everything” and opens windows through which new possibilities of authentic liberation may be discerned. Later, at the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Charity, the pope committed to the Virgin’s care “those who are deprived of freedom, those who are separated from their loved ones or who are undergoing times of difficulty.” In light of these unmistakable challenges, the pope’s words of greeting at Mass to “the civil authorities who have graciously wished to join us” came as close to public irony as Joseph Ratzinger ever gets.</p>
<p>Finally, at the Mass in José Martí Square in Havana, Benedict XVI returned to the theme of Marxism’s madness, in a homily that stressed the importance of truth and reason in building the just society. In contrast to those who seek authentic truth in a reasonable way and build freedom on that solid foundation, the pope deplored the “irrationality and fanaticism” that some “try to impose…on others” — which was not, one may safely assume, a reference to the division in Cuba between Yankees fans and Red Sox fans. Then, as if to ensure that no one present, including Raúl Castro, missed the point, Benedict XVI insisted that religious freedom is not just the freedom of public worship, important as that is. Rather, “the right to freedom of religion, both in its private and public dimensions, manifests the unity of the human person, who is at once a citizen and a believer,” so the just state must recognize that “believers have a contribution to make to the building-up of society.” Benedict then illustrated this point by paying homage to Father Félix Varela, a 19th-century precursor of Cuban independence and a patron of pro-democracy forces in Cuba today. “Cuba and the world need change,” the pope concluded, “but this will occur only if each person is in a position to seek the truth,” i.e., without coercive state power blocking the way, or keeping the truth-tellers in rancid prisons for decades.</p>
<p>COUNTER-SIGNS AND MISSING SYMBOLS These were profoundly challenging words of truth, deftly crafted, and delivered with calm assurance by a figure of indisputable moral authority in the face of the regime and its leadership. But virtually all that wisdom was undercut by the photos the next day of Benedict XVI in conversation with Fidel Castro. The Catholic Church has some two millennia of experience with the crucial importance of symbols and signs in the proclamation of the truth; the pope’s men seemed virtually clueless about that “sacramental” dimension of Catholicism in planning and executing the papal visit to Cuba.</p>
<p>In the run-up to the visit, the papal nuncio, or ambassador, celebrated a Mass at the Havana cathedral with the cardinal archbishop of the city, Jaimé Ortega, for the healing of Hugo Chávez, a persecutor of the Venezuelan Church, then in Cuba for medical treatment; both Chávez and Raúl Castro, neither noted for public displays of piety in recent decades, were present. The LadiesinWhite, the most prominent of all Cuban civil-society groups, requested a meeting with the pope during a session with the nuncio; 70 members of the group were subsequently arrested and others were beaten. Just before the pope arrived, Cuban dissidents frustrated by the Vatican’s unwillingness to announce that the pope would meet with members of Cuban civil society occupied a church in Havana; Cardinal Ortega had the police remove the demonstrators, and his ham-handed archdiocesan spokesman criticized the demonstrators for politicizing the papal visit — as if the impending papal pilgrimage would take place on some planet devoid of politics. Throughout the pope’s time in Cuba, cell-phone communication among civil-society dissidents was interrupted by the regime in order to make organizing more difficult; almost 200 pro-democracy leaders were arrested; and on the pope’s second day in Cuba, Cuban internal security texted several known dissidents a warning that, after the pope left, “you will be disappeared.” All of this was known, almost as it happened, throughout the world; it is inconceivable that the attack on dissidents during the papal visit was not known to the nunciature in Havana and to the papal party, and yet there were no public denunciations of the regime’s police-state tactics of intimidation and brutalization, nor was the regime challenged by a papal meeting w ith Cuban democrats.</p>
<p>To the contrary: Asked at the end of the visit why the pope had not met with the Ladies in White and other civil-society dissidents, the Holy See’s sometimes-hapless press spokesman, Fr. Federico Lombardi, S.J., made matters worse by replying that the Vatican, in planning such a visit, had to take account of the wishes of the public authorities about the pope’s program.</p>
<p>That, however, was not John Paul II’s view of the matter. Prior to the second papal visit to Poland, which took place in 1983 during martial law, the regime insisted that the pope could not meet with Lech Wałesa, the imprisoned Solidarity leader; the pope insisted on the meeting and threatened to leave early if the meeting were not arranged; and the meeting took place. And if it be countered that, well, Benedict XVI is not a Cuban returning to his own country, then it should be remembered that John Paul II did precisely the same thing in Chile in 1987, when, much to the aggravation of the Pinochet regime, he had a lengthy meeting (arranged by local Catholic authorities) with the Chilean democratic opposition.</p>
<p>On the last day of Benedict XVI’s Cuban visit, when there was still hope that a previously unannounced papal meeting with civil-society representatives might be held, Vatican sources suggested that efforts had been made to arrange such an encounter, but that those efforts had been systematically thwarted by the regime. Assuming that was indeed the case, the claim nonetheless raises more questions than it answers.</p>
<p>If the pope was being prevented from meeting members of his flock whom he wanted to meet, why was a doddering and slightly gaga Fidel Castro granted a half-hour of the pope’s time? Couldn’t the Vatican planners have used the regime’s desire for an obvious propaganda photo-op as leverage to dismantle the obstacles the regime had put in the way of a papal meeting with pro-democracy Catholics and other civil-society representatives?</p>
<p>Moreover, Cuba is not North Korea. It may still be a gigantic prison, but it is not the country it was 30 years ago. If representatives of the National Endowment for Democracy could recently arrange to bring into Cuba an award for the founders of the Ladies in White and could bestow that award at a meeting with civil-society and pro-democracy activists, there is no reason why a competent Vatican nunciature in Havana, working with competent papal trip planners, couldn’t have figured out a way for the pope to meet representatives of Cuban civil society. At the very least, the Vatican could have extracted a high price from the regime (including international media exposure) for blocking such a meeting.</p>
<p>A week after the pope left Cuba, veteran Cuba analyst Carlos Alberto Montaner wrote in the Miami Herald that “ecclesiastical sources,” some of them “very close to the Holy Father,” had told him of the Vatican’s surprise at the sharp contrast between the spontaneous and joyful mass welcome the pope had received in Mexico (just before he came to Cuba), and the controlled atmosphere of an impoverished country the papal party had experienced in Cuba. Moreover, Montaner reported, Vatican officials “found it lamentable” that Raúl Castro had given a speech in Santiago “intended to justify the dictatorship,” a point reinforced during the papal visit by two other senior Cuban officials who insisted that political change was not on the horizon in Cuba. Those same Vatican officials, according to Montaner, found it “painful” that Cuban officials “reprised the most inflexible and Stalinist” orthodoxies whenever journalists were present. Further, Montaner wrote, the visit confirmed the Vatican’s sense of a division in the Cuban Church between bishops who want to support religious freedom by defending the free associations of civil society, and bishops like Cardinal Ortega who take a more benign view of the regime’s program of “reform” and wish to work with it — or, at the very least, not directly against it.</p>
<p>All of this, if true, raises even more questions, for everything Montaner reports the Vatican “learned” from the papal visit to Cuba was well known before the visit was even planned. There was no reason for surprise. The Castro regime behaved precisely the way any knowledgeable person would have expected it to behave. Thus the Vatican’s papal trip planners were either unaware of fundamental Cuban realities, or resigned to dealing with the regime over the long haul, or incapable of imagining effective counter-measures to the regime’s attempts to manipulate the visit for its own purposes. None of those three alternatives is very edifying.</p>
<p>THE FUTURE, IN CUBA AND IN ROME And that brings this discussion to questions of the future. One of those sets of questions involves the Church’s role in Cuba in the next several years. The second set of questions involves the future of the papacy.</p>
<p>As to Cuba: Everyone knows that a transition is underway on that long-suffering island. The question is whether that transition will resemble Spain, and result in a relatively swift and easy transition to democracy and the free economy, or whether it will resemble China, with the regime retaining (and enforcing) its political power while the country opens up economically. The social doctrine of the Catholic Church ought to impel the Vatican to bend every effort to support a Spanish-type transition. Yet that will require the Holy See to remember, and learn from, the example of John Paul II in Poland in the 1980s.</p>
<p>Ever since it was reported that John Paul II would go to Cuba in January 1998, inappropriate analogies have been drawn between the Church in Poland and the Church in Cuba. The blunt fact is that the Cuban Church has nothing resembling the grip on Cuban culture that the Polish Church had on Polish culture. Moreover, Cuban Catholicism has nothing like the overwhelming number of adherents the Polish Church had at the rise of Solidarity, a figure north of 90 percent of the national population. So expectations that Catholicism could play the pivotal role in Cuba that the Catholic Church played in Poland have usually been misplaced.</p>
<p>But there is a relevant Polish-Cuban analogy with lessons for the future. As martial law was winding down in Poland in 1983, the Jaruzelski regime hinted that it was open to an arrangement in which the Catholic Church would become its negotiating partner over the future of Polish society. Some churchmen were tempted (including, one suspects, the primate, Cardinal Józef Glemp). But John Paul II refused the deal, insisting that the nascent associations and institutions of Polish civil society, like Solidarity, had their own integrity, which the Church was duty-bound to respect and support. There would be no deal, then, in which Solidarity was quietly interred while the Church became the de facto institutional opposition to the regime. The Church, as its doctrine required, would support civil society.</p>
<p>Raúl Castro may well be taking a page from the Jaruzelski playbook, hinting to Cardinal Ortega and those of his cast of mind that the regime will work with the Church on certain changes, on the understanding that the Church will not ally itself with Cuban civil society and pro-democracy dissidents. That deal, like the Jaruzelski deal, should be firmly rejected. Doing so will require new, vigorous, and courageous leadership in Cuban Catholicism, of the sort displayed by Archbishop Dionisio García Ibáñez of Santiago, who snubbed Raúl Castro in a receiving line at the papal arrival ceremony. Cardinal Ortega is already six months past the normal retirement age of 75, which means that his letter of resignation has been received by the Holy See. One hopes that it will be swiftly accepted, and leadership capable of leading the Cuban Church in support of Cuban civil society brought to the fore.</p>
<p>And as to the next conclave: The re-Italianization of the Roman Curia under Benedict XVI’s secretary of state, Cardina l Tarcisio Bertone, S.D.B., must be critically scrutinized before a new pope is elected. That process has proven deeply problematic on any number of counts; what the Cuba visit suggests is that re-Italianization has brought with it a return to the international perspective of the late Cardinal Agostino Casaroli, architect of the failed Vatican strategy of “saving what could be saved” behind the old Iron Curtain, which meant reaching accommodations with Communist regimes. That strategy not only failed politically; it created enormous, post-Communist obstacles to the Church’s evangelical mission in free societies that had thrown off the Communist yoke. Accommodation is morally offensive in itself. And while prudence remains an important political virtue, prudence does not equate with appeasement, as history has taught time and again in a variety of circumstances.</p>
<p>The Casaroli approach, which seems to have shaped the planning of the papal visit to Cuba, also fails to grasp the nature of papal power in the 21st-century world. A century and a half after the demise of the Papal States, many Italian curialists and more than a few Vatican diplomats still habitually think of the pope as the sovereign of a mid-sized European power, who deals with other political sovereigns according to the usual rules of the sovereignty game: thus Father Lombardi’s clumsy response to journalists at the end of the papal visit, asserting that Benedict XVI had to play by the established ground rules. But he doesn’t, and neither does any other 21st-century pope. Yes, the pope is a sovereign under international law. But his authority in world affairs does not derive from the fact that he is the master of 110 acres in the middle of Rome and issues his own stamps and coins. As John Paul II demonstrated, and as Benedict XVI has also shown in many of his major public addresses (including those in Cuba), contemporary papal power is a unique form of moral authority that comes from an unshakeable determination to speak the truth, even in the face of worldly power.</p>
<p>Benedict XVI has been ill-served during his pontificate by associates who too often seem to have forgotten that fact. Putting that truth about the nature of papal authority in world affairs back at the center of the Church’s global role — and getting the next pope the kind of assistance he needs to live that truth out — ought to be high on the agenda of discussion in the College of Cardinals at the next papal transition.</p>
<p>Nothing less than the Church’s commitment to a New Evangelization of the 21st century is at stake.</p>
<p>– George Weigel is Distinguished Senior Fellow of Washington’s Ethics and Public Policy Center, where he holds the William E. Simon Chair in Catholic Studies.</p> | false | 1 | catholicism religion book rather faith built around word sacrament prefer text demonstration symbolic acts convey truths church teaches essence catholic practice true churchs public life well worship church teaches ethic charity toward poor marginalized church embodies teaching hospitals schools socialservice agencies church teaches society composed democratic political community free economy vibrant public moral culture church embodies teaching support institutions civil society make free politics free economics possible even requires challenging existing political order pontificate john paul ii countries diverse poland chile argentina philippines viewed prism wordandsacrament textanddemonstration pope benedict xvis march 2628 pilgrimage island prison cuba rather protestant exercise brilliant word deficient sacramentality popes time santiago havana means wasted could used better demonstrating action truths benedict xvi taught conviction demonstration would strengthened hand civilsociety associations transition free cuba ultimately depends gap text demonstration popes cuban voyage also instructive light sheds catholic future cubaintransition crucial issue conclave choose pope benedicts successor texts benedict xvis addresses cuba vintage joseph ratzinger richly informed biblical theological wisdom lucidly expressed despite prepapal reputation fierce defender orthodoxy ratzingers papacy consistently shown world real man friends colleagues knew admired man doesnt raise voice matter habit tactic makes arguments calmly drawing unmatched fund knowledge variety fields benedict xvi occasion use somewhat elliptical constructions wont meaning never much doubt thus airborne press conference en route latin america pope quartercentury ago referred impossible compromise christianity marxism spoke cuban marxism something longer corresponds reality slightly less edgy formulation one might think except polite papal way saying castroite communism crazy mad completelyoutoftouchwiththerealworld another way saying hellish little chance pope meant missed raúl castro rest cubas jailerclass santiago devotional center cuban catholicism centered small icon lady charity el cobre heartland castroite revolution benedict xvi insisted mass homily christianity opens doors world truth especially truth apart god alienated hurled void explicit inversion thus rejection marxist theory biblical religions alienating role history truth church bears pope concluded crushed power evil darkens everything opens windows new possibilities authentic liberation may discerned later sanctuary lady charity pope committed virgins care deprived freedom separated loved ones undergoing times difficulty light unmistakable challenges popes words greeting mass civil authorities graciously wished join us came close public irony joseph ratzinger ever gets finally mass josé martí square havana benedict xvi returned theme marxisms madness homily stressed importance truth reason building society contrast seek authentic truth reasonable way build freedom solid foundation pope deplored irrationality fanaticism try imposeon others one may safely assume reference division cuba yankees fans red sox fans ensure one present including raúl castro missed point benedict xvi insisted religious freedom freedom public worship important rather right freedom religion private public dimensions manifests unity human person citizen believer state must recognize believers contribution make buildingup society benedict illustrated point paying homage father félix varela 19thcentury precursor cuban independence patron prodemocracy forces cuba today cuba world need change pope concluded occur person position seek truth ie without coercive state power blocking way keeping truthtellers rancid prisons decades countersigns missing symbols profoundly challenging words truth deftly crafted delivered calm assurance figure indisputable moral authority face regime leadership virtually wisdom undercut photos next day benedict xvi conversation fidel castro catholic church two millennia experience crucial importance symbols signs proclamation truth popes men seemed virtually clueless sacramental dimension catholicism planning executing papal visit cuba runup visit papal nuncio ambassador celebrated mass havana cathedral cardinal archbishop city jaimé ortega healing hugo chávez persecutor venezuelan church cuba medical treatment chávez raúl castro neither noted public displays piety recent decades present ladiesinwhite prominent cuban civilsociety groups requested meeting pope session nuncio 70 members group subsequently arrested others beaten pope arrived cuban dissidents frustrated vaticans unwillingness announce pope would meet members cuban civil society occupied church havana cardinal ortega police remove demonstrators hamhanded archdiocesan spokesman criticized demonstrators politicizing papal visit impending papal pilgrimage would take place planet devoid politics throughout popes time cuba cellphone communication among civilsociety dissidents interrupted regime order make organizing difficult almost 200 prodemocracy leaders arrested popes second day cuba cuban internal security texted several known dissidents warning pope left disappeared known almost happened throughout world inconceivable attack dissidents papal visit known nunciature havana papal party yet public denunciations regimes policestate tactics intimidation brutalization regime challenged papal meeting w ith cuban democrats contrary asked end visit pope met ladies white civilsociety dissidents holy sees sometimeshapless press spokesman fr federico lombardi sj made matters worse replying vatican planning visit take account wishes public authorities popes program however john paul iis view matter prior second papal visit poland took place 1983 martial law regime insisted pope could meet lech wałesa imprisoned solidarity leader pope insisted meeting threatened leave early meeting arranged meeting took place countered well benedict xvi cuban returning country remembered john paul ii precisely thing chile 1987 much aggravation pinochet regime lengthy meeting arranged local catholic authorities chilean democratic opposition last day benedict xvis cuban visit still hope previously unannounced papal meeting civilsociety representatives might held vatican sources suggested efforts made arrange encounter efforts systematically thwarted regime assuming indeed case claim nonetheless raises questions answers pope prevented meeting members flock wanted meet doddering slightly gaga fidel castro granted halfhour popes time couldnt vatican planners used regimes desire obvious propaganda photoop leverage dismantle obstacles regime put way papal meeting prodemocracy catholics civilsociety representatives moreover cuba north korea may still gigantic prison country 30 years ago representatives national endowment democracy could recently arrange bring cuba award founders ladies white could bestow award meeting civilsociety prodemocracy activists reason competent vatican nunciature havana working competent papal trip planners couldnt figured way pope meet representatives cuban civil society least vatican could extracted high price regime including international media exposure blocking meeting week pope left cuba veteran cuba analyst carlos alberto montaner wrote miami herald ecclesiastical sources close holy father told vaticans surprise sharp contrast spontaneous joyful mass welcome pope received mexico came cuba controlled atmosphere impoverished country papal party experienced cuba moreover montaner reported vatican officials found lamentable raúl castro given speech santiago intended justify dictatorship point reinforced papal visit two senior cuban officials insisted political change horizon cuba vatican officials according montaner found painful cuban officials reprised inflexible stalinist orthodoxies whenever journalists present montaner wrote visit confirmed vaticans sense division cuban church bishops want support religious freedom defending free associations civil society bishops like cardinal ortega take benign view regimes program reform wish work least directly true raises even questions everything montaner reports vatican learned papal visit cuba well known visit even planned reason surprise castro regime behaved precisely way knowledgeable person would expected behave thus vaticans papal trip planners either unaware fundamental cuban realities resigned dealing regime long haul incapable imagining effective countermeasures regimes attempts manipulate visit purposes none three alternatives edifying future cuba rome brings discussion questions future one sets questions involves churchs role cuba next several years second set questions involves future papacy cuba everyone knows transition underway longsuffering island question whether transition resemble spain result relatively swift easy transition democracy free economy whether resemble china regime retaining enforcing political power country opens economically social doctrine catholic church ought impel vatican bend every effort support spanishtype transition yet require holy see remember learn example john paul ii poland 1980s ever since reported john paul ii would go cuba january 1998 inappropriate analogies drawn church poland church cuba blunt fact cuban church nothing resembling grip cuban culture polish church polish culture moreover cuban catholicism nothing like overwhelming number adherents polish church rise solidarity figure north 90 percent national population expectations catholicism could play pivotal role cuba catholic church played poland usually misplaced relevant polishcuban analogy lessons future martial law winding poland 1983 jaruzelski regime hinted open arrangement catholic church would become negotiating partner future polish society churchmen tempted including one suspects primate cardinal józef glemp john paul ii refused deal insisting nascent associations institutions polish civil society like solidarity integrity church dutybound respect support would deal solidarity quietly interred church became de facto institutional opposition regime church doctrine required would support civil society raúl castro may well taking page jaruzelski playbook hinting cardinal ortega cast mind regime work church certain changes understanding church ally cuban civil society prodemocracy dissidents deal like jaruzelski deal firmly rejected require new vigorous courageous leadership cuban catholicism sort displayed archbishop dionisio garcía ibáñez santiago snubbed raúl castro receiving line papal arrival ceremony cardinal ortega already six months past normal retirement age 75 means letter resignation received holy see one hopes swiftly accepted leadership capable leading cuban church support cuban civil society brought fore next conclave reitalianization roman curia benedict xvis secretary state cardina l tarcisio bertone sdb must critically scrutinized new pope elected process proven deeply problematic number counts cuba visit suggests reitalianization brought return international perspective late cardinal agostino casaroli architect failed vatican strategy saving could saved behind old iron curtain meant reaching accommodations communist regimes strategy failed politically created enormous postcommunist obstacles churchs evangelical mission free societies thrown communist yoke accommodation morally offensive prudence remains important political virtue prudence equate appeasement history taught time variety circumstances casaroli approach seems shaped planning papal visit cuba also fails grasp nature papal power 21stcentury world century half demise papal states many italian curialists vatican diplomats still habitually think pope sovereign midsized european power deals political sovereigns according usual rules sovereignty game thus father lombardis clumsy response journalists end papal visit asserting benedict xvi play established ground rules doesnt neither 21stcentury pope yes pope sovereign international law authority world affairs derive fact master 110 acres middle rome issues stamps coins john paul ii demonstrated benedict xvi also shown many major public addresses including cuba contemporary papal power unique form moral authority comes unshakeable determination speak truth even face worldly power benedict xvi illserved pontificate associates often seem forgotten fact putting truth nature papal authority world affairs back center churchs global role getting next pope kind assistance needs live truth ought high agenda discussion college cardinals next papal transition nothing less churchs commitment new evangelization 21st century stake george weigel distinguished senior fellow washingtons ethics public policy center holds william e simon chair catholic studies | 1,662 |
<p>By Hyonhee Shin and James Pearson (LON:)</p>
<p>SEOUL (Reuters) – On an icy December day in 2011, North Korea’s new leader Kim Jong Un was accompanied by seven advisers as they escorted the hearse that carried his father, Kim Jong Il, through the streets of Pyongyang.</p>
<p>None of the men remain with the young Kim. This October, he demoted the last of his father’s aides, both men in their nineties. They were among around 340 people he has purged or executed, according to the Institute for National Security Strategy, a think tank of South Korea’s National Intelligence Service (NIS).</p>
<p>Kim, “obviously a madman” in the eyes of U.S. President Donald Trump, has completed a six-year transition to what the South calls a reign of terror. His unpredictability and belligerence have instilled fear worldwide: After he tested a “breakthrough” missile earlier this week, he pronounced North Korea a nuclear power capable of striking the United States. But a closer look at his leadership reveals a method behind the “madness.”</p>
<p>At 33, Kim Jong Un is one of the world’s youngest heads of state. He inherited a nation with a proud history, onto which a socialist state had essentially been grafted by Cold War superpowers to create a buffer between Communist China and the capitalist South. Under Kim’s father, the economy was mismanaged, and the collapse of Communism in the Soviet Union eliminated an important source of support. Up to three million people starved.</p>
<p>To consolidate a weak position, the young leader has been cultivating three main forces: military and nuclear power, a tacit private sector market economy, and the fear and adoration of a god. To this end, he has executed two powerful men and promoted one young woman – Kim Yo Jong, his younger sister, who Korea-watchers say is also Kim’s chief propagandist. She is Kim’s only other blood relative to be involved in politics: His elder brother, Kim Jong Chol, was rejected by their father as heir.</p>
<p>Over the five years to December 2016, Kim spent $300 million on 29 nuclear and missile tests, $180 million on building some 460 family statues, and as much as $1 billion on a party congress in 2016 – including $26.8 million on fireworks alone, according to the Institute, which employs high-level defectors.</p>
<p>“Yes, he has replaced many top commanders and officials so easily and ruthlessly killed some of them, which could make you wonder if he’s sane,” said Lee Sang-keun, a North Korean leadership expert at the Institute of Unification Studies at Ewha Womans University in Seoul.</p>
<p>“But this is a historical way of governing that can put you in power for a long time.”</p>
<p>GREAT LEADER</p>
<p>In ancient days, Pyongyang was the capital of a mighty empire, Koguryo, the root of the modern word “Korea.” Going back through history, the Great Leader concept is a blend of several ideas handed down through time: an almighty god, the Confucian worship of a parent, and a king with the Mandate of Heaven, according to Lee Seung-yeol, a senior researcher at the National Assembly Research Service in Seoul.</p>
<p>Lee, a leading North Korea leadership researcher, said the state’s theory of succession means Kim the younger’s rise should have been completed while his father was alive: Kim’s father was anointed 20 years before he took over, giving him time to build allies and a leadership system.</p>
<p>Kim Jong Un had just three years as leader-in-waiting.</p>
<p>Born in 1984, he was third in line for power and a fractious, competitive child, according to Kenji Fujimoto, a Japanese chef who worked for the family and one of the few people to recount meetings with the young Kim. In his memoirs published in 2010, Fujimoto, who now runs a sushi restaurant in Pyongyang, said Kim once snapped at his aunt Ko Yong Suk for calling him “Little General.” Kim wanted to be called “Comrade General.”</p>
<p>When Kim Jong Il knew his young son would soon succeed him, researchers have said, the father took several measures to protect the boy. Lee said these included shifting the country’s power base to create rivalry between the elites so Kim the younger could play one group off against another.</p>
<p>Kim Jong Il had declared the military the country’s supreme power – a policy known as songun, which means “military first.” At a party conference in 2010, he changed the setup so the military had to compete with the party administration for the leader’s favour.</p>
<p>“POOR MAN’S WEAPON”</p>
<p>Military strategy was the first thing Kim changed. His father had used the promise of nuclear disarmament as a bargaining chip for aid, and in February 2012, young Kim started in his father’s footsteps, promising to freeze North Korea’s nuclear program in return for food aid from the United States.</p>
<p>But weeks later he changed tack, saying North Korea would fire a long-range rocket. “The negotiations were carried on as the legacy of Kim Jong Il,” said Wi Sung-lac, a former South Korean envoy to talks in 2011 that contributed to the February deal. “Since then his strategic thinking has shaped up.”</p>
<p>In Kim’s view, Saddam Hussein of Iraq and Muammar Gaddafi of Libya were fatally weakened by not having nuclear weapons, North Korean media say. “History proves that powerful nuclear deterrence serves as the strongest treasured sword for frustrating outsiders’ aggression,” the official KCNA news agency said in an editorial in January 2016.</p>
<p>North Korea is racing to achieve a nuclear deterrent because the state feels threatened, worrying particularly that Kim may face a fate like Gaddafi. The Libyan leader agreed in 2003 to eliminate his weapons of mass destruction; in 2011, he was killed by rebels that the United States and its allies had supported.</p>
<p>Months after Kim’s accession, North Korea updated its constitution to declare itself a nuclear weapons state.</p>
<p>One leading pallbearer at Kim Jong Il’s funeral was Ri Yong Ho, Chief of the General Staff of the Korean People’s Army. Kim sacked him in July 2012. South Korean intelligence later confirmed that Ri had been executed.</p>
<p>By December 2012, North Korea had carried out another, successful, rocket test.</p>
<p>In 2013, Kim outlined a new policy: The “byungjin line,” or parallel development, to combine the nuclear buildup and economic growth.</p>
<p>A nuclear deterrent is essential to that, says Thae Yong-ho, North Korea’s former deputy ambassador to London, who staged a high-profile defection to South Korea in 2016. The threat of absolute destruction makes a nuclear bomb a “poor man’s weapon” with which to tighten control of the country and ensure long-term rule, Thae said.</p>
<p>“Once he has assumed control of usable nuclear weapons, he has more room to allocate resources more flexibly, and allocate the military forces for civilian construction,” said Thae.</p>
<p>“FOOLISH DREAM”</p>
<p>North Korea spends about a quarter of its GDP on defense: Russia’s President Vladimir Putin has said Kim Jong Un would have his people “eat grass” rather than give up its nuclear program.</p>
<p>But with a legacy of famine, Kim also says he wants to boost people’s prosperity.</p>
<p>The former chef, Fujimoto, said that on one summer break from school in Switzerland in 2000, the young Kim was preoccupied with a visit to Beijing his father had made.</p>
<p>“Let’s talk,” Fujimoto recalled the future leader saying over drinks on his father’s private train. “I hear from higher up that China seems to be succeeding on many fronts – engineering, commerce, hotels, agriculture – everything,” Kim said. “In many ways, don’t we need to take them as a model example for us?”</p>
<p>In 2012, shortly after taking power, Kim went a small way to mimic reforms China made in the 1980s. Farmers were allowed to keep most of the harvest. State enterprises were given the right to buy and sell at market prices and to hire and fire workers. Private entrepreneurs and traders were encouraged to invest in state projects or with party and military entities. Kim also began to turn a blind eye to informal markets – a force his father tried in vain to contain.</p>
<p>That April, Kim addressed the nation – the first time in 17 years North Koreans had heard the voice of their leader. “It is the party’s steadfast determination to ensure that the people will never have to tighten their belt again,” he said.</p>
<p>Outsiders hoped the reform signaled a new political openness as Kim drove to promote the North in the world: In 2012 Antonio Razzi, an Italian senator for Forza Italia who calls himself the only Italian to have met the leader, said Kim had asked him to find training facilities for soccer players in Italy.</p>
<p>“I have talked with many (North Korean) local leaders,” Razzi said. “They have no plan to attack anybody. North Korea is interested in nuclear only as a form of defense.”</p>
<p>Kim worked to ensure the economic freedom would not unseat him.</p>
<p>Also escorting his father’s funeral car in 2011 was Jang Song Thaek, an administrator at the vanguard of the reforms. He was married to Kim Jong Il’s sister, was a special envoy to China and had overseen a host of new Special Economic Zones all over the country.</p>
<p>In December 2013, Jang was hauled out of the Politburo in front of the cameras and accused of plotting a coup. “Jang dreamed such a foolish dream,” state media said, adding Jang hoped his reformist plans would help him “get ‘recognized’ by foreign countries.”</p>
<p>Jang was shot “dozens of times” by an anti-aircraft gun and his remains removed with a flamethrower, according to South Korea’s National Intelligence Service (NIS) – an account no one has confirmed.</p>
<p>“DEVELOPMENT DICTATOR”</p>
<p>From that point on, Kim honed his personality cult. On the day Jang’s purge was announced, North Korea’s official daily the Rodong Sinmun unveiled a song dedicated to Kim Jong Un, titled “We Know Nothing But You.” More were to follow.</p>
<p>The next year, Kim also ordered school textbooks be revised to focus on idolization of himself and include images of nuclear weapons and missiles, according to the NIS-affiliated Institute for National Security Strategy.</p>
<p>The idolization campaign kicked into high gear in 2016, focused on pop culture and youth: Kim’s chosen female singers, the Moranbong Band, staged a series of musical performances and plays calling for loyalty to the leader, while the Shock Brigade, a crew of young North Koreans in charge of major economic construction, produced about 1,200 poems and other literary works, the Institute said.</p>
<p>“He has linked his own legitimacy to improving the economic situation in the country,” said John Delury of Seoul’s Yonsei University. “Kim Jong Un wants to become a development dictator.”</p>
<p>At home, he casts himself as a bringer of plenty. In 2015, almost half the times he was photographed were at economic events, data from Seoul’s Unification Ministry shows. Only this year, as his weapons tests multiplied and met an angry response in the United States, have military appearances come back into prominence.</p>
<p>Standing tearfully behind Kim Jong Un at their father’s funeral was his younger sister, 28-year-old Kim Yo Jong. On the same October day that Kim dropped the last two of his father’s aides, he included her in his Politburo. Kim Jong Chol, their elder brother, leads a quiet life in Pyongyang where he plays guitar in a band, according to former ambassador Thae.</p>
<p>“I think Kim Jong Un has been making good use of the existing system, while strengthening his power base and dictator regime in a very shrewd manner,” said Lee Su-seok, a research fellow at the Institute for National Security Strategy.</p> | false | 1 | hyonhee shin james pearson lon seoul reuters icy december day 2011 north koreas new leader kim jong un accompanied seven advisers escorted hearse carried father kim jong il streets pyongyang none men remain young kim october demoted last fathers aides men nineties among around 340 people purged executed according institute national security strategy think tank south koreas national intelligence service nis kim obviously madman eyes us president donald trump completed sixyear transition south calls reign terror unpredictability belligerence instilled fear worldwide tested breakthrough missile earlier week pronounced north korea nuclear power capable striking united states closer look leadership reveals method behind madness 33 kim jong un one worlds youngest heads state inherited nation proud history onto socialist state essentially grafted cold war superpowers create buffer communist china capitalist south kims father economy mismanaged collapse communism soviet union eliminated important source support three million people starved consolidate weak position young leader cultivating three main forces military nuclear power tacit private sector market economy fear adoration god end executed two powerful men promoted one young woman kim yo jong younger sister koreawatchers say also kims chief propagandist kims blood relative involved politics elder brother kim jong chol rejected father heir five years december 2016 kim spent 300 million 29 nuclear missile tests 180 million building 460 family statues much 1 billion party congress 2016 including 268 million fireworks alone according institute employs highlevel defectors yes replaced many top commanders officials easily ruthlessly killed could make wonder hes sane said lee sangkeun north korean leadership expert institute unification studies ewha womans university seoul historical way governing put power long time great leader ancient days pyongyang capital mighty empire koguryo root modern word korea going back history great leader concept blend several ideas handed time almighty god confucian worship parent king mandate heaven according lee seungyeol senior researcher national assembly research service seoul lee leading north korea leadership researcher said states theory succession means kim youngers rise completed father alive kims father anointed 20 years took giving time build allies leadership system kim jong un three years leaderinwaiting born 1984 third line power fractious competitive child according kenji fujimoto japanese chef worked family one people recount meetings young kim memoirs published 2010 fujimoto runs sushi restaurant pyongyang said kim snapped aunt ko yong suk calling little general kim wanted called comrade general kim jong il knew young son would soon succeed researchers said father took several measures protect boy lee said included shifting countrys power base create rivalry elites kim younger could play one group another kim jong il declared military countrys supreme power policy known songun means military first party conference 2010 changed setup military compete party administration leaders favour poor mans weapon military strategy first thing kim changed father used promise nuclear disarmament bargaining chip aid february 2012 young kim started fathers footsteps promising freeze north koreas nuclear program return food aid united states weeks later changed tack saying north korea would fire longrange rocket negotiations carried legacy kim jong il said wi sunglac former south korean envoy talks 2011 contributed february deal since strategic thinking shaped kims view saddam hussein iraq muammar gaddafi libya fatally weakened nuclear weapons north korean media say history proves powerful nuclear deterrence serves strongest treasured sword frustrating outsiders aggression official kcna news agency said editorial january 2016 north korea racing achieve nuclear deterrent state feels threatened worrying particularly kim may face fate like gaddafi libyan leader agreed 2003 eliminate weapons mass destruction 2011 killed rebels united states allies supported months kims accession north korea updated constitution declare nuclear weapons state one leading pallbearer kim jong ils funeral ri yong ho chief general staff korean peoples army kim sacked july 2012 south korean intelligence later confirmed ri executed december 2012 north korea carried another successful rocket test 2013 kim outlined new policy byungjin line parallel development combine nuclear buildup economic growth nuclear deterrent essential says thae yongho north koreas former deputy ambassador london staged highprofile defection south korea 2016 threat absolute destruction makes nuclear bomb poor mans weapon tighten control country ensure longterm rule thae said assumed control usable nuclear weapons room allocate resources flexibly allocate military forces civilian construction said thae foolish dream north korea spends quarter gdp defense russias president vladimir putin said kim jong un would people eat grass rather give nuclear program legacy famine kim also says wants boost peoples prosperity former chef fujimoto said one summer break school switzerland 2000 young kim preoccupied visit beijing father made lets talk fujimoto recalled future leader saying drinks fathers private train hear higher china seems succeeding many fronts engineering commerce hotels agriculture everything kim said many ways dont need take model example us 2012 shortly taking power kim went small way mimic reforms china made 1980s farmers allowed keep harvest state enterprises given right buy sell market prices hire fire workers private entrepreneurs traders encouraged invest state projects party military entities kim also began turn blind eye informal markets force father tried vain contain april kim addressed nation first time 17 years north koreans heard voice leader partys steadfast determination ensure people never tighten belt said outsiders hoped reform signaled new political openness kim drove promote north world 2012 antonio razzi italian senator forza italia calls italian met leader said kim asked find training facilities soccer players italy talked many north korean local leaders razzi said plan attack anybody north korea interested nuclear form defense kim worked ensure economic freedom would unseat also escorting fathers funeral car 2011 jang song thaek administrator vanguard reforms married kim jong ils sister special envoy china overseen host new special economic zones country december 2013 jang hauled politburo front cameras accused plotting coup jang dreamed foolish dream state media said adding jang hoped reformist plans would help get recognized foreign countries jang shot dozens times antiaircraft gun remains removed flamethrower according south koreas national intelligence service nis account one confirmed development dictator point kim honed personality cult day jangs purge announced north koreas official daily rodong sinmun unveiled song dedicated kim jong un titled know nothing follow next year kim also ordered school textbooks revised focus idolization include images nuclear weapons missiles according nisaffiliated institute national security strategy idolization campaign kicked high gear 2016 focused pop culture youth kims chosen female singers moranbong band staged series musical performances plays calling loyalty leader shock brigade crew young north koreans charge major economic construction produced 1200 poems literary works institute said linked legitimacy improving economic situation country said john delury seouls yonsei university kim jong un wants become development dictator home casts bringer plenty 2015 almost half times photographed economic events data seouls unification ministry shows year weapons tests multiplied met angry response united states military appearances come back prominence standing tearfully behind kim jong un fathers funeral younger sister 28yearold kim yo jong october day kim dropped last two fathers aides included politburo kim jong chol elder brother leads quiet life pyongyang plays guitar band according former ambassador thae think kim jong un making good use existing system strengthening power base dictator regime shrewd manner said lee suseok research fellow institute national security strategy | 1,184 |
<p />
<p>When the bodies of three Israeli settlers – Aftali Frenkel and Gilad Shaar, both 16, and Eyal Yifrach, 19 – were found on June 30 near Hebron in the southern West Bank, Israel went into a state of mourning and a wave of sympathy flowed in from around the world. The three had disappeared 18 days earlier in circumstances that remain unclear.</p>
<p>The entire episode, particularly after its grim ending, seemed to traumatize Israelis into ignoring harsh truths about the settlers and the militarization of their society. Amid a portrayal of the three as hapless youths, although one was a 19-year-old soldier, commentators have failed to provide badly needed context to the events. Few, if any, assigned the blame where it was most deserved – on expansionist policies which have sown hatred and bloodshed.</p>
<p>Before the discovery of the bodies, the real face of Netanyahu’s notoriously right-wing government was well-known. Few held Illusions about how “peaceful” an occupation could be if run by figures such as Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, Economy Minister Naftali Bennett, and Deputy Defense Minister Danny Danon. But because “children” – the term used by Netanyahu himself – were involved, even critics didn’t expect an exercise in political point-scoring.</p>
<p>There was sympathy elicited for the missing settlers case, but it quickly vanished in the face of an Israeli response (in the West Bank, Jerusalem and later in a full-scale war on Gaza) largely seen in the crucible of world opinion as disproportionate and cruel. Rather than being related to the tragic death of three youths, this response obviously reflected Netanyahu’s grand political calculations.</p>
<p>As mobs of Israeli Jews went out on an ethnic lynching spree in Israel, Jerusalem and the West Bank that some likened to a “pogrom”, occupation soldiers conducted a massive arrest campaign of hundreds of Palestinians, mostly Hamas members and supporters.</p>
<p>The Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas said it had no role in the death of the settlers, and this appears plausible since they rarely hesitate to take credit for something carried out by their military wing. Israeli military strategists were well aware of that.</p>
<p>This war on Hamas, however, has little to do with the killed settlers, and everything to do with the political circumstances that preceded their disappearance.</p>
<p>On May 15, two Palestinian youths, Nadim Siam Abu Nuwara, 17, and Mohammed Mahmoud Odeh Salameh, 16, were killed by Israeli soldiers while taking part in a protest commemorating the anniversary of the Nakba, or ‘Great Catastrophe’. Video footage shows that Nadim was innocently standing with a group of friends before collapsing as he was hit by an Israeli army bullet.</p>
<p>The Nakba took place 66 years ago when the so-called Arab-Israeli conflict emerged. An estimated one million Palestinians were forced out of their homes as they fled a Zionist invasion. Israel was established on the ruins of that Palestine.</p>
<p>Nadim and Mohammed, like the youths of several generations since, were killed in cold blood as they walked to remember that exodus. In Israel, there was no outrage. However, Palestinian anger, which seems to be in constant accumulation – being under military occupation and enduring harsh economic conditions – was reaching a tipping point.</p>
<p>In some way, the deaths of these Palestinian youths were a distraction from the political disunity that has afflicted Palestinian leadership and society for years. Their deaths were a reminder that Palestine, as an idea and a collective plight and struggle, goes beyond the confines of politics or even ideology.</p>
<p>Their deaths reminded us that there is much more to Palestine than the whims of the aging Palestinian Authority ‘President’ Mahmoud Abbas and his Ramallah-based henchmen, or even Hamas’s regional calculations following the rise and fall of the ‘Arab Spring.’</p>
<p>The Israeli reaction to the settlers’ death has been different. After the discovery of the bodies, fellow settlers and right-wing Israelis began exacting revenge from Palestinian communities. The mob was united by the slogan “death to the Arabs”, reviving a long-disused notion of a single Palestinian identity that precedes the emergence of Fatah and Hamas.</p>
<p>Perhaps paradoxically, the grief and anger provoked by the death of Mohammad Abu Khdeir, 17, who was burnt alive by Israeli settlers as part of this lashing out, has furthered this reawakening of a long-fragmented Palestinian national identity.</p>
<p>This identity that had suffered due to Israeli walls, military tactics and the Palestinians’ own disunity, has been glued back together in a process that resembles the events which preceded the first and second uprisings of 1987 and 2000 respectively.</p>
<p>However, unlike in the previous Intifadas, the hurdles towards a unified voice this time seem insurmountable. Abbas is a weak leader who has done so much to meet Israel’s security expectations and so very little to defend the rights of his people. He is a relic from a bygone era who merely exists because he is the best option Israel and the US have at the moment.</p>
<p>In the aftermath of the Israeli violent response to the killing of the settlers, Abbas labored to coordinate with the massive Israeli search. At times, he stayed away as Israeli troops brutalized Palestinians in the West Bank.</p>
<p>It is clear that there can be no third Intifada that leaves Abbas and his wretched political apparatus in place. This is precisely why Palestinian Authority goons prevented many attempts by Palestinians in the West Bank to protest the Israeli violence unleashed in the occupied territories, which finally culminated into a massive war against Gaza that has killed and wounded hundreds.</p>
<p>Whatever credit Abbas supposedly gained by closing ranks with Hamas to form a unity government last June has been just as quickly lost. It has been overshadowed by his own failures to live up to commitment under the unity deal, and the relevance of his ‘authority’ was quickly eclipsed by Israeli violence, highlighting his and his government’s utter irrelevance to Israel’s political calculations.</p>
<p>When Israel launched its massive arrest campaign that mainly targeted Hamas in the West Bank, Hamas’s political wing was already considering “alternatives” to the unity government in Ramallah.</p>
<p>Hamas’s objectives were not being met. The unity deal was meant to achieve several goals: end Hamas’s political isolation in Gaza, resulting from the intensifying of the siege by Egypt’s Abdul Fatah al-Sisi, solving the economic crisis in the Strip, and also allowing Hamas to revert to its old brand, as a resistance movement first and foremost.</p>
<p>Even if Hamas succeeded in establishing a new brand based on the resistance/political model, Israel was determined to deactivate any potential for Palestinian unity. Destroying that unity became almost an obsession for Netanyahu.</p>
<p>The disappearance of the settlers gave Netanyahu’s quest a new impetus. He immediately began a campaign pressuring Abbas to break away from Hamas.</p>
<p>But there is still more to Israel’s war on Gaza than this. Fearing an intifada that would unite Palestinians, threaten the PA, and slow down the construction of illegal settlements, Netanyahu’s war on Gaza means to distract from the slowly building collective sentiment among Palestinians throughout Palestine, and among Palestinian citizens in Israel.</p>
<p>This unity is much more alarming for Netanyahu than a political arrangement by Fatah and Hamas necessitated by regional circumstances. The targeting of Hamas is an Israeli attempt at challenging the emerging new narrative that is no longer about Gaza and its siege anymore, but the entirety of Palestine and its collectives regardless of which side of the Israeli “separation wall” they live on.</p>
<p>A true Palestinian unity culminating in a massive popular Intifada is the kind of war Netanyahu cannot possibly win.</p> | false | 1 | bodies three israeli settlers aftali frenkel gilad shaar 16 eyal yifrach 19 found june 30 near hebron southern west bank israel went state mourning wave sympathy flowed around world three disappeared 18 days earlier circumstances remain unclear entire episode particularly grim ending seemed traumatize israelis ignoring harsh truths settlers militarization society amid portrayal three hapless youths although one 19yearold soldier commentators failed provide badly needed context events assigned blame deserved expansionist policies sown hatred bloodshed discovery bodies real face netanyahus notoriously rightwing government wellknown held illusions peaceful occupation could run figures foreign minister avigdor lieberman economy minister naftali bennett deputy defense minister danny danon children term used netanyahu involved even critics didnt expect exercise political pointscoring sympathy elicited missing settlers case quickly vanished face israeli response west bank jerusalem later fullscale war gaza largely seen crucible world opinion disproportionate cruel rather related tragic death three youths response obviously reflected netanyahus grand political calculations mobs israeli jews went ethnic lynching spree israel jerusalem west bank likened pogrom occupation soldiers conducted massive arrest campaign hundreds palestinians mostly hamas members supporters islamic resistance movement hamas said role death settlers appears plausible since rarely hesitate take credit something carried military wing israeli military strategists well aware war hamas however little killed settlers everything political circumstances preceded disappearance may 15 two palestinian youths nadim siam abu nuwara 17 mohammed mahmoud odeh salameh 16 killed israeli soldiers taking part protest commemorating anniversary nakba great catastrophe video footage shows nadim innocently standing group friends collapsing hit israeli army bullet nakba took place 66 years ago socalled arabisraeli conflict emerged estimated one million palestinians forced homes fled zionist invasion israel established ruins palestine nadim mohammed like youths several generations since killed cold blood walked remember exodus israel outrage however palestinian anger seems constant accumulation military occupation enduring harsh economic conditions reaching tipping point way deaths palestinian youths distraction political disunity afflicted palestinian leadership society years deaths reminder palestine idea collective plight struggle goes beyond confines politics even ideology deaths reminded us much palestine whims aging palestinian authority president mahmoud abbas ramallahbased henchmen even hamass regional calculations following rise fall arab spring israeli reaction settlers death different discovery bodies fellow settlers rightwing israelis began exacting revenge palestinian communities mob united slogan death arabs reviving longdisused notion single palestinian identity precedes emergence fatah hamas perhaps paradoxically grief anger provoked death mohammad abu khdeir 17 burnt alive israeli settlers part lashing furthered reawakening longfragmented palestinian national identity identity suffered due israeli walls military tactics palestinians disunity glued back together process resembles events preceded first second uprisings 1987 2000 respectively however unlike previous intifadas hurdles towards unified voice time seem insurmountable abbas weak leader done much meet israels security expectations little defend rights people relic bygone era merely exists best option israel us moment aftermath israeli violent response killing settlers abbas labored coordinate massive israeli search times stayed away israeli troops brutalized palestinians west bank clear third intifada leaves abbas wretched political apparatus place precisely palestinian authority goons prevented many attempts palestinians west bank protest israeli violence unleashed occupied territories finally culminated massive war gaza killed wounded hundreds whatever credit abbas supposedly gained closing ranks hamas form unity government last june quickly lost overshadowed failures live commitment unity deal relevance authority quickly eclipsed israeli violence highlighting governments utter irrelevance israels political calculations israel launched massive arrest campaign mainly targeted hamas west bank hamass political wing already considering alternatives unity government ramallah hamass objectives met unity deal meant achieve several goals end hamass political isolation gaza resulting intensifying siege egypts abdul fatah alsisi solving economic crisis strip also allowing hamas revert old brand resistance movement first foremost even hamas succeeded establishing new brand based resistancepolitical model israel determined deactivate potential palestinian unity destroying unity became almost obsession netanyahu disappearance settlers gave netanyahus quest new impetus immediately began campaign pressuring abbas break away hamas still israels war gaza fearing intifada would unite palestinians threaten pa slow construction illegal settlements netanyahus war gaza means distract slowly building collective sentiment among palestinians throughout palestine among palestinian citizens israel unity much alarming netanyahu political arrangement fatah hamas necessitated regional circumstances targeting hamas israeli attempt challenging emerging new narrative longer gaza siege anymore entirety palestine collectives regardless side israeli separation wall live true palestinian unity culminating massive popular intifada kind war netanyahu possibly win | 716 |
<p>What with Campaign 2012 hurtling into its last lap, the fourth game of the World Series being contested in Detroit, and Hurricane Sandy bearing down on the East Coast, it completely slipped my attention that Sunday, October 28, was the 1,700th anniversary of the Battle of the Milvian Bridge. There, Constantine defeated Maxentius, seized the Roman imperium, and began the process by which Christianity became Christendom. But up in his Canadian pastoral redoubt on Wolfe Island, the ever-alert Father Raymond de Souza was paying attention, and his thoughtful reflection in the National Post on the legacy of the imperial embrace of the Christian Church, and the subsequent practice of church establishment, prompted a few thoughts of my own on the Milvian Bridge and us, shortly before Election Day 2012.</p>
<p>Christian communities have played an enormously influential role in shaping American history since the colonial period, precisely because America was never a part of political Christendom. Cultural Christendom, yes; but not political Christendom, for while there were established churches in the colonies at the time of the Revolution, those establishments sat uneasily with various dissident Protestant groups (often Baptists of one sort or another), and even more uneasily with the colonies’ minuscule Catholic population.</p>
<p>Those ecclesial establishments survived the first years of American independence under the Articles of Confederation. But when the time came to give the new United States a proper Constitution, a critical mass of Christian opinion–Christian opinion, not secular opinion–held that the new national government should be constitutionally proscribed from getting into the business of ecclesiastical establishment. Thus was the First Amendment, under which having “no establishment” would serve the free exercise of religion, born. And state establishments of Congregationalism or Anglicanism, though not addressed in the Constitution, quickly fell by the wayside of American history.</p>
<p>Non-established and self-sustaining American Christian communities in a free and self-governing United States were thus a sign of contradiction at a time when various forms of the “Constantinian settlement” still prevailed in the West. Outside America’s boundaries, the Constantinian idea that the best possible arrangement was one in which the state gave favor and financial support to one established church continued, leading to political aberrations such as Josephism in Austria (where the son of Empress Maria Theresa considered the Church “a department of the police”) and theological oddities such as the British cabinet, under Disraeli, deciding whether certain kinds of candles could be used on altars and certain prayers used at Anglican services. To be sure, America was not without theological strangeness. But as Alexis de Tocqueville shrewdly observed, religion was the first of American political institutions precisely because it wasn’t a political institution: Absent the evangelically stifling embrace of the state, religious conviction flourished in America on its own terms, deeply shaped cultural and social life, and thereby influenced politics.</p>
<p>It’s also worth noting that the one part of the Western world that has, to date, resisted thoroughgoing secularization is the part of the West that stood outside the Constantinian orbit. And while there are many reasons for the collapse of Christian vitality in much of Europe, few serious analysts of Europe’s apostasy doubt that the slackness and complacency that come from ecclesiastical establishment is one significant factor in the de-Christianization of the historic Christian heartland.</p>
<p>The day before he met Maxentius at the Milvian Bridge, Constantine is said to have seen a sign in the sky–according to some, the cross; according to others, the Chi-Rho, a Greek monogram for “Christ.” Whatever he saw, he took it as a sign of divine favor from the God of the Christians and, in recompense, took the historically fateful decision to make the world safe for a previously persecuted Christianity (as Father de Souza nicely put it). Seventeen hundred years later, Western Christianity has now largely disentangled itself from the Constantinian arrangement on church-and-state.</p>
<p>The Catholic Church, for example, flatly rejected any future Constantinian settlements in 1965, in the Second Vatican Council’s Declaration on Religious Freedom, and in the 1983 Code of Canon Law, which denies political authorities a role in the appointment of bishops (a battle the Church has been fighting since Pope Gregory VII met the Holy Roman Emperor Henry II at Canossa in the early 11th century). Yet a new Constantinianism has come into view these past four years; and its “sign” is neither the cross nor the Chi-Rho, but the rainbow of the Obama campaign logo.</p>
<p>Like so much of the Obama administration’s social and economic policy, the Constantinianism of the administration is more European than American. In Obamacare and other initiatives, the administration has sought to replicate the European social-welfare state and the European state’s typical relationship to the national economy. The Constantinianism of the administration, although informed by the secularism implicit in that rainbow logo, is an attempt to bring America’s religious communities into a more European relationship to state power, not through church establishment in the classic sense, but through regulation.</p>
<p>Thus we have had the Obama version of the investiture controversy (who gets to choose religious ministers?), played out in the administration’s efforts to repeal the “ministerial exception” to equal-employment-opportunity law (which permits religious communities to order their internal lives according to their own self-understanding). And we have had the Obama equivalent of Josephism in the Obamacare “contraceptive mandate,” although in this instance the effort is not to make the Church into a “department of the police” but into a subdivision of the Department of Health and Human Services.</p>
<p>There is another odd historical twist to the story of the Milvian Bridge and us.</p>
<p>During the battles over religious freedom at Vatican II, one of the last Catholic defenders of church establishment–and thus of the Constantinian settlement–was Cardinal Alfredo Ottaviani, Secretary of the Holy Office, who had long buttressed his support of Catholic establishment with the claim that “error has no rights” (and by “error,” the doughty Ottaviani meant non-Catholic religious conviction). The bishops of Vatican II rejected that claim, on the ground that persons have rights, be their opinions true or false; thus the right of religious freedom, as the Council fathers finally taught, “is based on the very dignity of the human person as known through the revealed word of God and by reason itself.”</p>
<p>And here is the ironic twist: The secular Constantinians in the Obama administration are also the new defenders of the Ottaviani proposition that “error has no rights.” If the Evangelical Lutheran Hosanna-Tabor congregation in Redland, Mich., doesn’t agree with the U.S. government about Hosanna-Tabor’s employment practices, well, the congregation is wrong, error has no rights, and we’ll see you in court. If the Catholic Church doesn’t agree with the United States government on what constitute “reproductive health services,” the Catholic Church is wrong; and as error has no rights, the Church must be compelled under threat of serious financial penalties to do the government’s bidding (even though the government has a myriad of ways to distribute contraceptives and provide sterilizations and abortifacient drugs). As for the Defense of Marriage Act, which the Obama Justice Department has declined to defend, well, those who support DOMA are clearly wrong, according to the U.S. government; such an egregious error (an offense to everything symbolized by that rainbow logo) has no rights; thus these wrong-headed people can be portrayed as irrational bi gots, and the law they seek to defend can be pilloried as a mirror image of the old segregation laws.</p>
<p>Barack Obama as the Holy Roman Emperors Henry IV or Joseph II? It may seem a stretch. Still, the record is clear, and the historical parallels to the investiture controversy and Josephism are suggestive. The strategic goal of binding the churches (and indeed every other civil-society institution) ever closer to the federal government is plainly in view. A court jester is at hand (the vice president of the United States, who recently opined that transgender discrimination is “the civil-rights issue of our time”).</p>
<p>But America can say goodbye to all that on November 6. And in doing so, it can reaffirm its own experience of religious freedom, which has given biblical religion in America an unparalleled vitality in the developed world.</p>
<p>–George Weigel is Distinguished Senior Fellow of Washington’s Ethics and Public Policy Center, where he holds the William E. Simon Chair in Catholic Studies.</p> | false | 1 | campaign 2012 hurtling last lap fourth game world series contested detroit hurricane sandy bearing east coast completely slipped attention sunday october 28 1700th anniversary battle milvian bridge constantine defeated maxentius seized roman imperium began process christianity became christendom canadian pastoral redoubt wolfe island everalert father raymond de souza paying attention thoughtful reflection national post legacy imperial embrace christian church subsequent practice church establishment prompted thoughts milvian bridge us shortly election day 2012 christian communities played enormously influential role shaping american history since colonial period precisely america never part political christendom cultural christendom yes political christendom established churches colonies time revolution establishments sat uneasily various dissident protestant groups often baptists one sort another even uneasily colonies minuscule catholic population ecclesial establishments survived first years american independence articles confederation time came give new united states proper constitution critical mass christian opinionchristian opinion secular opinionheld new national government constitutionally proscribed getting business ecclesiastical establishment thus first amendment establishment would serve free exercise religion born state establishments congregationalism anglicanism though addressed constitution quickly fell wayside american history nonestablished selfsustaining american christian communities free selfgoverning united states thus sign contradiction time various forms constantinian settlement still prevailed west outside americas boundaries constantinian idea best possible arrangement one state gave favor financial support one established church continued leading political aberrations josephism austria son empress maria theresa considered church department police theological oddities british cabinet disraeli deciding whether certain kinds candles could used altars certain prayers used anglican services sure america without theological strangeness alexis de tocqueville shrewdly observed religion first american political institutions precisely wasnt political institution absent evangelically stifling embrace state religious conviction flourished america terms deeply shaped cultural social life thereby influenced politics also worth noting one part western world date resisted thoroughgoing secularization part west stood outside constantinian orbit many reasons collapse christian vitality much europe serious analysts europes apostasy doubt slackness complacency come ecclesiastical establishment one significant factor dechristianization historic christian heartland day met maxentius milvian bridge constantine said seen sign skyaccording cross according others chirho greek monogram christ whatever saw took sign divine favor god christians recompense took historically fateful decision make world safe previously persecuted christianity father de souza nicely put seventeen hundred years later western christianity largely disentangled constantinian arrangement churchandstate catholic church example flatly rejected future constantinian settlements 1965 second vatican councils declaration religious freedom 1983 code canon law denies political authorities role appointment bishops battle church fighting since pope gregory vii met holy roman emperor henry ii canossa early 11th century yet new constantinianism come view past four years sign neither cross chirho rainbow obama campaign logo like much obama administrations social economic policy constantinianism administration european american obamacare initiatives administration sought replicate european socialwelfare state european states typical relationship national economy constantinianism administration although informed secularism implicit rainbow logo attempt bring americas religious communities european relationship state power church establishment classic sense regulation thus obama version investiture controversy gets choose religious ministers played administrations efforts repeal ministerial exception equalemploymentopportunity law permits religious communities order internal lives according selfunderstanding obama equivalent josephism obamacare contraceptive mandate although instance effort make church department police subdivision department health human services another odd historical twist story milvian bridge us battles religious freedom vatican ii one last catholic defenders church establishmentand thus constantinian settlementwas cardinal alfredo ottaviani secretary holy office long buttressed support catholic establishment claim error rights error doughty ottaviani meant noncatholic religious conviction bishops vatican ii rejected claim ground persons rights opinions true false thus right religious freedom council fathers finally taught based dignity human person known revealed word god reason ironic twist secular constantinians obama administration also new defenders ottaviani proposition error rights evangelical lutheran hosannatabor congregation redland mich doesnt agree us government hosannatabors employment practices well congregation wrong error rights well see court catholic church doesnt agree united states government constitute reproductive health services catholic church wrong error rights church must compelled threat serious financial penalties governments bidding even though government myriad ways distribute contraceptives provide sterilizations abortifacient drugs defense marriage act obama justice department declined defend well support doma clearly wrong according us government egregious error offense everything symbolized rainbow logo rights thus wrongheaded people portrayed irrational bi gots law seek defend pilloried mirror image old segregation laws barack obama holy roman emperors henry iv joseph ii may seem stretch still record clear historical parallels investiture controversy josephism suggestive strategic goal binding churches indeed every civilsociety institution ever closer federal government plainly view court jester hand vice president united states recently opined transgender discrimination civilrights issue time america say goodbye november 6 reaffirm experience religious freedom given biblical religion america unparalleled vitality developed world george weigel distinguished senior fellow washingtons ethics public policy center holds william e simon chair catholic studies | 784 |
<p>From beginning to end, the debt crisis talks have come down to a struggle between advocates of tax increases and champions of domestic discretionary spending cuts. This important dispute has been at the heart of our politics for decades, and without question our out-of-control discretionary budget has a lot to do with the size of today’s deficit and debt. But it has little to do with tomorrow’s deficits and debt​—​that is, with the unprecedented oncoming explosion of federal spending and borrowing that terrifies our creditors and gravely threatens our future prosperity. Democrats were able to keep that approaching disaster entirely off the table in the debt ceiling fight. In the next round, Republicans must make sure to put it front and center.</p>
<p>Simply put, our coming debt crisis is a health care cost crisis. In 1971, the government spent 1 percent of GDP on Medicare and Medicaid. Four decades later, spending on these two programs has more than quintupled to 5.6 percent of GDP last year. In its latest long-term outlook document, published in June, the Congressional Budget Office projected that spending on these programs, and on the new entitlements created by Obama-care, will reach 10.4 percent of GDP by 2035 and 13 percent by 2050. In the meantime, all other government spending combined (including Social Security, defense, domestic discretionary spending, and everything other than interest on the debt) will actually decline, from 17 percent of GDP today to 14.6 percent in 2035 and 14 percent in 2050.</p>
<p>CBO projects that annual budget deficits will soar over this period to more than 15 percent of GDP each year by 2035 and 25 percent by 2050, and the national debt will be more than twice the size of the economy and growing. So even if the agency’s (likely too rosy) projections of economic growth come true and non-health spending falls as a share of the economy, health-entitlement spending would still grow fast enough to push the country off a fiscal cliff. Fixing our health care entitlements is the essential deficit and debt reform.</p>
<p>The president and congressional Democrats insisted on keeping meaningful health reforms off the table in the debt ceiling talks​—​criticizing Republicans for rejecting tax increases while they themselves rejected the only possible path to real debt reduction. Instead, they sought to lock in place their health care legislation (which vastly expands Medicaid spending and creates a costly new health entitlement through its state-exchange subsidies) and only tinker around the edges of Medicare and Medicaid.</p>
<p>In a study released on July 28, as the debt ceiling deadline approached, the actuaries of the Obama administration’s own Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services found that Obamacare will increase, not reduce, national health expenditures​—​bending the cost curve not down but up, and exacerbating an already critical problem. But even when a “grand bargain” on the debt ceiling still seemed like an option, the president refused to consider any changes to Obamacare as part of the deal, and was open to only the paltriest changes to our older health care entitlements.</p>
<p>He proposed to double down on the price controls that have done so much to cause the health-cost crisis. He proposed to raise the Medicare eligibility age to 67, which the CBO says would save very little, since Medicare’s soaring costs are heavily weighted toward older seniors. He endorsed modest cost-sharing increases for certain Medicare services and shifting more Medicaid costs onto the states.</p>
<p>Such cuts might produce marginal savings for a time, but they would not come close to addressing the heart of the problem. They would lock in place the immensely inefficient open-ended payment structure of Medicare (which is the chief driver of health care cost inflation) and the new health care law’s architecture, with the federal government calling the shots in the health sector. Under such circumstances, cost cutting can only be achieved at the expense of quality care​—and even so it rarely happens. Worse yet, such trivial steps would make real reforms less likely, by letting our leaders persuade themselves they have dealt with entitlements when in fact they would have only bought a little time.</p>
<p>To fix health care and the federal budget, reformers must set their sights on a much more fundamental shift, away from central planning and toward a genuine marketplace in health care​—​with cost-conscious consumers subjecting insurers and providers to competitive pressures. They must repeal Obamacare and convert today’s open-ended health care entitlements into defined-contribution programs, with predictable government budgets and sound incentives for efficiency and quality. Public support would be focused on those who need it most, and everyone would have strong incentives to sign up for high-value, low-cost plans to cut their premiums.</p>
<p>In April, the House passed a budget that moves Medicare and Medicaid decisively in this direction. Such a step, and a similar approach for the individual market and small employers, is essential for our health care system, and for the nation’s fiscal future. If there ever is to be a grand bargain with the Democrats, Republicans must make reforms like these their absolute bottom-line demands​—because our badly broken health entitlement system is at the heart of the government debt problem.</p>
<p>During the recent negotiations, Democrats closed off the path to real health reforms. Their top priority was tax increases. But as the president himself put it in early July, “if you look at the numbers, then Medicare in particular will run out of money and we will not be able to sustain that program no matter how much taxes go up.”</p>
<p>For Republicans, spending cuts have been the top priority, and rightly so. But the real problem is spending on health-entitlement programs. If that category of spending is not brought under the discipline of an effective marketplace, then American health care, and our economy as a whole, will be on the road to ruin.</p>
<p>Genuine health care reform therefore needs to be at the core of the Republican case for fiscal sanity​—a case that in turn must be front and center in the 2012 election. That election may well be the only real chance we have left to avoid a genuine debt crisis and set America back on the path to enduring prosperity and strength.</p>
<p>James C. Capretta is a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. He was an associate director at the Office of Management and Budget from 2001 to 2004. Yuval Levin is Hertog Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and editor of National Affairs.</p> | false | 1 | beginning end debt crisis talks come struggle advocates tax increases champions domestic discretionary spending cuts important dispute heart politics decades without question outofcontrol discretionary budget lot size todays deficit debt little tomorrows deficits debtthat unprecedented oncoming explosion federal spending borrowing terrifies creditors gravely threatens future prosperity democrats able keep approaching disaster entirely table debt ceiling fight next round republicans must make sure put front center simply put coming debt crisis health care cost crisis 1971 government spent 1 percent gdp medicare medicaid four decades later spending two programs quintupled 56 percent gdp last year latest longterm outlook document published june congressional budget office projected spending programs new entitlements created obamacare reach 104 percent gdp 2035 13 percent 2050 meantime government spending combined including social security defense domestic discretionary spending everything interest debt actually decline 17 percent gdp today 146 percent 2035 14 percent 2050 cbo projects annual budget deficits soar period 15 percent gdp year 2035 25 percent 2050 national debt twice size economy growing even agencys likely rosy projections economic growth come true nonhealth spending falls share economy healthentitlement spending would still grow fast enough push country fiscal cliff fixing health care entitlements essential deficit debt reform president congressional democrats insisted keeping meaningful health reforms table debt ceiling talkscriticizing republicans rejecting tax increases rejected possible path real debt reduction instead sought lock place health care legislation vastly expands medicaid spending creates costly new health entitlement stateexchange subsidies tinker around edges medicare medicaid study released july 28 debt ceiling deadline approached actuaries obama administrations centers medicare medicaid services found obamacare increase reduce national health expendituresbending cost curve exacerbating already critical problem even grand bargain debt ceiling still seemed like option president refused consider changes obamacare part deal open paltriest changes older health care entitlements proposed double price controls done much cause healthcost crisis proposed raise medicare eligibility age 67 cbo says would save little since medicares soaring costs heavily weighted toward older seniors endorsed modest costsharing increases certain medicare services shifting medicaid costs onto states cuts might produce marginal savings time would come close addressing heart problem would lock place immensely inefficient openended payment structure medicare chief driver health care cost inflation new health care laws architecture federal government calling shots health sector circumstances cost cutting achieved expense quality careand even rarely happens worse yet trivial steps would make real reforms less likely letting leaders persuade dealt entitlements fact would bought little time fix health care federal budget reformers must set sights much fundamental shift away central planning toward genuine marketplace health carewith costconscious consumers subjecting insurers providers competitive pressures must repeal obamacare convert todays openended health care entitlements definedcontribution programs predictable government budgets sound incentives efficiency quality public support would focused need everyone would strong incentives sign highvalue lowcost plans cut premiums april house passed budget moves medicare medicaid decisively direction step similar approach individual market small employers essential health care system nations fiscal future ever grand bargain democrats republicans must make reforms like absolute bottomline demandsbecause badly broken health entitlement system heart government debt problem recent negotiations democrats closed path real health reforms top priority tax increases president put early july look numbers medicare particular run money able sustain program matter much taxes go republicans spending cuts top priority rightly real problem spending healthentitlement programs category spending brought discipline effective marketplace american health care economy whole road ruin genuine health care reform therefore needs core republican case fiscal sanitya case turn must front center 2012 election election may well real chance left avoid genuine debt crisis set america back path enduring prosperity strength james c capretta fellow ethics public policy center associate director office management budget 2001 2004 yuval levin hertog fellow ethics public policy center editor national affairs | 621 |
<p>NEW YORK JETS (5-7) AT DENVER BRONCOS (3-9)</p>
<p>GAME SNAPSHOT</p>
<p>KICKOFF: Sunday, 4:05 p.m. ET, Sports Authority Field at Mile High. TV: CBS, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Greg_Gumbel/" type="external">Greg Gumbel</a>, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Trent_Green/" type="external">Trent Green</a>, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jamie-Erdahl/" type="external">Jamie Erdahl</a> (field reporter).</p>
<p>SERIES HISTORY: 35th regular-season meeting. Broncos lead series, 18-15-1. The Broncos have won four of the last five. The most historic meeting was on Jan. 17, 1999, when the Broncos won 23-10 in the AFC Championship Game in <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/John_Elway/" type="external">John Elway</a>‘s final home game.</p>
<p>KEYS TO THE GAME: Possession was nine-tenths of the law for the Jets in their win over the Chiefs last week, as they called 49 running plays and held the football for 42:49, countering the Chiefs’ big-play ability with time-consuming marches bolstered by a 65 percent success rate on third downs.</p>
<p>They will try to replicate that against a Broncos defense that buckled against the run last week without <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Derek-Wolfe/" type="external">Derek Wolfe</a> and Domata Peko.</p>
<p>Despite the team’s struggles, Denver’s defense remains stout, as it allows 296 yards per game, which is the fifth fewest in the league. Still, the Broncos allow the second-most points (26.3 per game), which means their offense usually gives up a short field.</p>
<p>The Jets average just 17.4 points on the road, compared to 25.5 at home. If the Jets can take their air show on the road, they should be in business.</p>
<p>Denver showed potential early in its loss to Miami when it came out running the football, but got away from it after being stuffed for no gain on its fourth snap following three handoffs to <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/C.J._Anderson/" type="external">C.J. Anderson</a> that picked up 21 yards — all of which got six yards or more.</p>
<p>For the Jets’ defense, it’s all about getting interceptions. Broncos quarterbacks have thrown 14 interceptions during their eight-game losing streak, including nine from current starter <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Trevor-Siemian/" type="external">Trevor Siemian</a>. The Jets have 10 interceptions, but none the last two weeks. They have to break that skid to win.</p>
<p>MATCHUPS TO WATCH:</p>
<p>–Jets RBs <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Bilal-Powell/" type="external">Bilal Powell</a> and <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Matt_Forte/" type="external">Matt Forte</a> vs. Broncos’ front seven. Forte and Powell combined for 106 yards on 33 carries last week as the Jets pounded away at the Chiefs, running the ball 49 times. Denver’s defensive line will play the rest of the season without the injured Derek Wolfe and could be without nose tackle Domata Peko for this game. With Wolfe and Peko out last week, the Broncos allowed Miami’s Kenyan Drake to rush for 120 yards, including a 42-yard touchdown gallop in the third quarter that effectively put the game out of reach.</p>
<p>–Broncos QB Trevor Siemian vs. Jets’ secondary. New York has just one interception in its last five games, but at one point in the season was on a pick tear, intercepting nine passes in Weeks 3-7. Siemian has thrown three interceptions in each of his last two starts — last week at Miami and in Week 8 at Kansas City — and has a 5-to-11 touchdown-to-interception ratio since Week 3.</p>
<p>FRIDAY INJURY REPORTS</p>
<p>NEW YORK JETS</p>
<p>–Out: LB Bruce Carter (groin)</p>
<p>–Questionable: RB Matt Forte (knee), G Brian Winters (abdomen, ankle)</p>
<p>DENVER BRONCOS</p>
<p>–Out: G <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Ronald-Leary/" type="external">Ronald Leary</a> (back), QB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Paxton-Lynch/" type="external">Paxton Lynch</a> (ankle)</p>
<p>–Questionable: DE Adam Gotsis (illness), DT Domata Peko (knee), WR <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Emmanuel-Sanders/" type="external">Emmanuel Sanders</a> (ankle)</p>
<p>PLAYER SPOTLIGHT: Jets WR <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jermaine-Kearse/" type="external">Jermaine Kearse</a>. He had a bit of a midseason slump but has really stepped up his game the last two weeks, with 16 catches for 262 yards and a touchdown. He and Robby Anderson are the first Jets to have back-to-back 100-yard receiving games since Don Maynard and the late George Sauer in 1967. Kearse has a career-high 51 catches, and his 677 yards are eight shy of a career-high. His five touchdowns are tied for a career-high.</p>
<p>FAST FACTS: Jets QB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Josh_McCown/" type="external">Josh McCown</a> threw for 331 yards and ran for two scores in Week 13. He is tied for the lead among NFL QBs with five rushing TDs. … RB Bilal Powell leads New York with 502 rushing yards. His 4.88-yard average per carry since 2016 is the second-highest in the NFL (minimum 200 rushes). … RB Matt Forte has a rushing and receiving TD in eight consecutive seasons, tied for fourth-longest streak in NFL history. … WR Robby Anderson caught eight passes for 107 yards last week, his second straight 100-yard game. He also has six touchdowns in his past six games. … Denver RB C.J. Anderson had 110 scrimmage yards (67 rushing) last week. In his past 10 games at home, he has 883 scrimmage yards and seven TDs. … WR <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Demaryius_Thomas/" type="external">Demaryius Thomas</a> aims for a third straight home game with a TD. He caught 10 balls for 124 yards and a TD in the last meeting and has scored in two of the past three games vs. the Jets. … LB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Von-Miller/" type="external">Von Miller</a> had two sacks in the last meeting and has 3.5 sacks and five tackles for loss in the past two vs. the Jets. … CB Aqib Talib returned an interception for a TD in the last game vs. New York and has three interceptions in his past two games against the Jets.</p>
<p>PREDICTION: The Jets are 1-4 on the road (the win at Cleveland), but the Broncos can’t stop shooting themselves in the feet.</p>
<p>OUR PICK: Jets, 27-13.</p>
<p>— <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Chris-Cluff/" type="external">Chris Cluff</a></p> | false | 1 | new york jets 57 denver broncos 39 game snapshot kickoff sunday 405 pm et sports authority field mile high tv cbs greg gumbel trent green jamie erdahl field reporter series history 35th regularseason meeting broncos lead series 18151 broncos four last five historic meeting jan 17 1999 broncos 2310 afc championship game john elways final home game keys game possession ninetenths law jets win chiefs last week called 49 running plays held football 4249 countering chiefs bigplay ability timeconsuming marches bolstered 65 percent success rate third downs try replicate broncos defense buckled run last week without derek wolfe domata peko despite teams struggles denvers defense remains stout allows 296 yards per game fifth fewest league still broncos allow secondmost points 263 per game means offense usually gives short field jets average 174 points road compared 255 home jets take air show road business denver showed potential early loss miami came running football got away stuffed gain fourth snap following three handoffs cj anderson picked 21 yards got six yards jets defense getting interceptions broncos quarterbacks thrown 14 interceptions eightgame losing streak including nine current starter trevor siemian jets 10 interceptions none last two weeks break skid win matchups watch jets rbs bilal powell matt forte vs broncos front seven forte powell combined 106 yards 33 carries last week jets pounded away chiefs running ball 49 times denvers defensive line play rest season without injured derek wolfe could without nose tackle domata peko game wolfe peko last week broncos allowed miamis kenyan drake rush 120 yards including 42yard touchdown gallop third quarter effectively put game reach broncos qb trevor siemian vs jets secondary new york one interception last five games one point season pick tear intercepting nine passes weeks 37 siemian thrown three interceptions last two starts last week miami week 8 kansas city 5to11 touchdowntointerception ratio since week 3 friday injury reports new york jets lb bruce carter groin questionable rb matt forte knee g brian winters abdomen ankle denver broncos g ronald leary back qb paxton lynch ankle questionable de adam gotsis illness dt domata peko knee wr emmanuel sanders ankle player spotlight jets wr jermaine kearse bit midseason slump really stepped game last two weeks 16 catches 262 yards touchdown robby anderson first jets backtoback 100yard receiving games since maynard late george sauer 1967 kearse careerhigh 51 catches 677 yards eight shy careerhigh five touchdowns tied careerhigh fast facts jets qb josh mccown threw 331 yards ran two scores week 13 tied lead among nfl qbs five rushing tds rb bilal powell leads new york 502 rushing yards 488yard average per carry since 2016 secondhighest nfl minimum 200 rushes rb matt forte rushing receiving td eight consecutive seasons tied fourthlongest streak nfl history wr robby anderson caught eight passes 107 yards last week second straight 100yard game also six touchdowns past six games denver rb cj anderson 110 scrimmage yards 67 rushing last week past 10 games home 883 scrimmage yards seven tds wr demaryius thomas aims third straight home game td caught 10 balls 124 yards td last meeting scored two past three games vs jets lb von miller two sacks last meeting 35 sacks five tackles loss past two vs jets cb aqib talib returned interception td last game vs new york three interceptions past two games jets prediction jets 14 road win cleveland broncos cant stop shooting feet pick jets 2713 chris cluff | 568 |
<p>Aug. 9 (UPI) — Hilarie Sorensen intended to do her master’s thesis on crystal jellyfish, the half moon-shaped bioluminescent jellies that are ubiquitous off the West Coast. Instead she’ll be researching a jelly-like creature she hadn’t heard of before May.</p>
<p>That was when the University of Oregon marine biology graduate student went on a two-week research cruise from San Francisco to Newport, Ore. “In pretty much every single station, all we would get were pyrosomes,” she said.</p>
<p>Pyrosomes look like a type of jellyfish but are actually colonies of tiny glowing animals usually found in tropical and subtropical oceans. But in recent years they’ve appeared in the millions off the coasts of Oregon, Washington, British Columbia and Alaska.</p>
<p>This isn’t the first year pyrosomes have appeared off the Northwest. “From 2015, we started [seeing] them in larger numbers. And 2016 was even larger. But then in February, we saw huge numbers, and in May even more,” said Samantha Zeman, a research associate at Oregon State University who was also on the May cruise and has been monitoring the pyrosome boom.</p>
<p>Some of the researchers on the cruise with Sorensen had seen them earlier in the year. But even those who had were struck by the sheer numbers of pyrosomes.</p>
<p>“It was pretty much the only thing we would catch,” Sorensen said. “What became increasingly frustrating was that there was so many of them. We just kept seeing more and more of them the further north and further offshore we went.”</p>
<p>A GoPro camera attached to a net was sent down to 330 feet. “When we plugged in that video and looked at it on the screen the entire view was just pyrosomes. There was nothing else,” she said, estimating there were a thousand of the gelatinous, tube-shaped creatures just within that frame. The average length of the ones pulled up was just over 10 inches, though they ranged from a few inches to over a foot.</p>
<p>Why they’re there, whether they’ll be back in future years and what impacts they’ll have on ecosystems and fisheries that haven’t seen these animals before are all questions researchers like Sorensen didn’t even know were worth trying to answer a couple months ago.</p>
<p>She’s focusing on determining what environmental conditions – salinity, temperature – appear to lead to an abundance of the newcomers. In short, why are they here?</p>
<p>The general hypothesis has been that the usually tropical species showed up because of recent warm water temperatures – in particular, “the Blob,” a mass of warm water that persisted off the West Coast from 2014 to 2016. Although Sorensen is “sure the story is much more complicated than that.”</p>
<p>But there are many more questions to answer.</p>
<p>For instance, Sorensen noted that some researchers have been dragging a bottom trawl along the sea floor and bringing up scores of dead pyrosomes. Other huge booms in a certain species, like algae, are followed by equally huge die-offs that consume dissolved oxygen as the animals decompose, leading to oxygen-deficient swathes of ocean. Could that pyrosome-caused dead zone become a new part of ocean cycles in the northeastern Pacific?</p>
<p>“I would not be surprised if in the next few months we see a lot of proposals going in for new research,” Sorensen said.</p>
<p>One question they’ll try to answer is how much phytoplankton they’re eating – and whether that’s impacting the rest of the food web. “They’re eating huge quantities of primary producers,” said Sorensen. “If they do continue to show up, what’s going to be the impact of that in terms of primary production?”</p>
<p>And then there’s the matter of what’s eating them.</p>
<p>“It is amazing to see them coming out of black cod,” Linda Behnken, executive director of the Alaska Longline Fishermen’s Association, said from her fishing boat off Sitka, Alaska, last week, where she was long-lining for black cod. That means the bottom-dwelling fish were eating the pyrosomes; surprising since pyrosomes are generally thought to stay near the sea’s surface.</p>
<p>“They must be thick from surface to deep,” Behnken added.</p>
<p>Zeman noted that fin whales and rockfish are known to eat them, too. “Though I’m not sure how much nutrition they have – they probably have to eat a lot, and maybe can’t digest them,” she added.</p>
<p>Behnken isn’t the only one encountering them in Alaska this year. A crab boat reported seeing thousands of pyrosomes illuminated in its lights on March 18 in the Chatham Strait, east of Baranof Island, home to Sitka, according to a map compiled by local fishers. A black cod long liner reported “fairly dense concentrations from the surface down” March 22 on the other side of the island. A salmon boat reported “clusters on troll gear” at the southern tip of the island April 15. When king salmon season opened in early July, one fisher reported picking 20 to 30 pyrosomes off the gear daily during a four-day period; the largest one was 1 foot long, though none were found in the salmon’s stomachs.</p>
<p>Compare that to last year, when Alaska fishers didn’t know what the jelly-like newcomers were. Alyssa Russell was on a boat that pulled up pyrosomes constantly – at least a dozen or two a day – while trolling for salmon last summer near Sitka. “The captain said, ‘I’ve never seen this before,'” she said.</p>
<p>She said that they didn’t seem to be tangling gear or causing problems, and Behnken said the pyrosomes weren’t slowing down her black cod fishing this year. But there have been reports that early this spring the pyrosomes were so abundant and getting caught in gear so often that some fishers in Alaska and Oregon stopped fishing for a while.</p>
<p>Down off the Oregon coast, things have calmed down a bit. Sorensen said they stopped washing up on beaches and there haven’t been many near shore since the beginning of June – which happens to be when the yearly upwelling of cold, deep waters started.</p>
<p>But she said they have still been coming up in nets offshore, 85 miles out or farther. She’s going back out on a research cruise Friday, to gather some more clues about why the newcomers showed up – and whether they’ll be back.</p>
<p>This article originally appeared on Oceans Deeply, and you can find the original <a href="https://www.newsdeeply.com/oceans/articles/2017/08/09/invasion-of-glowing-tropical-jellyfish-baffles-u-s-scientists" type="external">here.</a> For important news about ocean health, <a href="http://newsdeeply.us5.list-manage1.com/subscribe?u=8b78e9a34ff7443ec1e8c62c6&amp;id=dfde037196" type="external">you can sign up to the Oceans Deeply email list.</a></p> | false | 1 | aug 9 upi hilarie sorensen intended masters thesis crystal jellyfish half moonshaped bioluminescent jellies ubiquitous west coast instead shell researching jellylike creature hadnt heard may university oregon marine biology graduate student went twoweek research cruise san francisco newport ore pretty much every single station would get pyrosomes said pyrosomes look like type jellyfish actually colonies tiny glowing animals usually found tropical subtropical oceans recent years theyve appeared millions coasts oregon washington british columbia alaska isnt first year pyrosomes appeared northwest 2015 started seeing larger numbers 2016 even larger february saw huge numbers may even said samantha zeman research associate oregon state university also may cruise monitoring pyrosome boom researchers cruise sorensen seen earlier year even struck sheer numbers pyrosomes pretty much thing would catch sorensen said became increasingly frustrating many kept seeing north offshore went gopro camera attached net sent 330 feet plugged video looked screen entire view pyrosomes nothing else said estimating thousand gelatinous tubeshaped creatures within frame average length ones pulled 10 inches though ranged inches foot theyre whether theyll back future years impacts theyll ecosystems fisheries havent seen animals questions researchers like sorensen didnt even know worth trying answer couple months ago shes focusing determining environmental conditions salinity temperature appear lead abundance newcomers short general hypothesis usually tropical species showed recent warm water temperatures particular blob mass warm water persisted west coast 2014 2016 although sorensen sure story much complicated many questions answer instance sorensen noted researchers dragging bottom trawl along sea floor bringing scores dead pyrosomes huge booms certain species like algae followed equally huge dieoffs consume dissolved oxygen animals decompose leading oxygendeficient swathes ocean could pyrosomecaused dead zone become new part ocean cycles northeastern pacific would surprised next months see lot proposals going new research sorensen said one question theyll try answer much phytoplankton theyre eating whether thats impacting rest food web theyre eating huge quantities primary producers said sorensen continue show whats going impact terms primary production theres matter whats eating amazing see coming black cod linda behnken executive director alaska longline fishermens association said fishing boat sitka alaska last week longlining black cod means bottomdwelling fish eating pyrosomes surprising since pyrosomes generally thought stay near seas surface must thick surface deep behnken added zeman noted fin whales rockfish known eat though im sure much nutrition probably eat lot maybe cant digest added behnken isnt one encountering alaska year crab boat reported seeing thousands pyrosomes illuminated lights march 18 chatham strait east baranof island home sitka according map compiled local fishers black cod long liner reported fairly dense concentrations surface march 22 side island salmon boat reported clusters troll gear southern tip island april 15 king salmon season opened early july one fisher reported picking 20 30 pyrosomes gear daily fourday period largest one 1 foot long though none found salmons stomachs compare last year alaska fishers didnt know jellylike newcomers alyssa russell boat pulled pyrosomes constantly least dozen two day trolling salmon last summer near sitka captain said ive never seen said said didnt seem tangling gear causing problems behnken said pyrosomes werent slowing black cod fishing year reports early spring pyrosomes abundant getting caught gear often fishers alaska oregon stopped fishing oregon coast things calmed bit sorensen said stopped washing beaches havent many near shore since beginning june happens yearly upwelling cold deep waters started said still coming nets offshore 85 miles farther shes going back research cruise friday gather clues newcomers showed whether theyll back article originally appeared oceans deeply find original important news ocean health sign oceans deeply email list | 590 |
<p>The greatest threat that Russia faces is not sanctions but the incompetence of its neoliberal economists thoroughly brainwashed to serve US interests.</p>
<p>An article by Robert Berke in <a href="http://oilprice.com" type="external">oilprice.com</a>, which describes itself as “The No. 1 Source for Oil &amp; Energy News,” illustrates how interest groups control outcomes by how they shape policy choices.</p>
<p>Berke’s article reveals how the US intends to maintain and extend its hegemony by breaking up the alliance between Russia, Iran, and China, and by oil privatizations that result in countries losing control over their sovereignty to private oil companies that work closely with the US government. As Trump has neutered his presidency by gratuitously accepting Gen. Flynn’s resignation as National Security Advisor, this scheme is likely to be Trump’s approach to “better relations” with Russia.</p>
<p>Berke reports that Henry Kissinger has sold President Trump on a scheme to use the removal of Russian sanctions to pry President Putin away from the Russian alliance with Iran and China. Should Putin fall for such a scheme, it would be a fatal strategic blunder from which Russia could not recover. Yet, Putin will be pressured to make this blunder.</p>
<p>One pressure on Putin comes from the Atlanticist Integrationists who have a material stake in their connections to the West and who want Russia to be integrated into the Western world. Another pressure comes from the affront that sanctions represent to Russians. Removing this insult has become important to Russians even though the sanctions do Russia no material harm.</p>
<p>We agree with President Putin that the sanctions are in fact a benefit to Russia as they have moved Russia in self-sufficient directions and toward developing relationships with China and Asia. Moreover, the West with its hegemonic impulses uses economic relationships for control purposes. Trade with China and Asia does not pose the same threat to Russian independence.</p>
<p>Berke says that part of the deal being offered to Putin is “increased access to the huge European energy market, restored western financial credit, access to Western technology, and a seat at the global decision-making table, all of which Russia badly needs and wants.” Sweetening the honey trap is official recognition of “Crimea as part of Russia.”</p>
<p>Russia might want all of this, but it is nonsense that Russia needs any of it.</p>
<p>Crimea is part of Russia, as it has been for 300 years, and no one can do anything about it. What would it mean if Mexico did not recognize that Texas and California were part of the US? Nothing.</p>
<p>Europe has scant alternatives to Russian energy.</p>
<p>Russia does not need Western technology. Indeed, its military technology is superior to that in the West.</p>
<p>And Russia most certainly does not need Western loans. Indeed, it would be an act of insanity to accept them.</p>
<p>It is a self-serving Western myth that Russia needs foreign loans. This myth is enshrined in neoliberal economics, which is a device for Western exploitation and control of other countries. Russia’s most dangerous threat is the country’s neoliberal economists.</p>
<p>The Russian central bank has convinced the Russian government that it would be inflationary to finance Russian development projects with the issuance of central bank credit. Foreign loans are essential, claims the central bank.</p>
<p>Someone needs to teach the Russian central bank basic economics before Russia is turned into another Western vassal. Here is the lesson: When central bank credit is used to finance development projects, the supply of rubles increases but so does output from the projects. Thus, goods and services rise with the supply of rubles. When Russia borrows foreign currencies from abroad, the money supply also increases, but so does the foreign debt. Russia does not spend the foreign currencies on the project but puts them into its foreign exchange reserves. The central bank issues the same amount of rubles to pay the project’s bills as it would in the absence of the foreign loan. All the foreign loan does is to present Russia with an interest payment to a foreign creditor.</p>
<p>Foreign capital is not important to countries such as Russia and China. Both countries are perfectly capable of financing their own development. Indeed, China is the world’s largest creditor nation. Foreign loans are only important to countries that lack the internal resources for development and have to purchase the business know-how, technology, and resources abroad with foreign currencies that their exports are insufficient to bring in.</p>
<p>This is not the case with Russia, which has large endowments of resources and a trade surplus. China’s development was given a boost by US corporations that moved their production for the US market offshore in order to pocket the difference in labor and regulatory costs.</p>
<p>Neoliberals argue that Russia needs privatization in order to cover its budget deficit. Russia’s government debt is only 17 percent of Russian GDP. According to official measures, US federal debt is 104 percent of GDP, 6.1 times higher than in Russia. If US federal debt is measured in real corrected terms, <a href="http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2014/07/08/deteriorating-economic-outlook/" type="external">US federal debt is 185 percent of US GDP</a>. Clearly, if the massive debt of the US government is not a problem, the tiny debt of Russia is not a problem.</p>
<p>Berke’s article is part of the effort to scam Russia by convincing the Russian government that its prosperity depends on unfavorable deals with the West. As Russia’s neoliberal economists believe this, the scam has a chance of success.</p>
<p>Another delusion affecting the Russian government is the belief that privatization brings in capital. This delusion caused the Russian government to turn over 20 percent of its oil company to foreign ownership. The only thing Russia achieved by this strategic blunder was to deliver 20 percent of its oil profits into foreign hands. For a one-time payment, Russia gave away 20 percent of its oil profits in perpetuity.</p>
<p>To repeat ourselves, the greatest threat that Russia faces is not sanctions but the incompetence of its neoliberal economists who have been thoroughly brainwashed to serve US interests.</p>
<p>This article was originally published at&#160;PaulCraigRoberts.org.</p> | false | 1 | greatest threat russia faces sanctions incompetence neoliberal economists thoroughly brainwashed serve us interests article robert berke oilpricecom describes 1 source oil amp energy news illustrates interest groups control outcomes shape policy choices berkes article reveals us intends maintain extend hegemony breaking alliance russia iran china oil privatizations result countries losing control sovereignty private oil companies work closely us government trump neutered presidency gratuitously accepting gen flynns resignation national security advisor scheme likely trumps approach better relations russia berke reports henry kissinger sold president trump scheme use removal russian sanctions pry president putin away russian alliance iran china putin fall scheme would fatal strategic blunder russia could recover yet putin pressured make blunder one pressure putin comes atlanticist integrationists material stake connections west want russia integrated western world another pressure comes affront sanctions represent russians removing insult become important russians even though sanctions russia material harm agree president putin sanctions fact benefit russia moved russia selfsufficient directions toward developing relationships china asia moreover west hegemonic impulses uses economic relationships control purposes trade china asia pose threat russian independence berke says part deal offered putin increased access huge european energy market restored western financial credit access western technology seat global decisionmaking table russia badly needs wants sweetening honey trap official recognition crimea part russia russia might want nonsense russia needs crimea part russia 300 years one anything would mean mexico recognize texas california part us nothing europe scant alternatives russian energy russia need western technology indeed military technology superior west russia certainly need western loans indeed would act insanity accept selfserving western myth russia needs foreign loans myth enshrined neoliberal economics device western exploitation control countries russias dangerous threat countrys neoliberal economists russian central bank convinced russian government would inflationary finance russian development projects issuance central bank credit foreign loans essential claims central bank someone needs teach russian central bank basic economics russia turned another western vassal lesson central bank credit used finance development projects supply rubles increases output projects thus goods services rise supply rubles russia borrows foreign currencies abroad money supply also increases foreign debt russia spend foreign currencies project puts foreign exchange reserves central bank issues amount rubles pay projects bills would absence foreign loan foreign loan present russia interest payment foreign creditor foreign capital important countries russia china countries perfectly capable financing development indeed china worlds largest creditor nation foreign loans important countries lack internal resources development purchase business knowhow technology resources abroad foreign currencies exports insufficient bring case russia large endowments resources trade surplus chinas development given boost us corporations moved production us market offshore order pocket difference labor regulatory costs neoliberals argue russia needs privatization order cover budget deficit russias government debt 17 percent russian gdp according official measures us federal debt 104 percent gdp 61 times higher russia us federal debt measured real corrected terms us federal debt 185 percent us gdp clearly massive debt us government problem tiny debt russia problem berkes article part effort scam russia convincing russian government prosperity depends unfavorable deals west russias neoliberal economists believe scam chance success another delusion affecting russian government belief privatization brings capital delusion caused russian government turn 20 percent oil company foreign ownership thing russia achieved strategic blunder deliver 20 percent oil profits foreign hands onetime payment russia gave away 20 percent oil profits perpetuity repeat greatest threat russia faces sanctions incompetence neoliberal economists thoroughly brainwashed serve us interests article originally published at160paulcraigrobertsorg | 568 |
<p>It is twenty-five years since the collapse of communism in Central and Eastern&#160;Europe, and we ought to be celebrating. But a shadow has been cast over what sparse festivities were planned by the situation in Ukraine. It seems that we made a mistake in thinking it was all over, that the inscrutable Russian empire was only distracted for a few years, and that its demonic urge to control its neighbors is now fully revived. Or is there some other and more comforting explanation?</p>
<p>The European Union has played an interesting part in the drama. Its foreign ministers, weakly flapping their arms, and in the German case merely shrugging their shoulders, tell the Russians to respect the “territorial integrity” of Ukraine, and to recognize internationally agreed borders. But the project of the European Union, from the outset, has been to remove the concept of territorial integrity from the government of Europe, and to dissolve the continent’s borders.</p>
<p>Were the Ukrainians in the Maidan demonstrating on behalf of their borders? Surely not; they wanted to get out of the Russian sphere of influence and into the European. Their hope was not to secure the territorial integrity of Ukraine but to earn their right to flee the place, as so many other citizens of the post-communist states have fled, so as to take up residence in the West and put the memory of Soviet communism finally and irreversibly behind them.</p>
<p>The European Union doesn’t believe in national borders</p>
<p>That is what the EU has meant to Eastern Europeans, and it is why Eastern Europe has proved a problem to those countries, notably the United Kingdom, which are the unwilling hosts to the hundreds of thousands of migrants. Given the European project, which is to remove all borders, it is difficult to take the EU seriously, when it condemns Russia for not respecting them.</p>
<p>Moreover, the events awaken us to the great danger in which Europe has been placed by the process of integration. This process has proceeded without any reference to military matters, ignoring the history that tells us that prosperity provokes envy and that envy leads to the use of force, and cushioning the European people in an illusion of lasting peace.</p>
<p>That peace was not secured by the EU but by the Atlantic Alliance; the contribution of the EU has been to weaken the authority of the alliance by tying it to countries like Germany, which have neither the will nor the means to defend themselves. The events in Ukraine show us that, when Russia decides to move its borders towards us, there is little that we can do to prevent it.</p>
<p>Putin’s Orwellian approach</p>
<p>There are some important lessons to draw, concerning the last 25 years of dream-diplomacy. Few of the current generation of West European politicians have had to wrestle with the inner nature of the Soviet Union, or to explore the deep psychology of those like&#160;Vladimir Putin&#160;and his circle, who were formed as secret police officers under communism. It is the Orwellian aspect of this psychology that seems to me to have eluded our politicians – the aspect so brilliantly and prophetically described by George Orwell in&#160;1984.</p>
<p>The fundamental observation that dictates the scenario of Orwell’s novel is that truth is our only defense against manipulation, and that when truth is confiscated by power, we are helpless. That is what Lenin and Stalin perceived. Hence they set up a system of government in which truth was entirely plastic, to be shaped and reshaped by decrees from the ruling politburo, and to be fed to the people and to foreign powers in the form and the quantities that would be most useful to the business of social control. We see this process at work today.</p>
<p>The Russians claim that their actions are necessary to protect the Russian population in Ukraine, to ensure stability in the region, to counter the threat from fascist or extremist elements. And false documents, photographs, and alleged conversations are immediately produced in order to turn these lies into truths.</p>
<p>Mysterious figures emerge claiming to be Ukrainians, who demand the annexation of Crimea by Russia; Yanukovych, the ousted President, is recycled by the Russians as the patriot who begged the Russian troops to intervene; the history of Ukraine is rewritten for the 50th time since Stalin conceived the plan of starving the whole population to death in order to deal with the Ukrainian problem; and although nobody believes any of the stories, least of all those who invent them, that does not matter. For the point of the stories is to make truth irrelevant; to remove it entirely from the central place that it would otherwise occupy in people’s lives, and to put power in the place of it.</p>
<p>We must retain the memory of communism’s methods</p>
<p>This situation, which I knew so well during the years before the communist collapse, is one of which we should retain the memory. We should constantly remind ourselves that people brought up in a world where truth has been displaced from the heart of decision-making, where the secret police have all the power, and the ordinary person has only that “power of the powerless” of which Vaclav Havel wrote, are psychologically quite distinct from us. They live in a world of secrets, where it is dangerous to know things, and where every secret that is peeled away from the other person reveals another secret beneath it.</p>
<p>It is not only the operation of power that is changed in this world of secrets. In those circumstances personal life too has quite another meaning, and although ordinary people cling to each other for protection, to a certain measure it is always without trusting each other.</p>
<p>Under communism, the Poles, the Czechs, the Hungarians, and the Slovaks all cherished in their hearts another view of things than the one to which they were condemned. And sometimes the brave dissidents like Havel would speak out on their behalf, reaffirming the right of the individual to “live in truth,” and the right of the nation to those things of which the communists then, and the Eurocrats now, would deny them: defensible borders, territorial integrity, and a democratic process of their own. But all life was conducted under the rule of secrecy. And for that reason no mistake could be fully confessed to and no error corrected. That is what made the situation so dangerous, and what makes Russia so dangerous today.</p>
<p>Recently, looking back over these 25 years, I put my mind to writing down my own impressions. The result is a novel,&#160;Notes from Underground, which is set in Czechoslovakia in the mid-1980s, and explores love between two young people who are struggling in their separate ways to emerge from the dark world of secrets into the light of day. It is my attempt to keep alive the vivid memory of a situation which we, in Europe and America, should never lose sight of: the situation whose effects remain with us and for which we in general, and the Ukrainians in particular, are still paying the price.</p> | false | 1 | twentyfive years since collapse communism central eastern160europe ought celebrating shadow cast sparse festivities planned situation ukraine seems made mistake thinking inscrutable russian empire distracted years demonic urge control neighbors fully revived comforting explanation european union played interesting part drama foreign ministers weakly flapping arms german case merely shrugging shoulders tell russians respect territorial integrity ukraine recognize internationally agreed borders project european union outset remove concept territorial integrity government europe dissolve continents borders ukrainians maidan demonstrating behalf borders surely wanted get russian sphere influence european hope secure territorial integrity ukraine earn right flee place many citizens postcommunist states fled take residence west put memory soviet communism finally irreversibly behind european union doesnt believe national borders eu meant eastern europeans eastern europe proved problem countries notably united kingdom unwilling hosts hundreds thousands migrants given european project remove borders difficult take eu seriously condemns russia respecting moreover events awaken us great danger europe placed process integration process proceeded without reference military matters ignoring history tells us prosperity provokes envy envy leads use force cushioning european people illusion lasting peace peace secured eu atlantic alliance contribution eu weaken authority alliance tying countries like germany neither means defend events ukraine show us russia decides move borders towards us little prevent putins orwellian approach important lessons draw concerning last 25 years dreamdiplomacy current generation west european politicians wrestle inner nature soviet union explore deep psychology like160vladimir putin160and circle formed secret police officers communism orwellian aspect psychology seems eluded politicians aspect brilliantly prophetically described george orwell in1601984 fundamental observation dictates scenario orwells novel truth defense manipulation truth confiscated power helpless lenin stalin perceived hence set system government truth entirely plastic shaped reshaped decrees ruling politburo fed people foreign powers form quantities would useful business social control see process work today russians claim actions necessary protect russian population ukraine ensure stability region counter threat fascist extremist elements false documents photographs alleged conversations immediately produced order turn lies truths mysterious figures emerge claiming ukrainians demand annexation crimea russia yanukovych ousted president recycled russians patriot begged russian troops intervene history ukraine rewritten 50th time since stalin conceived plan starving whole population death order deal ukrainian problem although nobody believes stories least invent matter point stories make truth irrelevant remove entirely central place would otherwise occupy peoples lives put power place must retain memory communisms methods situation knew well years communist collapse one retain memory constantly remind people brought world truth displaced heart decisionmaking secret police power ordinary person power powerless vaclav havel wrote psychologically quite distinct us live world secrets dangerous know things every secret peeled away person reveals another secret beneath operation power changed world secrets circumstances personal life quite another meaning although ordinary people cling protection certain measure always without trusting communism poles czechs hungarians slovaks cherished hearts another view things one condemned sometimes brave dissidents like havel would speak behalf reaffirming right individual live truth right nation things communists eurocrats would deny defensible borders territorial integrity democratic process life conducted rule secrecy reason mistake could fully confessed error corrected made situation dangerous makes russia dangerous today recently looking back 25 years put mind writing impressions result novel160notes underground set czechoslovakia mid1980s explores love two young people struggling separate ways emerge dark world secrets light day attempt keep alive vivid memory situation europe america never lose sight situation whose effects remain us general ukrainians particular still paying price | 560 |
<p>In a characteristically&#160; <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/28/opinion/sunday/douthat-going-for-bolingbroke.html" type="external">superb column</a>&#160;yesterday, Ross Douthat described our contemporary political situation in terms of the “court party” and “country party” — terms drawn from 17th-and 18th-century British politics that refer to a party that wields power for the benefit of elite players and institutions and an opposition that seeks more dispersed power for the benefit of a larger public. No historical analogy is ever perfectly apt, but this one is powerfully clarifying.</p>
<p>Particularly as laid out by its foremost intellectual leader, Henry St. John (the&#160;Viscount Bolingbroke), the country party’s idea of an organized political opposition as well as its particular policy vision — which combined a commitment to individual liberty and frugal, restrained government with a kind of social traditionalism — were enormously influential in colonial America and have always continued to exert a powerful influence over our politics. It is an influence that we have often, perhaps too loosely, described as populism.</p>
<p>For much of the past four decades, that kind of substantive populism (as opposed to the far more insidious institutional populism advanced by the early progressives) has tended to be divided into cultural and economic populism, and the two parties have tended to break down along a double axis of populism and elitism: The Republican party has been the party of cultural populism and economic elitism, and the Democrats have been the party of cultural elitism and economic populism. Republicans have tended to identify with the traditional values, unabashedly patriotic, anti-cosmopolitan, non-nuanced Joe Sixpack, even as they pursued an economic policy that aims at elite investor-driven growth. Democrats identified with the mistreated, underpaid, overworked “people against the powerful,” but tended to look down on those people’s religion, education, and way of life. Republicans have tended to believe the dynamism of the market is for the best but that cultural change can be dangerously disruptive while Democrats tended to believe dynamic social change stretches the boundaries of inclusion for the better but that economic dynamism is often ruinous and unjust.</p>
<p>But in more recent years, perhaps especially the last decade, the Democratic party has been moving away from economic populism and becoming truly the party of concentrated elite power. As our elites have grown more socially liberal and our economy has grown more concentrated and consolidated, it has&#160;become easier to pursue liberal goals through the system than against it and the Democratic party has become the party of the large, established players — the court party, more or less.</p>
<p>Much of the policy agenda of the Obama administration has embodied this approach. It has been an agenda of consolidation — protecting larger players from competition in exchange for their willingness to serve as agents of government power and driving crucial sectors of our economy (finance and health insurance above all, but by no means only those) toward greater consolidation. This has been something of a return to the original vision of the American progressives, with its active role for government in choosing economic winners who will best serve the common interest while otherwise restraining chaotic market competition. “In economic warfare,” Herbert Croly wrote in 1909, “the fighting can never be fair for long, and it is the business of the state to see that its own friends are victorious.” Big business and big labor, overseen by big government, would keep things in balance. As big labor gradually fades, the progressive economic vision has come down to big business and the state.</p>
<p>The Left’s diminishing emphasis on economic populism has also been on display in the immigration debate, where the kinds of concerns with the wages of low-skill workers that were evident among Democrats in prior rounds of the argument have basically disappeared. Consider&#160; <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2000/02/22/opinion/hasty-call-for-amnesty.html" type="external">this&#160;New York Times&#160;editorial</a>&#160;from February of 2000, arguing against amnesty for illegal immigrants on the grounds that “amnesty would undermine the integrity of the country’s immigration laws and would depress the wages of its lowest-paid native-born workers.” Can you imagine such an editorial today in the flagship publication of American liberalism? The economic arguments they made have not gone away, as Andrew Biggs&#160; <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/article/354450/how-immigration-reform-takes-poor-andrew-biggs" type="external">recently noted</a>. It’s the Left’s interest in those arguments that has abated.</p>
<p>In general (and a discussion of such trends can only involve pretty gross generalizations of course), this has tended to leave us with one party of economic elitism and cultural populism and another party of economic elitism and cultural elitism. It’s a situation that should make Republicans think.</p>
<p>The Left’s economic policies (and the legacy of decades of right-wing confusion about the difference between being pro-market and being pro-business too) are making the American economy less and less like the vision of capitalism that conservatives should want to defend. They should consider what now would be best for the cause of growth and prosperity — the cause of free markets and free people.</p>
<p>Capitalism is fundamentally democratic, after all — we today might say fundamentally populist. Adam Smith’s opponents were mercantilists. He argued against economic policies that pursued the benefit of the nation’s largest producers and traders, which were taken to be equivalent to the interests of the nation as a whole. They are no such thing, Smith insisted, nor does helping big business necessarily increase the wealth of the nation. “The wealth of a state,” Smith wrote, “consists in the cheapness of provision and all other necessaries and conveniences of life.” So a nation is wealthy, in effect, when consumer items are inexpensive, at least relative to the means of the general public; that is, a nation is wealthy when a comfortable life is within the reach of most. Only economic growth, made possible by vibrant competition, can reliably allow for this to happen. Such growth, and so such competition, should be the goal of economic policy and regulation.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/recovering-the-case-for-capitalism" type="external">Recovering</a>&#160;this understanding of conservative economics would help today’s Republicans see an enormous public need, and an enormous political opportunity, they tend to miss, and to which conservatism could be very usefully applied. It would point to a conservative agenda to help working families better afford life in the middle class, and to give more Americans a chance to rise. This would mean emphasizing conservative paths to higher wages and a lower cost of living for working families (like&#160; <a href="http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/taxes-and-the-family" type="external">pro-family tax reform</a>, a&#160; <a href="http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/re-targeting-the-fed" type="external">more growth-oriented monetary policy</a>,&#160; <a href="http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/how-to-replace-obamacare" type="external">health-care reform</a>&#160;that reduces costs through competition and consumer power,&#160;energy policy aimed at both spurring growth and lowering utility bills by making the most of our domestic resources,&#160; <a href="http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/a-federal-education-agenda" type="external">K–12 reform</a>&#160;to give families more ways to escape failing schools,&#160; <a href="http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/the-coming-higher-ed-revolution" type="external">higher-ed reforms</a>&#160;to restrain tuition inflation, <a href="http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/saving-medicare-from-itself" type="external">entitlement</a>&#160; <a href="http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/a-new-vision-for-social-security" type="external">reform</a>&#160;to reduce the burden of debt on the young while retaining the safety net for the poor and the old). It would also mean&#160; <a href="http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/taming-the-megabanks" type="external">financial regulation</a>&#160;with an eye to competition, rather than consolidation.</p>
<p>The Democratic party can’t really do most of this. Both its ideology and its electoral coalition leave its options quite constrained. It has to make the most of its status as the party of entrenched insiders, and to employ populist rhetoric to mask its increasingly elitist agenda.</p>
<p>Republicans could and should offer the public a responsible, pro-growth, pro-market, economic populism. On conservative philosophical grounds, on practical economic grounds, and on sheer political grounds, it makes an enormous amount of sense. In many ways, it is the missing organizing principle in a lot of conservative policy conversations today. And as Douthat notes, many younger conservatives seem to see this. But most Republicans still do not.</p>
<p>The resistance does not, in my view, come from donors — who often get the blame for it. Blaming them requires a very simplistic view of how political movements work, and a misinformed sense of who Republican donors are and what they want. Even their interests, let alone their ideology and aspirations, would not be in much tension with this agenda.</p>
<p>Instead, it seems to me that the resistance comes from some politicians and activists who have not yet internalized the political environment and the American situation of the early 21st century. They are entirely well intentioned, and they are no less appalled than I am at the increasingly statist corporatism of the age of Obama. But they believe that resistance alone could suffice as an answer — that the Democratic agenda is sufficiently odious that the public requires only a means by which to say no to it. And in its place they have in mind a general outline of the Reagan-era conservative agenda, or maybe even of the pre-Obama status quo. They do not see that a working-families conservatism would move well to the right of that status quo ante, and yet would also be far more popular.</p>
<p>Perhaps understandably, if not wisely, they recoil from all detailed policy prescriptions, seeing them as symptoms of an overactive urge to micromanage. But conservative successes have always been success of public policy, not of anti-policy. And their resistance to policy leaves them, and the Republican party, with an inadequate sense of the purpose and potential of political opposition. Here, too, not much is new under the sun. Here is Bolingbroke, in his 1736 letter “On the Spirit of Patriotism,” laying out his vision of the country party in opposition:</p>
<p>I have observed, and your Lordship will have frequent occasions of observing, many persons who seem to think that opposition to an administration requires fewer preparatives, and less constant application than the conduct of it. Now, my Lord, I take this to be a gross error, and I am sure it has been a fatal one. It is one of those errors, and there are many such, which men impute to judgment, and which proceed from the defect of judgment, as this does from lightness, irresolution, laziness, and a false notion of opposition….</p>
<p>They who affect to head an opposition, or to make any considerable figure in it, must be equal at least to those whom they oppose; I do not say in parts only, but in application and industry, and the fruits of both, information, knowledge, and a certain constant preparedness for all the events that may arise. Every administration is a system of conduct: opposition, therefore, should be a system of conduct likewise; an opposite, but not a dependent system….</p>
<p>It follows from hence, that they who engage in opposition are under as great obligations, to prepare themselves to control, as they who serve the crown are under, to prepare themselves to carry on the administration: and that a party formed for this purpose, do not act like good citizens nor honest men, unless they propose true, as well as oppose false measures of government. Sure I am they do not act like wise men unless they act systematically, and unless they contrast, on every occasion, that scheme of policy which the public interest requires to be followed, with that which is suited to no interest but the private interest of the prince or his ministers. Cunning men (several such there are among you) will dislike this consequence, and object, that such a conduct would support, under the appearance of opposing, a weak and even a wicked administration; and that to proceed in this manner would be to give good counsel to a bad minister, and to extricate him out of distresses that ought to be improved to his ruin. But cunning pays no regard to virtue, and is but the low mimic of wisdom. It were easy to demonstrate what I have asserted concerning the duty of an opposing party. and I presume there is no need of labouring to prove, that a party who opposed, systematically, a wise to a silly, an honest to an iniquitous, scheme of government, would acquire greater reputation and strength, and arrive more surely at their end, than a party who opposed occasionally, as it were, without any common system, without any general concert, with little uniformity, little preparation, little perseverance, and as little knowledge or political capacity.</p>
<p>If the view of opposition he is criticizing doesn’t make you think of today’s Republican party, at least much of the time, then you’re not paying attention.</p>
<p>But precisely because today’s resistance to a policy-oriented conservatism is inertial more than structural — and is the view of devoted activists pursing the good of the country rather than donors defending material interests — it is open to persuasion and proof. The effort to provide those is what a lot of the intellectual energy of the conservative movement is directed to now.</p>
<p>Lots of people on the left fail to see that, just as they fail to see the transformation of their own political movement and the vulnerability it has left them with.&#160;To better grasp both, they could do worse than read Ross Douthat every week.</p>
<p>Yuval Levin is Hertog Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and editor of&#160;National Affairs.</p> | false | 1 | characteristically160 superb column160yesterday ross douthat described contemporary political situation terms court party country party terms drawn 17thand 18thcentury british politics refer party wields power benefit elite players institutions opposition seeks dispersed power benefit larger public historical analogy ever perfectly apt one powerfully clarifying particularly laid foremost intellectual leader henry st john the160viscount bolingbroke country partys idea organized political opposition well particular policy vision combined commitment individual liberty frugal restrained government kind social traditionalism enormously influential colonial america always continued exert powerful influence politics influence often perhaps loosely described populism much past four decades kind substantive populism opposed far insidious institutional populism advanced early progressives tended divided cultural economic populism two parties tended break along double axis populism elitism republican party party cultural populism economic elitism democrats party cultural elitism economic populism republicans tended identify traditional values unabashedly patriotic anticosmopolitan nonnuanced joe sixpack even pursued economic policy aims elite investordriven growth democrats identified mistreated underpaid overworked people powerful tended look peoples religion education way life republicans tended believe dynamism market best cultural change dangerously disruptive democrats tended believe dynamic social change stretches boundaries inclusion better economic dynamism often ruinous unjust recent years perhaps especially last decade democratic party moving away economic populism becoming truly party concentrated elite power elites grown socially liberal economy grown concentrated consolidated has160become easier pursue liberal goals system democratic party become party large established players court party less much policy agenda obama administration embodied approach agenda consolidation protecting larger players competition exchange willingness serve agents government power driving crucial sectors economy finance health insurance means toward greater consolidation something return original vision american progressives active role government choosing economic winners best serve common interest otherwise restraining chaotic market competition economic warfare herbert croly wrote 1909 fighting never fair long business state see friends victorious big business big labor overseen big government would keep things balance big labor gradually fades progressive economic vision come big business state lefts diminishing emphasis economic populism also display immigration debate kinds concerns wages lowskill workers evident among democrats prior rounds argument basically disappeared consider160 this160new york times160editorial160from february 2000 arguing amnesty illegal immigrants grounds amnesty would undermine integrity countrys immigration laws would depress wages lowestpaid nativeborn workers imagine editorial today flagship publication american liberalism economic arguments made gone away andrew biggs160 recently noted lefts interest arguments abated general discussion trends involve pretty gross generalizations course tended leave us one party economic elitism cultural populism another party economic elitism cultural elitism situation make republicans think lefts economic policies legacy decades rightwing confusion difference promarket probusiness making american economy less less like vision capitalism conservatives want defend consider would best cause growth prosperity cause free markets free people capitalism fundamentally democratic today might say fundamentally populist adam smiths opponents mercantilists argued economic policies pursued benefit nations largest producers traders taken equivalent interests nation whole thing smith insisted helping big business necessarily increase wealth nation wealth state smith wrote consists cheapness provision necessaries conveniences life nation wealthy effect consumer items inexpensive least relative means general public nation wealthy comfortable life within reach economic growth made possible vibrant competition reliably allow happen growth competition goal economic policy regulation recovering160this understanding conservative economics would help todays republicans see enormous public need enormous political opportunity tend miss conservatism could usefully applied would point conservative agenda help working families better afford life middle class give americans chance rise would mean emphasizing conservative paths higher wages lower cost living working families like160 profamily tax reform a160 growthoriented monetary policy160 healthcare reform160that reduces costs competition consumer power160energy policy aimed spurring growth lowering utility bills making domestic resources160 k12 reform160to give families ways escape failing schools160 highered reforms160to restrain tuition inflation entitlement160 reform160to reduce burden debt young retaining safety net poor old would also mean160 financial regulation160with eye competition rather consolidation democratic party cant really ideology electoral coalition leave options quite constrained make status party entrenched insiders employ populist rhetoric mask increasingly elitist agenda republicans could offer public responsible progrowth promarket economic populism conservative philosophical grounds practical economic grounds sheer political grounds makes enormous amount sense many ways missing organizing principle lot conservative policy conversations today douthat notes many younger conservatives seem see republicans still resistance view come donors often get blame blaming requires simplistic view political movements work misinformed sense republican donors want even interests let alone ideology aspirations would much tension agenda instead seems resistance comes politicians activists yet internalized political environment american situation early 21st century entirely well intentioned less appalled increasingly statist corporatism age obama believe resistance alone could suffice answer democratic agenda sufficiently odious public requires means say place mind general outline reaganera conservative agenda maybe even preobama status quo see workingfamilies conservatism would move well right status quo ante yet would also far popular perhaps understandably wisely recoil detailed policy prescriptions seeing symptoms overactive urge micromanage conservative successes always success public policy antipolicy resistance policy leaves republican party inadequate sense purpose potential political opposition much new sun bolingbroke 1736 letter spirit patriotism laying vision country party opposition observed lordship frequent occasions observing many persons seem think opposition administration requires fewer preparatives less constant application conduct lord take gross error sure fatal one one errors many men impute judgment proceed defect judgment lightness irresolution laziness false notion opposition affect head opposition make considerable figure must equal least oppose say parts application industry fruits information knowledge certain constant preparedness events may arise every administration system conduct opposition therefore system conduct likewise opposite dependent system follows hence engage opposition great obligations prepare control serve crown prepare carry administration party formed purpose act like good citizens honest men unless propose true well oppose false measures government sure act like wise men unless act systematically unless contrast every occasion scheme policy public interest requires followed suited interest private interest prince ministers cunning men several among dislike consequence object conduct would support appearance opposing weak even wicked administration proceed manner would give good counsel bad minister extricate distresses ought improved ruin cunning pays regard virtue low mimic wisdom easy demonstrate asserted concerning duty opposing party presume need labouring prove party opposed systematically wise silly honest iniquitous scheme government would acquire greater reputation strength arrive surely end party opposed occasionally without common system without general concert little uniformity little preparation little perseverance little knowledge political capacity view opposition criticizing doesnt make think todays republican party least much time youre paying attention precisely todays resistance policyoriented conservatism inertial structural view devoted activists pursing good country rather donors defending material interests open persuasion proof effort provide lot intellectual energy conservative movement directed lots people left fail see fail see transformation political movement vulnerability left with160to better grasp could worse read ross douthat every week yuval levin hertog fellow ethics public policy center editor of160national affairs | 1,120 |
<p>GLASGOW, Ky. — A bill focused on buttressing the nation’s insurance marketplaces will be needed if the full-fledged Republican effort to repeal much of President Barack Obama’s health care law fails, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Thursday.</p>
<p>It was one of his most explicit acknowledgments that his party’s top-priority drive to erase much of Obama’s landmark 2010 statutes might fall short.</p>
<p>The remarks by McConnell, R-Ky., also implicitly meant that to show progress on health care, Republicans controlling the White House and Congress might have to negotiate with Democrats. While the current, wide-ranging GOP health care bill — which McConnell is still hoping to push through the Senate — has procedural protections against a Democratic Senate filibuster, a subsequent, narrower measure wouldn’t and would take 60 votes to pass.</p>
<p>The existing bill would fail if just three of the 52 Republicans vote no, since all Democrats oppose it. McConnell was forced to cancel a planned vote on the measure last week after far more Republicans than that objected, and he’s been spending the Independence Day recess studying possible changes that might win over GOP dissidents.</p>
<p>“If my side is unable to agree on an adequate replacement, then some kind of action with regard to the private health insurance market must occur,” McConnell said at a Rotary Club lunch in this deep-red rural area of southern Kentucky. He made the comment after being asked if he envisioned needing bipartisan cooperation to replace Obama’s law.</p>
<p>“No action is not an alternative,” McConnell said. “We’ve got the insurance markets imploding all over the country, including in this state.”</p>
<p>In a written statement, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., called it encouraging that McConnell had “opened the door to bipartisan solutions.” He said the focus should be on continuing federal payments to insurers that help them contain costs for some low-earning customers. Trump has threatened to end these payments.</p>
<p>Schumer has repeatedly said Democrats won’t negotiate until Republicans abandon their repeal effort.</p>
<p>McConnell’s comments came during a recess that has produced no visible evidence that he’s winnowed the number of unhappy Republican senators. If anything, the list seemed to grow this week as Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D., said he opposed the bill, but he was vague about changes he’d want.</p>
<p>That brought to at least a dozen the GOP senators who’ve publicly opposed or criticized the legislation, though many are expected to be won over by revisions McConnell is concocting.</p>
<p>Even as Republicans have struggled to write legislation they can pass, some have acknowledged that if they encountered problems, a smaller bill with quicker help for insurers and consumers might be needed. They’ve said it could include provisions continuing the federal payments to insurers, which total around $7 billion annually, and some inducements to keep healthy people buying policies — a step that helps curb premiums.</p>
<p>Trump, McConnell, House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., and other Republicans have said Obama’s law is failing, citing markets around the country where insurers have pulled out or sharply boosted premiums. Some areas are down to a single insurer.</p>
<p>Democrats acknowledge Obama’s law needs changes that would help curb the growth of health care costs. But they say the GOP is exaggerating the problem and note that several insurers have attributed their decisions to stop selling policies in unprofitable areas, in part, to Trump administration indications that it may halt payments to insurers. A federal court has ruled the payments weren’t authorized by Congress but has allowed them to temporarily continue.</p>
<p>In its report last week on the Senate bill, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said that under Obama’s law, it expected health care markets “to be stable in most areas.”</p>
<p>It said the same about the Senate legislation. But it also said under the GOP bill, 22 million added Americans would be uninsured because it would eliminate Obama’s tax penalty on people who don’t buy coverage and it would cut Medicaid, the health insurance program for the poor, disabled and many nursing home patients.</p>
<p>McConnell spoke hours after Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said the bill’s prospects were “precarious.” Speaking on San Antonio’s KTSA Radio, Cruz said the GOP’s Senate majority “is so narrow, I don’t know if we can get it done or not.”</p>
<p>Further qualms were voiced by Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan.</p>
<p>“There are people who tell me they are better off” under Obama’s law, “and I believe them,” Moran said at a town hall meeting Thursday in Palco, Kansas. Moran, who’d said he could not support the current version of the bill, said health care is “almost impossible to solve” with the slim GOP majority in the Senate.</p>
<p>McConnell said he expected to have a new version of the legislation ready in “a week or so.” Another Republican, Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, suggested it may take some time before McConnell can win enough support.</p>
<p>“We’re still several weeks away from a vote, I think,” Toomey said Wednesday while appearing before a live studio audience at WHTM-TV in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.</p>
<p>Toomey partly attributed some of the GOP’s problems to Trump’s surprise victory last November.</p>
<p>“I didn’t expect Donald Trump to win, I think most of my colleagues didn’t, so we didn’t expect to be in this situation,” he said.</p>
<p>Related</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">Obamacare repeal and replace will hurt Nevada, Sandoval says</a></p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">Nevada Sen. Dean Heller says he’ll vote no on Obamacare repeal</a></p>
<p /> | false | 1 | glasgow ky bill focused buttressing nations insurance marketplaces needed fullfledged republican effort repeal much president barack obamas health care law fails senate majority leader mitch mcconnell said thursday one explicit acknowledgments partys toppriority drive erase much obamas landmark 2010 statutes might fall short remarks mcconnell rky also implicitly meant show progress health care republicans controlling white house congress might negotiate democrats current wideranging gop health care bill mcconnell still hoping push senate procedural protections democratic senate filibuster subsequent narrower measure wouldnt would take 60 votes pass existing bill would fail three 52 republicans vote since democrats oppose mcconnell forced cancel planned vote measure last week far republicans objected hes spending independence day recess studying possible changes might win gop dissidents side unable agree adequate replacement kind action regard private health insurance market must occur mcconnell said rotary club lunch deepred rural area southern kentucky made comment asked envisioned needing bipartisan cooperation replace obamas law action alternative mcconnell said weve got insurance markets imploding country including state written statement senate minority leader chuck schumer dny called encouraging mcconnell opened door bipartisan solutions said focus continuing federal payments insurers help contain costs lowearning customers trump threatened end payments schumer repeatedly said democrats wont negotiate republicans abandon repeal effort mcconnells comments came recess produced visible evidence hes winnowed number unhappy republican senators anything list seemed grow week sen john hoeven rnd said opposed bill vague changes hed want brought least dozen gop senators whove publicly opposed criticized legislation though many expected revisions mcconnell concocting even republicans struggled write legislation pass acknowledged encountered problems smaller bill quicker help insurers consumers might needed theyve said could include provisions continuing federal payments insurers total around 7 billion annually inducements keep healthy people buying policies step helps curb premiums trump mcconnell house speaker paul ryan rwis republicans said obamas law failing citing markets around country insurers pulled sharply boosted premiums areas single insurer democrats acknowledge obamas law needs changes would help curb growth health care costs say gop exaggerating problem note several insurers attributed decisions stop selling policies unprofitable areas part trump administration indications may halt payments insurers federal court ruled payments werent authorized congress allowed temporarily continue report last week senate bill nonpartisan congressional budget office said obamas law expected health care markets stable areas said senate legislation also said gop bill 22 million added americans would uninsured would eliminate obamas tax penalty people dont buy coverage would cut medicaid health insurance program poor disabled many nursing home patients mcconnell spoke hours sen ted cruz rtexas said bills prospects precarious speaking san antonios ktsa radio cruz said gops senate majority narrow dont know get done qualms voiced sen jerry moran rkan people tell better obamas law believe moran said town hall meeting thursday palco kansas moran whod said could support current version bill said health care almost impossible solve slim gop majority senate mcconnell said expected new version legislation ready week another republican sen pat toomey pennsylvania suggested may take time mcconnell win enough support still several weeks away vote think toomey said wednesday appearing live studio audience whtmtv harrisburg pennsylvania toomey partly attributed gops problems trumps surprise victory last november didnt expect donald trump win think colleagues didnt didnt expect situation said related obamacare repeal replace hurt nevada sandoval says nevada sen dean heller says hell vote obamacare repeal | 554 |
<p>If they wouldn’t do anything when children were murdered I have no hope that the Repugs will ever do the right thing. I’m actually not even sympathetic bc country music fans are often Republican gun toters.</p>
<p>That, as everybody now knows, was the Facebook post about the mass murders in Las Vegas at the beginning of October that got its author, Hayley Geftman-Gold, fired from her job as vice-president and senior counsel at CBS. How eaten up with hatred for your fellow-citizens who belong to a different political persuasion do you have to be so far to override the most basic sense of propriety, not to mention self-preservation, as to issue a public statement like that when the bodies were still warm? The unfortunate victims didn’t even have to be Republicans or gun toters to get what they deserved, in Ms Geftman-Gold’s opinion, only to like the same music that Republicans and gun toters “often” do.</p>
<p>She later&#160; <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/arts-and-entertainment/wp/2017/10/02/cbs-fires-lawyer-for-facebook-post-saying-las-vegas-victims-do-not-deserve-sympathy/" type="external">apologized</a>&#160;for what she described as her “shameful” post, but it should more accurately have been described as shameless. If whatever capacity for shame she might have been raised with had not been dried up and extinguished in her, as it has been in so many others these days, by too frequent an application to social media, she wouldn’t have written those words, or thought of doing so, in the first place. Their retrospective shamefulness will doubtless look to most people more like regret for what they have cost her — something that also could have been foreseen.</p>
<p>That there are so many fellow-sufferers from this 21st&#160;century epidemic of mass shamelessness might be considered a mitigating factor but for the fact that the shameless ones themselves never seem to regard it as one in any instance involving those they hate, such as gun toting Repugs or Donald Trump. Instead, they answer insult with insult and are never more outraged than when those they have insulted insult them back. I have often before remarked on the irony by which a virulent hatred of Mr Trump is dressed up in the ill-fitting costume of a campaign against “hate,” but the irony never seems to dawn on the Trump haters — perhaps because the ability to respond to irony is linked to the sense of shame, and burns up and blows away when it does.</p>
<p>I think it more interesting to ask ourselves where this hatred, sometimes softened by such quasi-clinical euphemisms as “partisanship” or “polarization,” comes from. One answer, from David Von Drehle of&#160; <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/americans-are-addicted-to-outrage/2017/10/03/ffb3c712-a854-11e7-92d1-58c702d2d975_story.html" type="external">The Washington Post</a>, is that “Americans are addicted to outrage” — for which he is inclined to blame the dealers of this dangerous drug on cable TV, talk radio and partisan websites. Oddly, he doesn’t mention mainstream media outlets like the&#160;Post&#160;itself or CBS, the erstwhile employers of Ms Geftman- Gold. But then the “outrage” which inspired his meditation was not her admittedly “appalling and stupid” remarks about the hated Repugs but rather the outpouring of vitriolic resentment which they inspired from those less respectable media venues. And who is responsible for that? Take a guess. The only named target of his own outrage is none other than Donald J. Trump, “the El Chapo of addictive controversy.”</p>
<p>I think we need to look elsewhere for the sources of this fatal attraction, this otherwise inexplicable willingness on the part of ordinary people to “inject a speedball of conflict” with every provocation, real or imagined, by those they despise. Why, for instance, do they despise each other in the first place? I can remember the debates among the progressives of the 1960s as to whether the views of those who disagreed with the antiwar faction should be allowed to be heard. They were similar to what you hear from the “antifa” demonstrators who are “no-platforming” those they claim are fascists today, but with a difference. Fifty years ago, the Vietnam War was considered such an enormity, such an atrocity, that the moral impetus behind the opposition to it was thought by many if not most of the opposers to have overriden every consideration of mere politeness or propriety.</p>
<p>What do we have to compare to that towering indignation today? Resentment against a boneheaded remark by a corporate lawyer? A vote for Donald Trump? A wish to preserve statues of long-dead Confederate soldiers? A plebian taste in music? In my old age, I find myself inclining to Jeeves’s opinion, in opposition to Bertie Wooster’s panicked question, “What do ties matter at a time like this?” Ties, which show every sign of going the same way as manners, can stand very nicely as a synecdoche for them in Jeeves’s reply. “There is no time, sir, at which ties do not matter.”</p>
<p>But let’s say, for the sake of argument — that same argument which will be the next thing to go after manners and has already gone, so far as the antifas and many if not most of those in the media are concerned — that Jeeves is wrong. Say that if the moral provocation is great enough neither ties nor manners nor anything else&#160;do&#160;matter. It nevertheless appears to be the case that, once we got into the habit of suspending any sense of the social proprieties in the name of our own moral and political sensibilities, we found ourselves doing it for ever more trivial or problematic causes until, by now, they are in a more or less permanent state of suspension. The addiction, in other words, was not to outrage but to the mellow high of our own self-righteousness.</p>
<p>Perhaps there we can begin to see where all the hatred comes from — which seems to me to be the habit, originally inspired by the revolutionary left, of localizing all our dissatisfactions with the world somewhere outside ourselves, in one person or a few people of evil disposition and malevolent intent who (we imagine) wish to do us harm, or to take away from us what is rightfully ours. It then becomes an additional source of grievance against this person or persons when we find that others deny or repudiate our discovery of his or their unique evil. So much so indeed that, like Hayley Geftman-Gold, we are prepared to dismiss or overlook real, obvious, open evil when it is committed against those whom we have taught ourselves to hate.</p>
<p>This idea had actually occurred to me a few hours before the Las Vegas shooter — as usual, I forbear to name one whose motivations for his wickedness seem likely to have included&#160; <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/what-mass-killers-want8212and-how-to-stop-them-1383957068" type="external">a lust for fame</a>, as fame is understood in the age of shamelessness — went about his lethal work. At the time, as it happened, I was reading a column in the Sunday&#160;New York Times&#160;with which I largely agreed. Either Ross Douthat or his headline writer showed that he was aware of what he was doing when he titled it&#160; <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/30/opinion/hugh-hefner.html" type="external">“Speaking Ill of Hugh Hefner,”</a>&#160;an obvious reference to the old maxim about not speaking ill of the dead which is now just another of those dispensable canons of good manners that no longer apply in our age of stern moralism. And boy was Mr Douthat stern about the late pornographer and&#160;bon viveur&#160;of&#160;Playboy&#160;fame!</p>
<p>From many of his respectful if not uncritical obituaries, we learned that Mr Hefner had regarded it as his crowning achievement in life that his fame had not been what used to be called notoriety and that he had made smut-peddling into a respectable business, earning precisely that respect for his nefarious activities that Mr Douthat, signaling another swing of the cultural pendulum, would now deny him. It’s not that Hef didn’t deserve such opprobrium, but why take the occasion of his death for venting it? What purpose was such a diatribe more likely to have served: calling the world’s attention to the well-known faults of Hugh Hefner or to the somewhat less well-known virtues of Ross Douthat? Perhaps that is ungenerous of me, but then I can always plead his own ungenerousness as my excuse, can’t I? Isn’t that how the new manners work?</p>
<p>A better excuse would be that he is a journalist, and over the past half century we have come to think of a particular kind of language as being appropriate to journalism even when it wouldn’t be in ordinary social intercourse. It is the language of scandal, and of self-importance and self-righteousness, the language of those who have been taught to think of themselves as specially privileged to expose the discreditable secrets, or anything that could be made to look like them, of anyone in need of discrediting. The scandal merchant, like the left-wing activist, is always on the lookout for the bad guy, the villain who ruined everything and who can bear all the blame for whatever is troubling us.</p>
<p>The ultimate bad guy for the latter is of course the chimera of “capitalism,” and Mr Douthat even finds a role for that as an accessory to Mr Hefner’s ill-doings when he writes that “his success as a businessman showed the rotten side of capitalism — the side that exploits appetites for money, that feeds leech-like on our vices, that dissolves family and religion while promising that consumption will fill the void they leave behind.” Didn’t you always just know that it was those bastard, no-name capitalists who were doing all that? See with what ease media-think and scandal-think slot in together with left-wing “progressivism” and other Marxist-inspired doctrines. The left always led the way to the scandal-hunting mentality by first identifying that imaginary villain of villains, the&#160;capo di tutti capi,&#160;capitalism, and then its later-born ideological siblings: imperialism, colonialism, racism, sexism, homophobia, Islamophobia and, the runt of the litter, transphobia.</p>
<p>Yet in the midst of his column Mr Douthat wrote this:</p>
<p>No doubt what Hefner offered America somebody else would have offered in his place, and the changes he helped hasten would have come rushing in without him. But in every way that mattered he made those changes worse, our culture coarser and crueler and more sterile than liberalism or feminism or freedom of speech required. And in every way that mattered his life story proved that we were wrong to listen to him, because at the end of the long slide lay only a degraded, priapic senility, or the desperate gaiety of Prince Prospero’s court with the Red Death at the door.</p>
<p>But if somebody else would have done what he did — and, as is not mentioned here, many did, and much worse — why hate him so much just because he’s dead? Perhaps the clue comes in the next paragraph.</p>
<p>Now that death has taken him, we should examine our own sins. Liberals should ask why their crusade for freedom and equality found itself with such a captain, and what his legacy says about their cause. Conservatives should ask how their crusade for faith and family and community ended up so Hefnerian itself — with a conservative news network that seems to have been run on Playboy Mansion principles and a conservative party that just elected a playboy as our president.</p>
<p>Come on now, Ross, do you expect us to believe that blaming Trump on Hefner — or is it Hefner on Trump? — is the result of examining “our own” sins? Isn’t it rather precisely because we are blind to our own sins that we have such lashings of hatred and blame to spare for the likes of Messrs Hefner and Trump?</p>
<p>Both men, that is, should be seen as symptoms, not causes. They have merely exploited the opportunity presented to them by the changing culture — i.e. us. The bad guy in this sense is never going to be anybody but ourselves, though there may be many people worse than you or I. But one of them, Richard Nixon, was once here to tell you all that that means. It means that “those who hate you don’t win unless you hate them, and then you destroy yourself.” And yet Nixon is somebody else whom we never seem to be able to hate enough, in spite of his being dead these 23 years. As anyone knows who has ever perused a website which allows readers to comment, the thirty-seventh president is still capable of inspiring the most vicious and contemptuous kinds of language whenever his name, or that of Watergate, comes up.</p>
<p>I hate to keep bringing up the subject of honor (see “Right side vs. white side” in&#160;The New Criterion&#160;of October, 2017). Actually, I don’t hate it at all, but it seemed only polite to apologize for what must seem a bit of a hobbyhorse for those less interested in the subject than I am. But to the old honor culture, now defunct, we owe our traditions of manners and civil discourse which once restrained, if imperfectly, the flow of political as well as other kinds of passion. The coincidence of the birth of social media and the death of manners should not be surprising to us. What is surprising is the outrage about it on the left, which refuses to recognize its own part in killing manners off — I suppose to preserve their hypocrisy in condemning the right for unmannerliness.</p>
<p>We see just as much of this — as we also do of fake news — in the mainstream media as we do from pajama-clad trolls living in their parents’ basement. See headlines like “Cruelty, Incompetence and Lies” to yet another&#160; <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/22/opinion/graham-cassidy-lies-healthcare.html" type="external">Paul Krugman column</a>&#160;slamming congressional Republicans for any attempt to tinker with Obamacare. Professor Krugman no more hopes to persuade the Repugs to his point of view than Hayley Geftman-Gold did to hers. For both, discussion and debate, the heart of the democratic process, are not just outmoded but utterly forgotten. They take for granted that politics is war and the enemy is “other” — not subject to reasoned argument but only an object for their hatred and contempt. At least CBS had the grace to feel embarrassed about Ms Geftman-Gold’s having opened a window to the echoing hatred she felt she could take for granted in that whole corporate culture.</p>
<p>For her political passion was only a slightly crasser version of the media and entertainment figures as well as politicians seeking to ride the Las Vegas massacre to victory in their own little political battles, most but not all of them to do with some more or less futile form of “gun control” wearing the unmerited accolade of a panacea. Rivalling her in the world of entertainment was the ever bumptious Lena Dunham who tweeted that the “Las Vegas Shooting Is Actually About Gender, Race, Capitalism.” When queried about this on Twitter, she supplied as her only explanation a link to a&#160; <a href="http://www.newsweek.com/white-men-have-committed-more-mass-shootings-any-other-group-675602" type="external">Newsweek&#160;story</a>&#160;by John Haltiwanger headed: “White Men Have Committed More Mass Shootings than Any Other Group.” White men, eh? Sounds like they, too, belong in that rogues’ gallery of evil-doers on which we can blame everything. And so, once again, we find that hatred, given free rein, tends to spread and generalize and, as wise old, wicked old Richard Nixon long ago discovered, eventually to destroy ourselves.</p>
<p>James Bowman is resident scholar at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p> | false | 1 | wouldnt anything children murdered hope repugs ever right thing im actually even sympathetic bc country music fans often republican gun toters everybody knows facebook post mass murders las vegas beginning october got author hayley geftmangold fired job vicepresident senior counsel cbs eaten hatred fellowcitizens belong different political persuasion far override basic sense propriety mention selfpreservation issue public statement like bodies still warm unfortunate victims didnt even republicans gun toters get deserved ms geftmangolds opinion like music republicans gun toters often later160 apologized160for described shameful post accurately described shameless whatever capacity shame might raised dried extinguished many others days frequent application social media wouldnt written words thought first place retrospective shamefulness doubtless look people like regret cost something also could foreseen many fellowsufferers 21st160century epidemic mass shamelessness might considered mitigating factor fact shameless ones never seem regard one instance involving hate gun toting repugs donald trump instead answer insult insult never outraged insulted insult back often remarked irony virulent hatred mr trump dressed illfitting costume campaign hate irony never seems dawn trump haters perhaps ability respond irony linked sense shame burns blows away think interesting ask hatred sometimes softened quasiclinical euphemisms partisanship polarization comes one answer david von drehle of160 washington post americans addicted outrage inclined blame dealers dangerous drug cable tv talk radio partisan websites oddly doesnt mention mainstream media outlets like the160post160itself cbs erstwhile employers ms geftman gold outrage inspired meditation admittedly appalling stupid remarks hated repugs rather outpouring vitriolic resentment inspired less respectable media venues responsible take guess named target outrage none donald j trump el chapo addictive controversy think need look elsewhere sources fatal attraction otherwise inexplicable willingness part ordinary people inject speedball conflict every provocation real imagined despise instance despise first place remember debates among progressives 1960s whether views disagreed antiwar faction allowed heard similar hear antifa demonstrators noplatforming claim fascists today difference fifty years ago vietnam war considered enormity atrocity moral impetus behind opposition thought many opposers overriden every consideration mere politeness propriety compare towering indignation today resentment boneheaded remark corporate lawyer vote donald trump wish preserve statues longdead confederate soldiers plebian taste music old age find inclining jeevess opinion opposition bertie woosters panicked question ties matter time like ties show every sign going way manners stand nicely synecdoche jeevess reply time sir ties matter lets say sake argument argument next thing go manners already gone far antifas many media concerned jeeves wrong say moral provocation great enough neither ties manners anything else160do160matter nevertheless appears case got habit suspending sense social proprieties name moral political sensibilities found ever trivial problematic causes less permanent state suspension addiction words outrage mellow high selfrighteousness perhaps begin see hatred comes seems habit originally inspired revolutionary left localizing dissatisfactions world somewhere outside one person people evil disposition malevolent intent imagine wish us harm take away us rightfully becomes additional source grievance person persons find others deny repudiate discovery unique evil much indeed like hayley geftmangold prepared dismiss overlook real obvious open evil committed taught hate idea actually occurred hours las vegas shooter usual forbear name one whose motivations wickedness seem likely included160 lust fame fame understood age shamelessness went lethal work time happened reading column sunday160new york times160with largely agreed either ross douthat headline writer showed aware titled it160 speaking ill hugh hefner160an obvious reference old maxim speaking ill dead another dispensable canons good manners longer apply age stern moralism boy mr douthat stern late pornographer and160bon viveur160of160playboy160fame many respectful uncritical obituaries learned mr hefner regarded crowning achievement life fame used called notoriety made smutpeddling respectable business earning precisely respect nefarious activities mr douthat signaling another swing cultural pendulum would deny hef didnt deserve opprobrium take occasion death venting purpose diatribe likely served calling worlds attention wellknown faults hugh hefner somewhat less wellknown virtues ross douthat perhaps ungenerous always plead ungenerousness excuse cant isnt new manners work better excuse would journalist past half century come think particular kind language appropriate journalism even wouldnt ordinary social intercourse language scandal selfimportance selfrighteousness language taught think specially privileged expose discreditable secrets anything could made look like anyone need discrediting scandal merchant like leftwing activist always lookout bad guy villain ruined everything bear blame whatever troubling us ultimate bad guy latter course chimera capitalism mr douthat even finds role accessory mr hefners illdoings writes success businessman showed rotten side capitalism side exploits appetites money feeds leechlike vices dissolves family religion promising consumption fill void leave behind didnt always know bastard noname capitalists see ease mediathink scandalthink slot together leftwing progressivism marxistinspired doctrines left always led way scandalhunting mentality first identifying imaginary villain villains the160capo di tutti capi160capitalism laterborn ideological siblings imperialism colonialism racism sexism homophobia islamophobia runt litter transphobia yet midst column mr douthat wrote doubt hefner offered america somebody else would offered place changes helped hasten would come rushing without every way mattered made changes worse culture coarser crueler sterile liberalism feminism freedom speech required every way mattered life story proved wrong listen end long slide lay degraded priapic senility desperate gaiety prince prosperos court red death door somebody else would done mentioned many much worse hate much hes dead perhaps clue comes next paragraph death taken examine sins liberals ask crusade freedom equality found captain legacy says cause conservatives ask crusade faith family community ended hefnerian conservative news network seems run playboy mansion principles conservative party elected playboy president come ross expect us believe blaming trump hefner hefner trump result examining sins isnt rather precisely blind sins lashings hatred blame spare likes messrs hefner trump men seen symptoms causes merely exploited opportunity presented changing culture ie us bad guy sense never going anybody though may many people worse one richard nixon tell means means hate dont win unless hate destroy yet nixon somebody else never seem able hate enough spite dead 23 years anyone knows ever perused website allows readers comment thirtyseventh president still capable inspiring vicious contemptuous kinds language whenever name watergate comes hate keep bringing subject honor see right side vs white side in160the new criterion160of october 2017 actually dont hate seemed polite apologize must seem bit hobbyhorse less interested subject old honor culture defunct owe traditions manners civil discourse restrained imperfectly flow political well kinds passion coincidence birth social media death manners surprising us surprising outrage left refuses recognize part killing manners suppose preserve hypocrisy condemning right unmannerliness see much also fake news mainstream media pajamaclad trolls living parents basement see headlines like cruelty incompetence lies yet another160 paul krugman column160slamming congressional republicans attempt tinker obamacare professor krugman hopes persuade repugs point view hayley geftmangold discussion debate heart democratic process outmoded utterly forgotten take granted politics war enemy subject reasoned argument object hatred contempt least cbs grace feel embarrassed ms geftmangolds opened window echoing hatred felt could take granted whole corporate culture political passion slightly crasser version media entertainment figures well politicians seeking ride las vegas massacre victory little political battles less futile form gun control wearing unmerited accolade panacea rivalling world entertainment ever bumptious lena dunham tweeted las vegas shooting actually gender race capitalism queried twitter supplied explanation link a160 newsweek160story160by john haltiwanger headed white men committed mass shootings group white men eh sounds like belong rogues gallery evildoers blame everything find hatred given free rein tends spread generalize wise old wicked old richard nixon long ago discovered eventually destroy james bowman resident scholar ethics public policy center | 1,220 |
<p />
<p>The author is indebted to the good people at History Commons for their “Complete 9/11 Timeline.”&#160; If a reference is not evident below, it can probably be found there.</p>
<p>A recent interview with former “Counterterrorism Czar,” Richard Clarke, is making a splash in the alternative media.[1]&#160; In this interview, Clarke speculates about CIA malfeasance related to the pre-9/11 monitoring of two alleged September 11 hijackers.&#160; This interview is somewhat interesting due to Clarke’s vague suggestion that the CIA had courted 9/11 suspects as sources, but it is far more interesting for what was not said with regard to Clarke’s personal history and associations.</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">&lt;img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-12820" style="margin: 5px;" title="richard-clarke" src="https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/richard-clarke.jpg" alt="Richard Clarke" width="300" height="238" srcset="https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/richard-clarke.jpg 300w, https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/richard-clarke-150x119.jpg 150w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" /&gt;</a>The seeming point of these new statements from Clarke is that the CIA might have withheld information from him, the FBI, and the Department of Defense (DOD) in the twenty months leading up to the 9/11 attacks. &#160;Clarke is not suggesting that the CIA did this maliciously, but only that his good friend, George Tenet, and two others made a mistake in their approach.&#160; Clarke says of these CIA leaders — “They understood that al Qaeda was a big threat, they were motivated, and they were really trying hard.” &#160;The mild twist that Clarke now puts on the story is that &#160;the CIA’s diligent effort to secure much needed sources within the al Qaeda organization was pursued without any suspicion that these sources might turn out to be “double agents.”</p>
<p>Clarke claims that if the CIA had simply told him, the FBI and the DOD, “even as late as September 4th, [2001]” they would have “conducted a massive sweep, we would have conducted it publicly, we would have found those assholes.&#160; There’s no doubt in my mind.&#160; Even with only a week left.”</p>
<p>There are many obvious problems with these new claims from Clarke.&#160; For one thing, the evidence we have indicates that FBI headquarters did everything it could to protect the alleged 9/11 hijackers in the months leading up to 9/11. Another spectacularly obvious problem is that those “assholes” lived with an FBI asset for at least four months and there are reasons to believe the FBI knew that.&#160; More importantly, Richard Clarke personally thwarted two of the attempts the CIA made to capture Osama bin Laden (OBL) in the two years before 9/11.&#160; It seems disingenuous at best that Clarke would say he didn’t have enough information to capture two of OBL’s underlings in 2000 when he was responsible for preventing the capture of OBL just the year before.&#160;</p>
<p>In an attempt to make sense of these matters, we should take a closer look at Richard Clarke.&#160; His own history might shed some light on why he is trying to confuse us today.</p>
<p>Not just another COG</p>
<p>Clarke began his government career in the Ford Administration’s DOD as a nuclear weapons analyst. &#160;At the time, several characters that were central to the events of 9/11 were in the highest positions of that administration.&#160; Toward the end of that era, White House chief of staff Dick Cheney and DOD secretary Donald Rumsfeld were fighting a war of public perception to preserve the increasingly unpopular aspects of the CIA. &#160;Nuclear policy was a big issue at the time as well, and at least one of Clarke’s closest colleagues in later years, Paul Wolfowitz, worked to present false “Team B” information.</p>
<p>After getting his MA from MIT, Clarke went on to become President Reagan’s Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Intelligence.&#160; In this role, Clarke negotiated US military presence in Egypt, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Qatar, and Saudi Arabia.&#160; He asked these foreign governments for “access” agreements and the right to enhance existing facilities.&#160; As a result, the US moved large numbers of contractors into Saudi Arabia.&#160; One such contractor, Bernard Kerik, the New York City police commissioner and “9/11 hero” who had worked for Morrison-Knudsen’s Saudi group in the mid-seventies, went back for another three year tour as the “the chief investigator for the royal family of Saudi Arabia.”[2]</p>
<p>During his half a dozen years in Reagan’s State department, Clarke called Morton Abramowitz, the Assistant Secretary of State for Intelligence and Research, his boss and mentor.&#160; Abramowitz, who was said to be influential in the career of Clarke, had worked as Assistant Secretary for Defense under Donald Rumsfeld in the seventies when Clarke worked in the DOD. &#160;Abramowitz left his position at State in 1989 to become the Ambassador to Turkey.&#160; The next person for whom Abramowitz was boss and mentor was his Deputy Ambassador, Marc Grossman, who is a 9/11 person of interest according to Sibel Edmonds.</p>
<p>In 1984, Clarke was selected to take part in one of the most highly classified programs of the Reagan Administration.&#160; This was the highly secret Continuity of Government (COG) program run by the National Program Office that continued up to and after the attacks of September 11.[3]&#160; The members of the COG group included Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Oliver North, George H.W. Bush, Kenneth Duberstein, James Woolsey, and Richard Clarke.&#160; Although Cheney and Rumsfeld were not government employees throughout the twenty years that Clarke participated in this official government program, they both continued to participate anyway.</p>
<p>COG was developed to install a shadow “government in waiting” to replace the US Congress and the US Constitution in the event of a national emergency like a nuclear war. The first and only time that COG was put into action was when Richard Clarke activated it during the 9/11 attacks. &#160;Clarke had been the one, in 1998, to revise the COG plan to use it as a response to a terrorist attack on American soil.&#160; Apparently, COG and the shadow government these men created are still in play to this day. [4]</p>
<p>In 1989, Clarke was appointed by George H.W. Bush to be the Assistant Secretary of State for Politico-Military Affairs, under James Baker. Clarke was in this position until 1992, and his role was to link the Department of Defense and the Department of State by providing policy in the areas of international security, security assistance, military operations, defense strategy, military use of space, and defense trade.&#160; One important aspect of his job during this time was that Clarke coordinated State Department support of Operation Desert Storm and led the efforts to design the international security structure after the Gulf War.</p>
<p>Throughout the years of the George H.W. Bush Administration, Clarke worked intimately with many people who should be investigated with regard to the events of 9/11 and the crimes that followed. This included:</p>
<p>• James Baker, the Secretary of State who went on to join the Carlyle Group</p>
<p>• Donald Rumsfeld, the State Department “Foreign Policy Consultant” who was Chairman Emeritus of the Carlyle Group at that time, and Secretary of Defense on 9/11</p>
<p>• Dick Cheney, the Reagan Secretary of Defense who, later as Vice President, coordinated the response to the 9/11 attacks</p>
<p>• Paul Wolfowitz, the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy who, in the week before 9/11, ran meetings with Pakistani ISI General Ahmed</p>
<p>• Duane Andrews, the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Intelligence who left to run SAIC</p>
<p>• Robert Gates, the CIA Director who was implicated in the Iran-Contra crimes and later also worked with SAIC</p>
<p>• Senate Intelligence Committee representatives George Tenet and William Cohen, the latter of whom, in 1997, dramatically reduced the number of jet fighters protecting the US</p>
<p>• And Reagan advisor Richard Armitage, who participated in the failed air defense teleconference on 9/11</p>
<p>According to his book, Clarke remembers that “Wolfowitz and I flew on to Bahrain, Abu Dhabi and Salaleh” to coordinate relations with the UAE, at Cheney’ request.&#160; Over the following decade, Clarke negotiated many deals with the Emirates, essentially becoming an agent of the UAE, and he was “particularly close to the UAE royal family.”[5]&#160;</p>
<p>Not long after Clarke began going there,the royal family of Abu Dhabi took over full ownership of the Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI).&#160; BCCI is significant relative to 9/11 because it was involved in funding terrorists in the late 1980s and was linked to the Pakistani intelligence network from which several alleged 9/11 conspirators came, including Khalid Sheik Mohammed. In fact, Time magazine reported that, relative to BCCI — “You can’t draw a line separating the bank’s black operatives and Pakistan’s intelligence services.”[6]</p>
<p>More importantly, there are strong suspicions that the CIA was involved in the founding of BCCI.[7]&#160; The CIA connection to the origins of the BCCI terrorist network is interesting in this context because the royal family of the UAE was also said to have played a primary role in the creation of BCCI.&#160; As the official US government report on the subject pointed out — “There was no relationship more central to BCCI’s existence from its inception than that between BCCI and Sheikh Zayed and the ruling family of Abu Dhabi.”[8]</p>
<p>As stated before, Clarke’s friends in the UAE royal family not only created the BCCI terrorist network, they took it over when the Bank of England shut it down:</p>
<p>By July 5, 1991, when BCCI was closed globally, the Government of Abu Dhabi, its ruling family, and an investment company holding the assets of the ruling family, were the controlling, and official “majority” shareholders of BCCI — owning 77 percent of the bank. But since the remaining 23 percent was actually held by nominees and by BCCI’s alter-ego ICIC, Abu Dhabi was in fact BCCI’s sole owner.[9]</p>
<p />
<p /> | false | 1 | author indebted good people history commons complete 911 timeline160 reference evident probably found recent interview former counterterrorism czar richard clarke making splash alternative media1160 interview clarke speculates cia malfeasance related pre911 monitoring two alleged september 11 hijackers160 interview somewhat interesting due clarkes vague suggestion cia courted 911 suspects sources far interesting said regard clarkes personal history associations ltimg classalignleft sizefull wpimage12820 stylemargin 5px titlerichardclarke srchttpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201108richardclarkejpg altrichard clarke width300 height238 srcsethttpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201108richardclarkejpg 300w httpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201108richardclarke150x119jpg 150w sizesmaxwidth 300px 100vw 300px gtthe seeming point new statements clarke cia might withheld information fbi department defense dod twenty months leading 911 attacks 160clarke suggesting cia maliciously good friend george tenet two others made mistake approach160 clarke says cia leaders understood al qaeda big threat motivated really trying hard 160the mild twist clarke puts story 160the cias diligent effort secure much needed sources within al qaeda organization pursued without suspicion sources might turn double agents clarke claims cia simply told fbi dod even late september 4th 2001 would conducted massive sweep would conducted publicly would found assholes160 theres doubt mind160 even week left many obvious problems new claims clarke160 one thing evidence indicates fbi headquarters everything could protect alleged 911 hijackers months leading 911 another spectacularly obvious problem assholes lived fbi asset least four months reasons believe fbi knew that160 importantly richard clarke personally thwarted two attempts cia made capture osama bin laden obl two years 911160 seems disingenuous best clarke would say didnt enough information capture two obls underlings 2000 responsible preventing capture obl year before160 attempt make sense matters take closer look richard clarke160 history might shed light trying confuse us today another cog clarke began government career ford administrations dod nuclear weapons analyst 160at time several characters central events 911 highest positions administration160 toward end era white house chief staff dick cheney dod secretary donald rumsfeld fighting war public perception preserve increasingly unpopular aspects cia 160nuclear policy big issue time well least one clarkes closest colleagues later years paul wolfowitz worked present false team b information getting mit clarke went become president reagans deputy assistant secretary state intelligence160 role clarke negotiated us military presence egypt bahrain kuwait oman united arab emirates uae qatar saudi arabia160 asked foreign governments access agreements right enhance existing facilities160 result us moved large numbers contractors saudi arabia160 one contractor bernard kerik new york city police commissioner 911 hero worked morrisonknudsens saudi group midseventies went back another three year tour chief investigator royal family saudi arabia2 half dozen years reagans state department clarke called morton abramowitz assistant secretary state intelligence research boss mentor160 abramowitz said influential career clarke worked assistant secretary defense donald rumsfeld seventies clarke worked dod 160abramowitz left position state 1989 become ambassador turkey160 next person abramowitz boss mentor deputy ambassador marc grossman 911 person interest according sibel edmonds 1984 clarke selected take part one highly classified programs reagan administration160 highly secret continuity government cog program run national program office continued attacks september 113160 members cog group included dick cheney donald rumsfeld oliver north george hw bush kenneth duberstein james woolsey richard clarke160 although cheney rumsfeld government employees throughout twenty years clarke participated official government program continued participate anyway cog developed install shadow government waiting replace us congress us constitution event national emergency like nuclear war first time cog put action richard clarke activated 911 attacks 160clarke one 1998 revise cog plan use response terrorist attack american soil160 apparently cog shadow government men created still play day 4 1989 clarke appointed george hw bush assistant secretary state politicomilitary affairs james baker clarke position 1992 role link department defense department state providing policy areas international security security assistance military operations defense strategy military use space defense trade160 one important aspect job time clarke coordinated state department support operation desert storm led efforts design international security structure gulf war throughout years george hw bush administration clarke worked intimately many people investigated regard events 911 crimes followed included james baker secretary state went join carlyle group donald rumsfeld state department foreign policy consultant chairman emeritus carlyle group time secretary defense 911 dick cheney reagan secretary defense later vice president coordinated response 911 attacks paul wolfowitz undersecretary defense policy week 911 ran meetings pakistani isi general ahmed duane andrews assistant secretary defense intelligence left run saic robert gates cia director implicated irancontra crimes later also worked saic senate intelligence committee representatives george tenet william cohen latter 1997 dramatically reduced number jet fighters protecting us reagan advisor richard armitage participated failed air defense teleconference 911 according book clarke remembers wolfowitz flew bahrain abu dhabi salaleh coordinate relations uae cheney request160 following decade clarke negotiated many deals emirates essentially becoming agent uae particularly close uae royal family5160 long clarke began going therethe royal family abu dhabi took full ownership bank credit commerce international bcci160 bcci significant relative 911 involved funding terrorists late 1980s linked pakistani intelligence network several alleged 911 conspirators came including khalid sheik mohammed fact time magazine reported relative bcci cant draw line separating banks black operatives pakistans intelligence services6 importantly strong suspicions cia involved founding bcci7160 cia connection origins bcci terrorist network interesting context royal family uae also said played primary role creation bcci160 official us government report subject pointed relationship central bccis existence inception bcci sheikh zayed ruling family abu dhabi8 stated clarkes friends uae royal family created bcci terrorist network took bank england shut july 5 1991 bcci closed globally government abu dhabi ruling family investment company holding assets ruling family controlling official majority shareholders bcci owning 77 percent bank since remaining 23 percent actually held nominees bccis alterego icic abu dhabi fact bccis sole owner9 | 927 |
<p>You’ve noticed it if you’ve kept a death-watch by the bedside of a loved one; emergency medics, physicians, and clergy see it all the time, even on the battlefield: the human body fights against death, resisting the inevitable to the end. Viewed through the lens of biblical faith, this innate, physical resistance to death is a trace of what theologians call “original innocence,” the condition of Adam and Eve before the Fall: before sin and death entered the story. Death is unnatural, in the sense that the Creator did not intend it “in the beginning.” Because “he is not God of the dead but of the living; for all live to him” [Luke 20.38].</p>
<p>Easter, which is properly celebrated for a full week, or “octave,” is an annual invitation to ponder and pray over just what the Resurrection wrought. Reflecting on that question in its most comprehensive sense, it’s good to keep that natural resistance-to-death in mind, for it sheds light on an important dimension of Easter faith. And that is the Church’s conviction, which we can see being formed in some of St. Paul’s later letters, that the Resurrection wrought a great change in the order of nature as well as in the order of history — a great change in the structure of reality itself, as well as in the trajectory of the human drama.</p>
<p>In the middle volume of his triptych, Jesus of Nazareth, Pope Benedict XVI tried to describe those Resurrection-changes in history and nature (which are, of course, ultimately indescribable) like this:</p>
<p>Christ’s Resurrection&#160;.&#160;.&#160;.&#160;is a historical event that nevertheless bursts open the dimensions of history and transcends it. Perhaps we may draw upon analogical language here&#160;.&#160;.&#160;.&#160;[and think of] the Resurrection as something akin to a radical “evolutionary leap,” in which a new dimension of life emerges, a new dimension of human existence.</p>
<p>Indeed, matter itself is remolded into a new type of reality. The man Jesus, complete with his body, now belongs to the sphere of the divine and eternal. From now on, as Tertullian once said, “spirit and blood” have a place within God.&#160;.&#160;.&#160;.&#160;Even if man by his nature is created for immortality, it is only now that the place exists in which his immortal soul can find its “space,” its “bodiliness,” in which immortality takes on its meaning as communion with God and with the whole of reconciled mankind. This is what is meant by those passages in Saint Paul’s prison letters (cf. Colossians 1.12–23 and Ephesians 1. 3–23) that speak of the cosmic body of Christ, indicating thereby that Christ’s transformed body is also the place where men enter into communion with God and with one another and are therefore able to live definitively in the fullness of indestructible life. . . .</p>
<p>[Thus] Jesus’s Resurrection was not just about some deceased individual coming back to life at a certain point.&#160;.&#160;.&#160;.&#160;[An] ontological leap occurred, one that touches being as such, opening up a dimension that affects us all, creating for all of us a new space of life, a new space of being in union with God.</p>
<p>Keeping in mind the magnitude of the change wrought by the Resurrection — a divine action in history and nature that changed history and nature in a radical way, opening new possibilities of life beyond the reach of death — we can get a deeper insight into those readings from the four Gospels that the Church uses on Easter Sunday and throughout Easter Week — readings in which the disciples don’t get it, time after time after time, in their encounters with the Risen One.</p>
<p>Take, for example, one of the literary gems of the New Testament: the account, in Luke 24.13–44, of the two disciples who meet the Risen Lord on Easter on the road to Emmaus, fail to recognize him at first, then come to know him in the breaking of bread. The two then rush back to Jerusalem where they share their experience with other friends of Jesus. Both the Emmaus disciples and the disciples in Jerusalem (who have found the empty tomb and have heard the angel’s proclamation of the Resurrection) believe that Jesus has been raised; they accept the testimony of their own eyes, and of witnesses. But they still cannot grasp what this “being raised” means. So when the Risen One appears among them, their first reaction is to think that this is a “spirit,” a ghost.</p>
<p>The Risen Lord chastises them mildly, pointing out that he has “flesh and bones” that a “spirit” would not have — and still they don’t get it, although St. Luke tells us that they “disbelieved for joy:” that is, this is too good to be true. So the Lord asks for something to eat; they give him broiled fish, which he eats before them. Then, as he had done on the Emmaus road, he shows them from Scripture that the Anointed One of God had to suffer; that he then had to rise from the dead to a new form of life; and that repentance should be preached in his name “to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.” They are, he concludes, “witnesses to these things” — which is to say, they have a mission, for which they will be equipped in due course by “power from on high,” in the gift of the Holy Spirit.</p>
<p>This striking pattern — incomprehension followed by divine instruction and example, and then by a gradual emerging of Easter faith in its fullness — is central to the Church’s liturgy throughout Easter Week. And in this age of skepticism, it is certainly striking that the Church made its own dullness and initial lack of understanding a central part of its preaching of the Resurrection — which is not precisely what today’s marketing gurus would recommend. (“Hi. I’m Steve Jobs and this is an iPhone. I’m not sure what it’ll do, but we’ll see.”) Why was this slowness to grasp the meaning of the New Life remembered? Why was it enshrined in the holy books of the New Covenant?</p>
<p>Benedict XVI, once again, suggests an answer. It was done, he wrote, because it accurately reflects the ways of God with humanity. Why didn’t God do things the way we would have done them — smiting the enemies of God with power, coming down from the Cross, revealing the truth of the world and of history to the powerful and influential, rather than to a small band of illiterates, peasants, and pious women? Because, as Benedict reminds us, God’s ways are not our ways:</p>
<p>It is part of the mystery of God that he acts so gently, that he gradually builds up his history within the great history of mankind; that he becomes man and so can be overlooked by his contemporaries and by the powers that shape history; that he suffers and dies and that, having risen again, he chooses to come to mankind only through the faith of the disciples to whom he reveals himself; that he continues to knock gently on the doors of our hearts and slowly opens out eyes if we open our doors to him.</p>
<p>And yet — is this not the truly divine way? Not to overwhelm with external power, but to give freedom, to offer and elicit love. And if we really think about it, is it not what seems so small that is truly great? Does not a ray of light issue from Jesus, growing brighter across the centuries, that could not come from any mere man and through which the light of God truly shines into the world? Could the apostolic preaching have found faith and build up a worldwide community unless the power of truth had been at work within it?</p>
<p>Because of Easter, nature and history, the material self and the soul, the world and the cosmos have all been transformed: they have been brought into communion with God, who is now shown to be Creator and Redeemer, and who will soon be known, at Pentecost, as Sanctifier. Because of that, we can see that history is, finally, His-story, God’s story, and that God has acted to put our history within His-story back on track. Because of Easter, we can take heart at moments when history seems careening off the rails, as it does in April 2015. Because of Easter, we can see (if more dimly than he saw) what the visionary John saw on Patmos, which is where all of this is finally heading:</p>
<p>Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband; and I heard a great voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling of God is with men. He will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself will be with them; he will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away.</p>
<p>And he who sat upon the throne said, “Behold, I make all things new.” [Revelation 21. 1–5a]</p>
<p>He is risen. Be not afraid.</p>
<p>— George&#160;Weigel is Distinguished Senior Fellow of Washington’s Ethics and Public Policy Center, where he holds the William E. Simon Chair in Catholic Studies. This essay is adapted from <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Roman-Pilgrimage-The-Station-Churches/dp/0465027695" type="external">Roman Pilgrimage: The Station Churches</a>,which he co-authored with Elizabeth Lev and Stephen Weigel.</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | false | 1 | youve noticed youve kept deathwatch bedside loved one emergency medics physicians clergy see time even battlefield human body fights death resisting inevitable end viewed lens biblical faith innate physical resistance death trace theologians call original innocence condition adam eve fall sin death entered story death unnatural sense creator intend beginning god dead living live luke 2038 easter properly celebrated full week octave annual invitation ponder pray resurrection wrought reflecting question comprehensive sense good keep natural resistancetodeath mind sheds light important dimension easter faith churchs conviction see formed st pauls later letters resurrection wrought great change order nature well order history great change structure reality well trajectory human drama middle volume triptych jesus nazareth pope benedict xvi tried describe resurrectionchanges history nature course ultimately indescribable like christs resurrection160160160160is historical event nevertheless bursts open dimensions history transcends perhaps may draw upon analogical language here160160160160and think resurrection something akin radical evolutionary leap new dimension life emerges new dimension human existence indeed matter remolded new type reality man jesus complete body belongs sphere divine eternal tertullian said spirit blood place within god160160160160even man nature created immortality place exists immortal soul find space bodiliness immortality takes meaning communion god whole reconciled mankind meant passages saint pauls prison letters cf colossians 11223 ephesians 1 323 speak cosmic body christ indicating thereby christs transformed body also place men enter communion god one another therefore able live definitively fullness indestructible life thus jesuss resurrection deceased individual coming back life certain point160160160160an ontological leap occurred one touches opening dimension affects us creating us new space life new space union god keeping mind magnitude change wrought resurrection divine action history nature changed history nature radical way opening new possibilities life beyond reach death get deeper insight readings four gospels church uses easter sunday throughout easter week readings disciples dont get time time time encounters risen one take example one literary gems new testament account luke 241344 two disciples meet risen lord easter road emmaus fail recognize first come know breaking bread two rush back jerusalem share experience friends jesus emmaus disciples disciples jerusalem found empty tomb heard angels proclamation resurrection believe jesus raised accept testimony eyes witnesses still grasp raised means risen one appears among first reaction think spirit ghost risen lord chastises mildly pointing flesh bones spirit would still dont get although st luke tells us disbelieved joy good true lord asks something eat give broiled fish eats done emmaus road shows scripture anointed one god suffer rise dead new form life repentance preached name nations beginning jerusalem concludes witnesses things say mission equipped due course power high gift holy spirit striking pattern incomprehension followed divine instruction example gradual emerging easter faith fullness central churchs liturgy throughout easter week age skepticism certainly striking church made dullness initial lack understanding central part preaching resurrection precisely todays marketing gurus would recommend hi im steve jobs iphone im sure itll well see slowness grasp meaning new life remembered enshrined holy books new covenant benedict xvi suggests answer done wrote accurately reflects ways god humanity didnt god things way would done smiting enemies god power coming cross revealing truth world history powerful influential rather small band illiterates peasants pious women benedict reminds us gods ways ways part mystery god acts gently gradually builds history within great history mankind becomes man overlooked contemporaries powers shape history suffers dies risen chooses come mankind faith disciples reveals continues knock gently doors hearts slowly opens eyes open doors yet truly divine way overwhelm external power give freedom offer elicit love really think seems small truly great ray light issue jesus growing brighter across centuries could come mere man light god truly shines world could apostolic preaching found faith build worldwide community unless power truth work within easter nature history material self soul world cosmos transformed brought communion god shown creator redeemer soon known pentecost sanctifier see history finally hisstory gods story god acted put history within hisstory back track easter take heart moments history seems careening rails april 2015 easter see dimly saw visionary john saw patmos finally heading saw new heaven new earth first heaven first earth passed away sea saw holy city new jerusalem coming heaven god prepared bride adorned husband heard great voice throne saying behold dwelling god men dwell shall people god wipe away every tear eyes death shall neither shall mourning crying pain former things passed away sat upon throne said behold make things new revelation 21 15a risen afraid george160weigel distinguished senior fellow washingtons ethics public policy center holds william e simon chair catholic studies essay adapted roman pilgrimage station churcheswhich coauthored elizabeth lev stephen weigel 160 | 766 |
<p>This summer EPPC Resident Scholar James Bowman is&#160;presenting on behalf of the Ethics and Public Policy Center and the Hudson Institute in Washington a series of five films on the general theme of Heaven. The films are being shown at the Hudson Institute, 1015 15th Street N.W., Suite 600, and you can go to the <a href="" type="internal">EPPC</a>&#160;or <a href="http://hudson.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=hudson_upcoming_events&amp;id=862" type="external">Hudson</a>&#160;websites for details or to register to attend. The series continued on Tuesday, July 19th with a screening of Defending Your Life of 1991 by Albert Brooks and also starring Mr Brooks along with Meryl Streep, Rip Torn, Lee Grant and Buck Henry. Before showing the film,&#160;Mr. Bowman&#160;spoke for a few minutes about the movie as follows.</p>
<p>In my introduction to Between Two Worlds in Week Two of this series of movies about Heaven, I mentioned the heterodoxy ofHeaven Can Wait with its rendering of judgment by Satan, known in the film as His Excellency, and not God—as if the former were a functionary to whom the latter had delegated his authority. We saw more such heterodoxy with a comical intent in last week’s movie, Stairway to Heaven or A Matter of Life and Death, but that seems only to have been a dream vision in any case. Yet however strange or ludicrous their various versions of the afterlife, all of those first three movies, made within a few years of each other during and just after the Second World War, were recognizably derived from the Western Christian tradition—which would have been a good deal more familiar to their original audiences than it is to audiences today.</p>
<p>In the nearly half a century between last week’s movie and this week’s, which is Albert Brooks’s Defending Your Life of 1991, all that has obviously changed. This film’s version of the afterlife is also a kind of parody of conventional religious belief, but this time the parody is not of Christianity but of the Hindu or Buddhist belief in reincarnation. It even includes a very funny cameo appearance by Shirley MacLaine, Hollywood’s most famous believer in reincarnation—a post-modern, breaking-the-fourth-wall sort of joke which is perhaps meant to reassure us that we don’t have to take the Eastern Mysticism stuff too seriously. Not that the reassurance is really necessary. Mr Brooks, who also plays the film’s Everyman, Daniel Miller, makes it clear throughout that he has no theological or eschatological purpose by making this heaven—and, once again, it is only the anteroom of the afterlife and not the ultimate destination that we see—way too much like earth, though he might have a satirical one.</p>
<p>Reincarnation shorn of any specific religious context as it is here is naturally a doctrine to appeal to narcissists, as I am not the first to notice, and Albert Brooks is also making fun of that other manifestation of Hollywood narcissism, the therapeutic culture. The Judgment Day that W.H. Auden once said even conscious unbelievers felt quite sure of was once a matter of the terror described in the Dies Irae or Day of Wrath in the Latin poem by Thomas of Celano that was part of the Requiem Mass of the Roman Catholic Church for hundreds of years.</p>
<p>Dies irae! dies illa</p>
<p>Solvet saeclum in favilla:</p>
<p>Teste David cum Sibylla!</p>
<p>Quantus tremor est futurus,</p>
<p>Quando iudex est venturus,</p>
<p>Cuncta stricte discussurus!</p>
<p>That is, roughly, “A Day of Wrath, that Day when the world will be reduced to a cinder, as David predicted through the Sybil. What fear and trembling will there be when that Judge comes and searches strictly into everything!” The word discutio, of which discussurus is the future participle, really means something like “shaken to pieces,” but the idea of a searching investigation seems to be what is the point of the destruction. It is the destruction of our defenses, of our secrets. As Ambrose Bierce rendered it,</p>
<p>Ah! what terror shall be shaping</p>
<p>When the Judge the truth’s undraping—</p>
<p>Cats from every bag escaping!</p>
<p>But the Second Vatican Council of the revolutionary 1960s decided that this had to be looking at the thing in too negative a light and took it out of the Requiem mass—an impulse of the therapeutic culture which Mr Brooks, too, both pre-supposes and gently satirizes in his marvelous invention of Judgment City, a sort of eschatological Disneyland designed to look as much as possible like home and so to re-assure and eliminate stress from the lives of recently dead Californians as they are escorted to a judgment that is more like a job interview than a scene of ultimate destruction. I especially like one of the movie’s several running gags, which is that in Judgment City you can eat whatever you like and never get fat. Thus even the one thing remaining that late 20thcentury Americans have to feel guilty about, endangering their own health, has been reassuringly taken off the eternal score sheet. Heaven!</p>
<p>Another of those running gags is the business about how the Judgment Citizens use close to 50 per cent of their brains’ capacity versus the mere three to five per cent that we earthlings are said to use. “When you use more than five per cent of your brain,” explains Rip Torn’s wonderfully raffish Bob Diamond to Daniel, “you don’t want to be on earth, believe me; not that your take-out places aren’t nice.” Bob confides that the meritocratic élite in Judgment City refer to those they judge behind their backs, as “Little Brains”—which perfectly reproduces the condescending attitude that we suspect is harbored by so much of officialdom here on earth. I mentioned last week the genealogy of the idea of the next world as a kind of vast and not always terribly efficient bureaucracy that is common to all five of the movies I am showing this summer, but this is the only one of the five that takes the trouble to make the bureaucrats look familiar rather than strange and—at least to some extent—mysterious and awe-inspiring.</p>
<p>For I think we are meant to see a connection between the worship of intelligence that is so much a feature of what Charles Murray calls the cognitive élite in our society and the therapeutic culture that Mr Brooks imagines is inescapable even in death. Both are involved in producing the kind of bureaucratic paternalism that is the film’s starting point and that makes it, so I’m told, a favorite with libertarian audiences. But for all the familiarity of the Disneyland trappings and the slickness and disingenuousness of Bob Diamond—and what a disappointment it must be to discover that you can’t escape from bores and unfunny comedians and insincere camaraderie even in heaven—the film does take the matter of judgment seriously. And yet the judgment that we see ignores all our traditional ideas of guilt and sin and concentrates instead on the matter of neglected opportunities. “I can’t believe that the whole point of the universe is to make money,” says the outraged Daniel on realizing that he is being called to account for being too cautious an investor. But we are clearly meant to take it seriously when he is told that “you keep thinking it’s about money, but it isn’t about money; it’s about fear.”</p>
<p>One way of looking at this version of the supernatural economy is as a working out of Brigid Brophy’s dictum that “courage is the only virtue”—which must be another aspect of this universal model that appeals to libertarians or what in my youth used to be called existentialists. But maybe it would be truer to say that courage is the only virtue if you are a coward, as Daniel is portrayed as being here. It seems possible to look at Judgment City and the whole mechanism of the trial that, so we are frequently told, is not really a trial as having been designed specifically for him and the life he has lived. So that when the iudex gets around to the discussurus there really is a sense of his standing naked before his creator, unable to hide anything. As he is also a stand-up comedian, I wonder if Mr Brooks hasn’t included the business of the unfunny comedian, dying on stage in his film as an analogy to that feeling of exposure he is creating for his own character and perhaps for himself in it. And if we know that in the course of his career Albert Brooks turned down the Tom Hanks role in Big, the Billy Crystal role in When Harry Met Sally and the Richard Gere role in Pretty Woman, the idea of an eternal reckoning for missed opportunity begins to sound more than a bit autobiographical.</p>
<p>The point of judgment, in other words, may be not so much what you have done or haven’t done as it is what you are ashamed of having done or not having done. That’s there in the Dies Irae as well:</p>
<p>Iudex ergo cum sedebit</p>
<p>Quidquid latet, apparebit:</p>
<p>Nil inultum remanebit.</p>
<p>Or: “When the Judge shall take his seat, whatever is hidden shall be revealed and nothing shall remain unpunished.” The punishment, that is, lies in the revelation itself, in simply not being able to hide anything anymore. That may also be the point of Daniel’s being given such an inept defense lawyer as Bob Diamond. His unsuccessful attempts to keep Daniel’s hidden things hidden still only succeed in exposing them the more mercilessly. Not only can he not keep them hidden from others, he can’t even keep them hidden from himself anymore.</p>
<p>This idea of judgment as exposure also brings up the matter of movie-making, which will be the central idea in next week’s final picture in this series, Hirokazu Kore-eda’s After Life. It doesn’t quite occupy that position in Albert Brooks’s movie, but it is still an important part of it. As in Mr Kore-eda’s film, we are asked to believe that every moment of our lives has been captured on videotape by the Great Cameraman in the sky—or even on high-quality film which suggests (so Daniel is told anyway) a vividly lifelike 3-D effect. As the number of closed-circuit television cameras to which we are all exposed in our daily lives has increased exponentially since this film was made, we are likely today to be even more sensitive to the terror of exposure which has always been a part of the idea of judgment—and which is also what makes scandal so titillating to us here below. Once again, the autobiographical element may be implicit in the idea of a man’s being forced to watch himself on film, to see himself as others see him, which is a kind of exposure Mr Brooks is inviting for himself in making this film.</p>
<p>There are various threads of continuity between this movie and the others in the series, but of course the principal one is the love story. Again and again, erotic love becomes a kind of synecdoche for or even, as here, the instrument of eternal salvation and redemption from sin. That’s the movies for you. I would say, however, though there may be many of you who will want to disagree with me if you can stay around for the discussion afterwards, that another thread of continuity is the unsatisfactory nature of the love story as a love story. As with Kim Hunter and David Niven and Eleanor Parker and Paul Henreid or even Gene Tierney and Don Ameche, Meryl Streep and Albert Brooks don’t exactly light up the screen with their sexual chemistry. To my mind the best joke in the movie is when Daniel instantly regrets his backing out on his tryst with Miss Streep’s Julia and tries to call her hotel room. Suddenly he realizes he doesn’t know her surname and is forced to ask if there is anyone named Julia there. There are two Julias, he is told, but both have gone to bed after asking not to be disturbed. Well, then, says Daniel, nothing daunted, leave this message: “Tell them both, I guess, that I love them more than life itself.” Anyway, that’s pretty big talk for a dead guy.</p>
<p>As Kim Hunter tells the heavenly tribunal in Stairway to Heaven, “There’s no sense in love,” and Albert Brooks goes even more out of his way than Powell and Pressburger to make love seem capricious and even nonsensical. More than once, Daniel remarks on the fact that he and Julia are almost the only two souls-in-transit in Judgment City who are under a hundred years old. They clearly have taken with them to the other world the hormonal urges of this one, so that the element of accident and opportunity in their attraction to each other is unavoidable. We also have to notice the disparity between them, Julia being a standout performer in the Judgment stakes while poor Daniel has to plod along with the also-rans. Another of the movie’s great jokes takes place as we watch on her life-review her rescue not only of her children but of their pet from a blazing house as her judge says admiringly, like a Hollywood executive looking at the rushes of a new film, “Going back for the cat is wonderful.”</p>
<p>Daniel later compares this scene to a life insurance commercial, and that kind of shlockiness, as it would seem on earth anyway, might seem to be at odds with the idea of judgment as exposure and the movies as unforgivingly realistic. But of course exposure works both ways as an indulgent deity apparently allows us to show what we are proud of as well as forcing us to watch what we are ashamed of. It may be easy to forget in the movies we see here below, but virtue and beauty are also real things. Moreover, they allow Julia to take on the role of Beatrice to Daniel’s Dante or Gretchen to his Faust, as Martha did to Henry Van Cleve in Heaven Can Wait: that is, as the feminine principle which enables men (at least) to understand the kind of goodness they are meant to seek as their salvation. I hope this isn’t too portentous a view of this movie. It is, as we have also had to notice in the others we have seen here, just a movie. But if we need to hold on to the idea of the lightness that it shares with all those other cinematic parades of light and shadow which have tried to take on serious subjects, I think we can also give it some credit for giving us images of Death, Resurrection and Judgment, if not of Heaven exactly, that we can take seriously.</p> | false | 1 | summer eppc resident scholar james bowman is160presenting behalf ethics public policy center hudson institute washington series five films general theme heaven films shown hudson institute 1015 15th street nw suite 600 go eppc160or hudson160websites details register attend series continued tuesday july 19th screening defending life 1991 albert brooks also starring mr brooks along meryl streep rip torn lee grant buck henry showing film160mr bowman160spoke minutes movie follows introduction two worlds week two series movies heaven mentioned heterodoxy ofheaven wait rendering judgment satan known film excellency godas former functionary latter delegated authority saw heterodoxy comical intent last weeks movie stairway heaven matter life death seems dream vision case yet however strange ludicrous various versions afterlife first three movies made within years second world war recognizably derived western christian traditionwhich would good deal familiar original audiences audiences today nearly half century last weeks movie weeks albert brookss defending life 1991 obviously changed films version afterlife also kind parody conventional religious belief time parody christianity hindu buddhist belief reincarnation even includes funny cameo appearance shirley maclaine hollywoods famous believer reincarnationa postmodern breakingthefourthwall sort joke perhaps meant reassure us dont take eastern mysticism stuff seriously reassurance really necessary mr brooks also plays films everyman daniel miller makes clear throughout theological eschatological purpose making heavenand anteroom afterlife ultimate destination seeway much like earth though might satirical one reincarnation shorn specific religious context naturally doctrine appeal narcissists first notice albert brooks also making fun manifestation hollywood narcissism therapeutic culture judgment day wh auden said even conscious unbelievers felt quite sure matter terror described dies irae day wrath latin poem thomas celano part requiem mass roman catholic church hundreds years dies irae dies illa solvet saeclum favilla teste david cum sibylla quantus tremor est futurus quando iudex est venturus cuncta stricte discussurus roughly day wrath day world reduced cinder david predicted sybil fear trembling judge comes searches strictly everything word discutio discussurus future participle really means something like shaken pieces idea searching investigation seems point destruction destruction defenses secrets ambrose bierce rendered ah terror shall shaping judge truths undraping cats every bag escaping second vatican council revolutionary 1960s decided looking thing negative light took requiem massan impulse therapeutic culture mr brooks presupposes gently satirizes marvelous invention judgment city sort eschatological disneyland designed look much possible like home reassure eliminate stress lives recently dead californians escorted judgment like job interview scene ultimate destruction especially like one movies several running gags judgment city eat whatever like never get fat thus even one thing remaining late 20thcentury americans feel guilty endangering health reassuringly taken eternal score sheet heaven another running gags business judgment citizens use close 50 per cent brains capacity versus mere three five per cent earthlings said use use five per cent brain explains rip torns wonderfully raffish bob diamond daniel dont want earth believe takeout places arent nice bob confides meritocratic élite judgment city refer judge behind backs little brainswhich perfectly reproduces condescending attitude suspect harbored much officialdom earth mentioned last week genealogy idea next world kind vast always terribly efficient bureaucracy common five movies showing summer one five takes trouble make bureaucrats look familiar rather strange andat least extentmysterious aweinspiring think meant see connection worship intelligence much feature charles murray calls cognitive élite society therapeutic culture mr brooks imagines inescapable even death involved producing kind bureaucratic paternalism films starting point makes im told favorite libertarian audiences familiarity disneyland trappings slickness disingenuousness bob diamondand disappointment must discover cant escape bores unfunny comedians insincere camaraderie even heaventhe film take matter judgment seriously yet judgment see ignores traditional ideas guilt sin concentrates instead matter neglected opportunities cant believe whole point universe make money says outraged daniel realizing called account cautious investor clearly meant take seriously told keep thinking money isnt money fear one way looking version supernatural economy working brigid brophys dictum courage virtuewhich must another aspect universal model appeals libertarians youth used called existentialists maybe would truer say courage virtue coward daniel portrayed seems possible look judgment city whole mechanism trial frequently told really trial designed specifically life lived iudex gets around discussurus really sense standing naked creator unable hide anything also standup comedian wonder mr brooks hasnt included business unfunny comedian dying stage film analogy feeling exposure creating character perhaps know course career albert brooks turned tom hanks role big billy crystal role harry met sally richard gere role pretty woman idea eternal reckoning missed opportunity begins sound bit autobiographical point judgment words may much done havent done ashamed done done thats dies irae well iudex ergo cum sedebit quidquid latet apparebit nil inultum remanebit judge shall take seat whatever hidden shall revealed nothing shall remain unpunished punishment lies revelation simply able hide anything anymore may also point daniels given inept defense lawyer bob diamond unsuccessful attempts keep daniels hidden things hidden still succeed exposing mercilessly keep hidden others cant even keep hidden anymore idea judgment exposure also brings matter moviemaking central idea next weeks final picture series hirokazu koreedas life doesnt quite occupy position albert brookss movie still important part mr koreedas film asked believe every moment lives captured videotape great cameraman skyor even highquality film suggests daniel told anyway vividly lifelike 3d effect number closedcircuit television cameras exposed daily lives increased exponentially since film made likely today even sensitive terror exposure always part idea judgmentand also makes scandal titillating us autobiographical element may implicit idea mans forced watch film see others see kind exposure mr brooks inviting making film various threads continuity movie others series course principal one love story erotic love becomes kind synecdoche even instrument eternal salvation redemption sin thats movies would say however though may many want disagree stay around discussion afterwards another thread continuity unsatisfactory nature love story love story kim hunter david niven eleanor parker paul henreid even gene tierney ameche meryl streep albert brooks dont exactly light screen sexual chemistry mind best joke movie daniel instantly regrets backing tryst miss streeps julia tries call hotel room suddenly realizes doesnt know surname forced ask anyone named julia two julias told gone bed asking disturbed well says daniel nothing daunted leave message tell guess love life anyway thats pretty big talk dead guy kim hunter tells heavenly tribunal stairway heaven theres sense love albert brooks goes even way powell pressburger make love seem capricious even nonsensical daniel remarks fact julia almost two soulsintransit judgment city hundred years old clearly taken world hormonal urges one element accident opportunity attraction unavoidable also notice disparity julia standout performer judgment stakes poor daniel plod along alsorans another movies great jokes takes place watch lifereview rescue children pet blazing house judge says admiringly like hollywood executive looking rushes new film going back cat wonderful daniel later compares scene life insurance commercial kind shlockiness would seem earth anyway might seem odds idea judgment exposure movies unforgivingly realistic course exposure works ways indulgent deity apparently allows us show proud well forcing us watch ashamed may easy forget movies see virtue beauty also real things moreover allow julia take role beatrice daniels dante gretchen faust martha henry van cleve heaven wait feminine principle enables men least understand kind goodness meant seek salvation hope isnt portentous view movie also notice others seen movie need hold idea lightness shares cinematic parades light shadow tried take serious subjects think also give credit giving us images death resurrection judgment heaven exactly take seriously | 1,220 |
<p>WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump met with key GOP senators at the White House on Monday ahead of a series of critical votes on a sweeping tax-reform bill that lacks sufficient Republican support.</p>
<p>Trump and Republican leaders continued to tweak the legislation in order to sway undecided GOP senators and notch an elusive legislative win if the bill goes to the Senate floor this week.</p>
<p>Trump met with members of the Senate Finance Committee at the White House on Monday, and planned to attend the GOP caucus luncheon on Capitol Hill on Tuesday in his push to get the bill through the upper chamber.</p>
<p>“It’s going to be tremendous tax cut — the biggest in the history of our country. You’ll have to pay a lot less tax,” Trump said at the White House following the meeting.</p>
<p>Democrats remain united in their opposition to the bill, calling it a giveaway to corporations and the most wealthy Americans at the expense of working families.</p>
<p>Progressive advocacy groups like Not One Penny and Priorities USA have launched advertising campaigns in Maine, Nevada, Alaska and Arizona to pressure GOP lawmakers to vote against the tax bill.</p>
<p>The House passed the bill along partly lines earlier this month, and Trump wants to sign the tax bill into law by the end of the year to provide a “big Christmas present” for American taxpayers.</p>
<p>The Congressional Budget Office released an updated analysis of the bill that showed the tax cuts would raise the budget debt by $1.4 trillion over 10 years.</p>
<p>Several Republican senators have raised concerns about the debt due to a tax-cut package that would permanently slash corporate rates from 35 percent to 20 percent, and provide new tax brackets for individuals and families to give them a temporary break until 2025.</p>
<p>Trump open to changes</p>
<p>Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., said he was withholding support for the bill because it does more for corporations than smaller businesses, which he called the economic driver in this country.</p>
<p>But Johnson is seeking a compromise, and Trump signaled Monday he was open to changes in the Senate bill. Sen. Steve Daines, R-Mont., voiced similar concerns but spoke with Trump over the weekend.</p>
<p>In a social media message on Twitter, Trump said that “with just a few changes, some mathematical, the middle class and job producers can get even more in actual dollars and savings.”</p>
<p />
<p>Other hurdles remain in the Republican caucus. Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., and Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., both raised concerns that the tax cuts would irresponsibly saddle future generations with mountains of debt.</p>
<p>And independent groups that monitor the debt say it is doubtful that Congress will let individual tax cuts in the Senate bill expire in 2025.</p>
<p>“Does anyone really believe Congress will allow the individual tax cuts to sunset in eight years?” asked Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.</p>
<p>MacGuineas called the sunset provision “an obvious ruse to hide very real costs and make more room for debt-financed cuts and giveaways.”</p>
<p>Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., suggested adding a mechanism that pushes the tax rates back up if projections on the increase to the debt soar past the mark.</p>
<p>With solid opposition from Democrats, Republicans are trying to pass the tax bill under special budget rules that require them to not increase the debt by more than $1.5 trillion over 10 years or face a possible filibuster.</p>
<p>Slim GOP margin</p>
<p>To pass the bill with a simple majority, Republicans, who hold a slim 52-48 majority, can afford to lose no more than two GOP lawmakers.</p>
<p>Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, defected on the GOP bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare. None of those senators have divulged how they may vote on the tax bill, but all have said they have concerns.</p>
<p>Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev., considered the most vulnerable Republican incumbent facing re-election in 2018, has embraced the GOP plan and was instrumental in tucking a provision into the legislation that would double the child tax credit.</p>
<p>Heller said he worked with the president’s daughter, Ivanka Trump, “to make it happen.”</p>
<p>The Nevada Republican also included language that would allow small businesses to award stock options to employees. He also worked to retain tax-exempt status of certain bonds, such as <a href="" type="internal">those being used to finance the Raiders football stadium in Las</a> <a href="" type="internal">Vegas</a>.</p>
<p />
<p>The House bill, passed without a single Democrat, would eliminate tax deductions for medical expenses, interest on student loans and would cap the amount of the mortgage interest deduction at $500,000. It also would eliminate the state and local property tax deduction on federal forms.</p>
<p>The Senate bill keeps intact those deductions, but includes a repeal of the individual mandate in the ACA, commonly known as Obamacare. The elimination of the mandate would defund subsidies to low-income families who purchase insurance on public exchanges.</p>
<p>The CBO said repeal of the individual mandate would cause premiums on public exchanges to rise by 10 percent.</p>
<p>The CBO also estimates the number of Americans covered by health insurance plans would decrease by 13 million over the next decade, if the mandate is eliminated.</p>
<p>Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev., said on Twitter that the GOP plan would “hurt rural Nevadans, potentially leaving them with no coverage options or facing plans with skyrocketing premiums.”</p>
<p>“We should be making health care more accessible and affordable in our rural communities, not less,” Cortez Masto said.</p>
<p>In addition, the CBO found that families with income under $75,000 a year would actually see a tax hike after 2025 when deductions allowed under the bill expire.</p>
<p>Contact Gary Martin at <a href="" type="internal">[email protected]</a> or 202-662-7390. Follow <a href="https://twitter.com/garymartindc" type="external">@garymartindc</a> on Twitter.</p> | false | 1 | washington president donald trump met key gop senators white house monday ahead series critical votes sweeping taxreform bill lacks sufficient republican support trump republican leaders continued tweak legislation order sway undecided gop senators notch elusive legislative win bill goes senate floor week trump met members senate finance committee white house monday planned attend gop caucus luncheon capitol hill tuesday push get bill upper chamber going tremendous tax cut biggest history country youll pay lot less tax trump said white house following meeting democrats remain united opposition bill calling giveaway corporations wealthy americans expense working families progressive advocacy groups like one penny priorities usa launched advertising campaigns maine nevada alaska arizona pressure gop lawmakers vote tax bill house passed bill along partly lines earlier month trump wants sign tax bill law end year provide big christmas present american taxpayers congressional budget office released updated analysis bill showed tax cuts would raise budget debt 14 trillion 10 years several republican senators raised concerns debt due taxcut package would permanently slash corporate rates 35 percent 20 percent provide new tax brackets individuals families give temporary break 2025 trump open changes sen ron johnson rwis said withholding support bill corporations smaller businesses called economic driver country johnson seeking compromise trump signaled monday open changes senate bill sen steve daines rmont voiced similar concerns spoke trump weekend social media message twitter trump said changes mathematical middle class job producers get even actual dollars savings hurdles remain republican caucus sen jeff flake rariz sen bob corker rtenn raised concerns tax cuts would irresponsibly saddle future generations mountains debt independent groups monitor debt say doubtful congress let individual tax cuts senate bill expire 2025 anyone really believe congress allow individual tax cuts sunset eight years asked maya macguineas president committee responsible federal budget macguineas called sunset provision obvious ruse hide real costs make room debtfinanced cuts giveaways sen james lankford rokla suggested adding mechanism pushes tax rates back projections increase debt soar past mark solid opposition democrats republicans trying pass tax bill special budget rules require increase debt 15 trillion 10 years face possible filibuster slim gop margin pass bill simple majority republicans hold slim 5248 majority afford lose two gop lawmakers sen john mccain rariz sen susan collins rmaine sen lisa murkowski ralaska defected gop bill repeal affordable care act also known obamacare none senators divulged may vote tax bill said concerns sen dean heller rnev considered vulnerable republican incumbent facing reelection 2018 embraced gop plan instrumental tucking provision legislation would double child tax credit heller said worked presidents daughter ivanka trump make happen nevada republican also included language would allow small businesses award stock options employees also worked retain taxexempt status certain bonds used finance raiders football stadium las vegas house bill passed without single democrat would eliminate tax deductions medical expenses interest student loans would cap amount mortgage interest deduction 500000 also would eliminate state local property tax deduction federal forms senate bill keeps intact deductions includes repeal individual mandate aca commonly known obamacare elimination mandate would defund subsidies lowincome families purchase insurance public exchanges cbo said repeal individual mandate would cause premiums public exchanges rise 10 percent cbo also estimates number americans covered health insurance plans would decrease 13 million next decade mandate eliminated sen catherine cortez masto dnev said twitter gop plan would hurt rural nevadans potentially leaving coverage options facing plans skyrocketing premiums making health care accessible affordable rural communities less cortez masto said addition cbo found families income 75000 year would actually see tax hike 2025 deductions allowed bill expire contact gary martin gmartinreviewjournalcom 2026627390 follow garymartindc twitter | 598 |
<p>The deep and punishing recession that began with the financial crisis of 2008 will almost certainly become, in tomorrow’s history books, a demarcation line separating what was and what is yet to come.</p>
<p>Since the end of World War Two, the United States and other Western democracies have used their growing wealth and prosperity to build generous social welfare states. These programmatic structures have varied in size and scope, depending on the cirucumstances unique to each country. Still, without exception, the leaders of the rich, industrialized West have sought to improve the security of workers in the postwar years by extending to them better health and retirement income protection, sometimes through direct governmental programs and sometimes through quasi-governmental programs administered by employers.</p>
<p>Although it has been clear for some time now—at least three decades—that these arrangements need to be revised substantially to survive in the twenty-first century, the global financial crash made it abundantly clear that using debt to paper over fundamental imbalances in government finances was not a sensible solution. The social welfare programs that were erected in the postwar era were premised on assumptions of robust fertility rates, perpetually growing workforces, and never-ending economic growth. But without exception, the population of the industrialized world is rapidly aging, birthrates are anemic, workforces are stagnant or declining, and global economic competition has suppressed the wage growth of the West’s middle class.</p>
<p>The United States isn’t exempt from these problems. The Baby-Boom generation is on the verge of retirement, which will swell the ranks of enrollees in entitlement programs. The U.S. workforce is still growing, but not nearly as rapidly as the population age 65 and older. And the middle class has gone through a long period of stagnant wage growth.</p>
<p>The effects of these demographic and economic shifts are already evident in the federal government’s finances. Federal spending has been soaring in recent years and will continue to rise rapidly over the next decade. Meanwhile, the economy is not expected to expand nearly fast enough to produce revenue that keeps pace with obligations. The result is an expected explosion in deficits and debt that will almost certainly precipitate a debt crisis of some sort before too many years pass.</p>
<p>At the center of the looming U.S. fiscal crisis is the nation’s most popular social program, Social Security. Since its enactment in 1935, it has served as the foundation of retirement security for generations of American workers and their dependents. But it is also the federal government’s most costly program, and is set to become much more costly over the coming two decades. Moreover, because the workforce is growing more slowly than is enrollment in the program, revenue has now fallen below annual benefit payments, and under current law, revenue is not expected to ever again exceed annual benefits. The program’s annual cash deficits are projected to deplete the Social Security’s trust-fund reserves over the next two decades. Of course, these reserves aren’t assets in an economic sense. They are simply U.S. treasury bonds and securities issued to the trust fund over the years. Redeeming them will require the government to raise taxes, cut spending elsewhere, or borrow more in order to turn the debt into cash that can be paid to beneficaries. <a href="#_ftn1" type="external">1</a></p>
<p>One way or another, change is coming to Social Security; it will not be possible to run a cash deficit in perpetuity. The only question is what kind of change will be implemented. Policymakers must properly diagnose what ails Social Security before fixing it. Only then will they be able to put in place reforms that can stand the test of time.</p>
<p>The Unspoken Source of Insolvency</p>
<p>The Social Security program has been the subject of a nearly continual political and policy debate for the better part of fifteen years—although no significant changes to the program have been enacted since 1983. It is now almost forgotten that President Bill Clinton took initial steps toward a Social Security overhaul in the late 1990s, engaging in a series of nationwide “open forums” on the future of the program before abandoning the effort in favor of the more rhetorical—and politically safe—”Save Social Security First!” slogan. While notionally aimed at “saving” the Social Security surpluses, in the end, the Clinton Social Security effort meant little more than “Don’t Cut Taxes!”</p>
<p>In 2005, President George W. Bush, having campaigned on Social Security reform in the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections, attempted to put the issue on the national agenda. His proposal to introduce voluntary personal accounts set off a heated debate among reformers and program advocates, with scores of experts queuing up to advocate a politically diverse range of recommendations, with a number of these recommendations taking form as competing bills before Congress. Despite the intense level of activity, the president was never able to get traction for his ideas, as there was little momentum or consensus for reform.</p>
<p>With so much discussion and political debate in recent years, one might think that every possible diagnosis of and remedy for Social Security’s long-term financial challenges has been offered and debated. Yet there has been very little mention of the central issue in financing Social Security—namely, the long-term fertility rate. Indeed, if the U.S. fertility rate were expected to return to the levels seen in the 1950s and through the mid-1960s, the subject of Social Security reform would likely never come up at all. With higher birthrates, there would be no financing crisis, as the projected workforce in the decades ahead could support the growing numbers of elderly Americans. With no financing shortfall, politicians would gladly leave the program alone.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, fertility is not projected to rise to the levels seen in earlier eras, and, consequently, Social Security does indeed face a substantial long-term financial shortfall. As Social Security again takes center stage in the national debate, policymakers need to take time to understand the critical relationship between fertility and Social Security financing, as well as the potential implications of different reform options for indirectly improving or worsening the American fertility problem over time.</p>
<p>Pension Financing Demographics</p>
<p>Social Security is a conventional “pay-as-you-go” state-run pension system, in which taxes collected from today’s workers are used to pay benefits for today’s retirees. The benefits provided to retirees are based on their earnings records during the course of their working careers. This kind of pay-as-you-go system can be defined with stylized mathematical formula, represented in Chart 1.</p>
<p>The critical assumption in this equation is that, over time, a pay-as-you-go pension system must collect revenue (“financing”) that keeps pace with annual pension-benefit payments. Pension financing can be calculated by multiplying the payroll-tax rate (T), the average earnings of workers on which the tax applies (E), and the total number of workers paying into the system (W). Pension benefits are determined by multiplying the average pension paid (P) by the number of retirees (R).</p>
<p>With these parameters established, it is possible to reconfigure the equation to provide interesting insights into the dynamics of a pay-as-you-go system. The ratio of what someone gets in retirement to what he or she earned while working is called the “replacement rate,” and is depicted by “P/E.” The ratio of retirees to workers is called the “dependency ratio,” and is represented by “R/W.” And the multiplication of these two ratios can be used to calculate the required tax rate necessary to keep the program solvent.</p>
<p>Fertility, of course, is a primary determinant of the number of workers over time. As fertility falls, the old-age dependency ratio increases. As the old-age dependency ratio increases, payroll-tax rates must also rise to maintain pension-financing balance (unless replacement rates are cut). As shown in Chart 1, taking replacement rates of 50 percent and 70 percent as examples, movement of the old-age dependency ratio from .20 to .60 requires a substantial payroll-tax hike—from 10 and 14 percent of payroll to 30 and 42 percent of payroll, respectively. Of course, such high payroll-tax rates would have significant negative consequences for employment and economic growth.</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p />
<p>The demographic dynamic of pension financing shown in Chart 1 reflects a prototypical pay-as-you-go state pension scheme. Of course, nearly every country’s state pension has detailed provisions that make it unique and different from the basic structure assumed in the equation. Nonetheless, the main point of the equation presented in Chart 1—that state pension financing is dependent on the demographic forces driving the old-age dependency ratio—is evident in the moves to reform state pension systems around the world to avoid crushing tax hikes.</p>
<p>To be sure, the problems plaguing state pensions are due, in part, to rising longevity. In the United States, for instance, male life expectancy at 65 increased by 5.3 years from 1940 to 2009, and for women it has increased by 6.3 years. <a href="#_ftn2" type="external">2</a> In much of Europe and Japan, lifespans increased even more dramatically during this period. Unfortunately, the rules of state pension schemes have not changed sufficiently to reflect increases in longevity. The result is that state pensions are paying benefits to workers who are spending an increasing proportion of their lives in retirement.</p>
<p>Of course, living longer is a positive development with a ready remedy for state pension financing—longer working lives. The fall in birthrates is more alarming and harder to address. As shown in Chart 2, the decline in the Total Fertility Rate (TFR)—the average number of live births to a woman in her childbearing years—over the period 1950 to 2000 has been between 0.8 and 2.2 among the world’s richest nations.</p>
<p />
<p>The implications of these falling birthrates are startling to consider and beginning to become more evident, particularly in Europe and Japan. As just one of many examples, in Germany, the number of people in their twenties has already dropped by 25 percent since the 1980s. Astoundingly, the population in Germany is expected to drop from 82 million in 2000 to 68 million in 2050. <a href="#_ftn3" type="external">3</a> The impact of falling fertility on pension financing is clear: fewer workers in the future mean either higher payroll taxes or lower pension benefits. The effect of falling fertility can be seen clearly in the projected increases in the old-age dependency ratios for countries around the world, as shown in Chart 3.</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p />
<p>The Inherent Contradictions of Social Insurance</p>
<p>Though policymakers have expended considerable effort in trying to understand and address the difficulty of financing state pensions with rising old-age dependency ratios, they have worried far less about understanding the dramatic fall in fertility. Most policymakers have assumed that fertility is an endogenous factor—a given, determined by factors outside of the state pension structure and government policy. In particular, it is well known that improved medical care for infants and declining infant mortality reduces fertility.</p>
<p>But there is substantial evidence that a particular relationship between public pension schemes and fertility does indeed exist. Foreign as it may sound to the modern ear, a motivation for having children in earlier times was economic security in old age. As parents became frail and less productive, it was expected that one or more of their adult children would take care of them. Married couples thus “invested” in numerous children, in part to ensure the next generation would have the economic capacity to provide for them in their final years. With state-run Social Security schemes, the government has largely absorbed this family responsibility. Married couples have a much diminished economic incentive to have children because now they are counting on—and paying for—government-based old-age support.</p>
<p>Social-expenditure data complied by the United Nations Population Division and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) reveal that fertility rates in industrial democracies decline as Social Security spending (measured as a percentage of GDP) increases. <a href="#_ftn4" type="external">4</a> Moreover, a 2005 study by economists Michele Boldrin, Mariacristina de Nardi, and Larry Jones provides strong empirical support for this insight into the fertility dilemma. These scholars looked at long-term trends in Social Security spending and fertility rates around the world and estimated, using regression analysis, that a government-run pension system equal to 10 percent of a country’s economy suppresses the TFR in that country by between 0.7 and 1.6 children, after controlling for other variables. Such a finding is extraordinary given that most industrialized countries now have TFR’s well below 2.0. This research confirms that program size matters. The bigger or more generous the Social Security scheme, the steeper the fertility decline. <a href="#_ftn5" type="external">5</a></p>
<p>The relationship between social insurance and fertility points toward an internal contradiction in the social insurance model. To finance programs providing for the retired elderly, society needs a growing working-age population, but the presence of the state-based pension benefit—particularly if it is large—reduces the incentive of younger workers to have children. Thus, U.S. Social Security, like government pension plans the world over, is built on a fundamental and poorly understood contradiction: it reduces the economic incentive within a family to invest in children even as it remains ever-dependent on a new generation of productive workers to keep the program afloat.</p>
<p>This insight, it turns out, is not a recent revelation. In a paper presented at the Family Research Council, historian Allan Carlson pointed out that as early as 1940 Gunnar Myrdal, the Swedish economist, had observed in a Harvard lecture that social insurance pensions contained a contradiction. <a href="#_ftn6" type="external">6</a> For all of human history, adult children were the safety net for the elderly, taking care of aging parents, often in the same homes. With social insurance, the government takes resources from workers to finance direct government assistance in old age, effectively absorbing what was once an entirely family responsibility. While social insurance depends on a productive workforce to pay taxes, families have less of an economic incentive to have children because now they are counting on—and paying for—government-based old-age support.</p>
<p>The fact that Social Security and fertility are inversely related should not be surprising. In fact, the social teaching of the Catholic church—particularly the concept of subsidiarity—warns policymakers to carefully consider the proper balance among societal institutions. According to this teaching, similar to the Protestant understanding of “sphere sovereignty,” higher levels of societal institutions—those farther removed from the daily lives of its citizens, such as a central government authorities—must respect the roles of lower level institutions, not taking for themselves rights and responsibilities that can be properly handled by communities, families, and individuals. This concept of subsidiarity is particularly important for protecting the rights and responsibilities of the family. At the same time, Catholic social teaching allows governments to institute social policies promoting the common good if individual families and citizens would be better off as a group with such a policy in place.</p>
<p>So the question of Social Security is a matter of balance. In modern and wealthy societies, most would agree that it is proper for the government to provide a level of common social assistance and insurance to the elderly to assure that no senior citizen is left destitute in his final years, regardless of his family situation. Yet both society and the economy are stronger when families remain vibrant and independent—producing children and caring for themselves as much as possible.</p>
<p>Although other countries are facing more severe fertility problems than the United States, the U.S. TFR remains well below the levels seen in earlier decades and well below the levels necessary to assure stable financing of Social Security. As shown in Chart 4, in their intermediate set of assumptions, the Trustees for the Social Security program assume that the U.S. TFR will settle at a rate of 2.0 over the long run, which is below the 2.1 TFR needed to replace the population over time.</p>
<p />
<p />
<p>With relatively low fertility and rising longevity, the gap between Social Security revenue and spending is about to become very wide, and stay that way indefinitely. As shown in Chart 5, Social Security income (payroll taxes plus some taxes collected on benefit payments) will hover just below 5 percent of the GDP over the coming years. Today, Social Security spending is at a comparable level, but as the Baby Boomers retire, spending will soar and never fall back again to its prior level. The 2010 Social Security Trustees’ report projects the excess of Social Security spending over income will reach about 1 percent of GDP and then stay there for most of the coming century. It is inconceivable that the nation could afford to run to such a large permanent deficit in Social Security.</p>
<p>The U.S. Social Security System would be in far better financial condition if U.S. TFR rose from where it is today to something closer to what it was two generations ago, in the immediate postwar era. According to the 2010 Trustees’ report, every 0.1 increase in the ultimate TFR decreases the Social Security deficit by about 6 percent. This means that if the TFR rose from where it is today (just about 2.0) to 2.3 in about 2034, then the deficit in Social Security would fall by 20 percent, thus substantially lessening the need for other benefit reductions. <a href="#_ftn7" type="external">7</a></p>
<p>Initially, higher fertility reduces tax receipts of the Social Security System, as labor-force participation drop as more women leave the paid labor force to give attention to raising their children. But over the long-term, the workforce expands as a larger younger generation comes of age. As Edward Crenshaw and Kristopher Robison note in their recent study, “If a society can hold its own economically during its baby booms, then it stands a good chance of ratcheting up its economic activity when these children finally enter the labor force.” <a href="#_ftn8" type="external">8</a> With passing years, the gap between spending and revenue narrows more and more as a larger working-age population matures and boosts the size of the economy.</p>
<p>Pro-Family, Pro-Growth Reforms</p>
<p>The size of the coming Social Security financing gap is so large that it is unlikely that policymakers would—or should—rely entirely on expected fertility improvement to solve the problem. Some programmatic reform will be necessary. The starting point for a sensible approach should be unyielding opposition to any increases in the program’s current size, especially increases financed through tax increases.</p>
<p>The current Social Security payroll-tax rate and wage base—12.4 percent of wages up to $106,800 since 2009—should be ceilings (the taxable wage limit is already indexed to increase with average wage growth each year). Policymakers should resist the temptation to enact a tax hike or to raise the wage-base line to secure a Social Security reform agreement. Such an agreement would only lead to further downward pressure on the U.S. birthrate. Social Security’s financing gap needs to be closed with more robust population growth and benefit adjustments.</p>
<p>The best way to alter Social Security benefits is to redesign how the system operates so that it automatically adjusts with evolving demographic reality. When Social Security began, male retirees at the age of 65 could expect to receive benefits for an average of about twelve years. Today, men at the age of 65 will receive benefits for an average of sixteen years. And by 2050, the average male retiree is expected to live about 19 years after reaching age 65. A similar trend is underway for women.</p>
<p>Private insurers selling annuities carefully calibrate the monthly payments they are willing to provide for a fixed premium based on up-to-date mortality data to keep annuity costs in line with the purchase price. Social Security, however, will finance longer and longer retirement periods for each new generation of retirees—even though the different cohorts will all pay the same payroll-tax rate during their working years.</p>
<p>One way to deal with this problem would be to set the Social Security normal retirement age administratively, as determined by up-to-date life-span data. Congress could give administrative authority to the Social Security Administration to set the age after establishing a uniform number of retirement years, with actuarially fair reductions for early and delayed retirement. Once enacted, this approach would remove “raising the retirement age” from on-going political consideration, so shielding political leaders from unwelcome pressure on the issue. <a href="#_ftn9" type="external">9</a></p>
<p>The normal retirement age is already scheduled to increase from age 65 to age 67 by 2027, but it needs to go to age 68 to keep the number of years in retirement consistent with current levels and keep pace with expected declines in mortality. To improve Social Security solvency, a more aggressive reform may be necessary. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that moving the normal retirement age up to age 70 over the next fifty years—thus reducing the targeted time in full retirement to the levels experienced by persons retiring in the 1970s—would cut Social Security spending, by about 12 percent when fully implemented.</p>
<p>Perhaps more important, Social Security benefits should be adjusted based on shifts in the old-age dependency ratio. As the number of retirees to workers increases, benefits will need to be adjusted downward to prevent the need for tax increases. But, conversely, if birthrates improve over time, building an automatic adjustment into the benefit formula can mitigate benefit restraint automatically as the dependency ratio improves.</p>
<p>The United States could model this particular reform along the lines of what Germany has implemented in its retirement system. <a href="#_ftn10" type="external">10</a> Germany’s “sustainability factor” measures the change in the ratio of beneficiaries to workers contributing payroll taxes on a yearly basis. As this ratio increases in the years ahead, a weighted-adjustment factor could be applied in the U.S. system to the initial Social Security benefit formula, slightly reducing the benefits payable to a defined group of new retirees. For example, today the old-age dependency ratio is .22; it is expected to reach .36 in 2050. A new dependency-ratio adjustment factor would convert this shift into a uniform percentage reduction in the initial, full-benefit retirement formula. To minimize annual fluctuations, the factor could be calibrated based on a ten-year moving average. Once retirees start receiving benefits, they would no longer be subject to this adjustment factor and would be protected from inflation through annual cost-of-living increases.</p>
<p>Once they have implemented these automatic adjustment mechanisms, policymakers should reverse the negative impact of Social Security on fertility rates. Today, two workers with identical wage histories pay the same contributions and get the same benefits, even if one of them has numerous children and the other has none. Any discussion of fixing Social Security must focus on correcting this imbalance, making the reform plan more appealing to young families.</p>
<p>The easiest way to fertility-enhancing reform would be to build directly into the Social Security formula a factor reflecting the value to Social Security of raising an additional future contributor. Like the adjustment in the retirement age, this adjustment for having and raising children could be calculated by the Social Security Administration and adjusted over time as circumstances warranted. The calculation would reflect the additional value to the Social Security of families raising children compared to those that do not. The calculation would reflect average lifetime earnings and benefit payments for families over time, giving appropriate additional benefits to workers who have reared children—the future contributors that the Social Security System must have to survive. Because parents with multiple children would be raising multiple future taxpayers, the calculation would show the expectation of a net gain to Social Security from such a family compared to one without children. That net gain could then be partially shared with the parents during their retirement years in the form of higher monthly benefits.</p>
<p>There are, of course, many non-economic reasons for declining fertility in the United States. Societal norms, the decline in religious practice, and later median age at first marriage all play roles. Social Security reform by itself will not be able to reverse those trends. But there is little doubt that Social Security is partially responsible for the demographic decline that has been underway since the 1970s. Whatever can be done through changes in Social Security to boost fertility should, therefore, be a top priority of reform. Such changes would not only help restore solvency to Social Security but also help ensure that America in the twenty-first century remains as vital and dynamic as she was in the last.</p>
<p>Mr. Capretta, a fellow at the Ethics &amp; Public Policy Center, was an associate director of the U.S. Office of Management and Budget, 2001 to 2004.</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>1. <a href="" type="internal" />See U.S. Office of Management and Budget, FY 2000 Budget, Analytical Perspectives, p. 337.</p>
<p>2. <a href="" type="internal" />The 2010 Annual Report of the Board of Trustees of the Old Age and Survivors Insurance and Disability Insurance Trust Funds, August 2010, Table V.A3.</p>
<p>3. <a href="" type="internal" />Richard Jackson, Germany and the Challenge of Global Aging (Center for Strategic and International Studies, March 2003), p. 21.</p>
<p>4. <a href="" type="internal" />See OECD Social Expenditure Database (2004) as well as World Population Prospect, The 2002 Revision, published by the U.N. Population Division.</p>
<p>5. <a href="" type="internal" />Michele Boldrin, Mariacristina de Nardi, and Larry Jones, “Fertility and Social Security,” National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper 11146, February 2005.</p>
<p>6. <a href="" type="internal" />Allan C. Carlson, Making Social Security Reform Family-Friendly,” The Family in America, April 2005, &lt; <a href="http://www.profam.org/pub/fia/fia_1904.htm" type="external">http://www.profam.org/pub/fia/fia_1904.htm</a>&gt;.</p>
<p>7. <a href="" type="internal" />The 2010 Annual Report of the Board of Trustees of the Old Age and Survivors Insurance and Disability Insurance Trust Funds, August 2010.</p>
<p>8. <a href="" type="internal" />Edward Crenshaw and Kristopher Robison, “Socio-demographic Determinants of Economic Growth: Age-Structure, Preindustrial Heritage, and Sociolinguistic Integration,” Social Forces 88.5 (July 2010): 2217-40.</p>
<p>9. <a href="" type="internal" />See C. Eugene Steuerle and Rudolph Penner, “Time to Take the Federal Budget Off of Auto-Pilot,” Investor’s Business Daily, August 29, 2005.</p>
<p>10. <a href="" type="internal" />See James C. Capretta, “Building Automatic Solvency Into U.S. Social Security: Insights from Sweden and Germany,” The Brookings Institution Policy Brief #151, March 2006.</p> | false | 1 | deep punishing recession began financial crisis 2008 almost certainly become tomorrows history books demarcation line separating yet come since end world war two united states western democracies used growing wealth prosperity build generous social welfare states programmatic structures varied size scope depending cirucumstances unique country still without exception leaders rich industrialized west sought improve security workers postwar years extending better health retirement income protection sometimes direct governmental programs sometimes quasigovernmental programs administered employers although clear time nowat least three decadesthat arrangements need revised substantially survive twentyfirst century global financial crash made abundantly clear using debt paper fundamental imbalances government finances sensible solution social welfare programs erected postwar era premised assumptions robust fertility rates perpetually growing workforces neverending economic growth without exception population industrialized world rapidly aging birthrates anemic workforces stagnant declining global economic competition suppressed wage growth wests middle class united states isnt exempt problems babyboom generation verge retirement swell ranks enrollees entitlement programs us workforce still growing nearly rapidly population age 65 older middle class gone long period stagnant wage growth effects demographic economic shifts already evident federal governments finances federal spending soaring recent years continue rise rapidly next decade meanwhile economy expected expand nearly fast enough produce revenue keeps pace obligations result expected explosion deficits debt almost certainly precipitate debt crisis sort many years pass center looming us fiscal crisis nations popular social program social security since enactment 1935 served foundation retirement security generations american workers dependents also federal governments costly program set become much costly coming two decades moreover workforce growing slowly enrollment program revenue fallen annual benefit payments current law revenue expected ever exceed annual benefits programs annual cash deficits projected deplete social securitys trustfund reserves next two decades course reserves arent assets economic sense simply us treasury bonds securities issued trust fund years redeeming require government raise taxes cut spending elsewhere borrow order turn debt cash paid beneficaries 1 one way another change coming social security possible run cash deficit perpetuity question kind change implemented policymakers must properly diagnose ails social security fixing able put place reforms stand test time unspoken source insolvency social security program subject nearly continual political policy debate better part fifteen yearsalthough significant changes program enacted since 1983 almost forgotten president bill clinton took initial steps toward social security overhaul late 1990s engaging series nationwide open forums future program abandoning effort favor rhetoricaland politically safesave social security first slogan notionally aimed saving social security surpluses end clinton social security effort meant little dont cut taxes 2005 president george w bush campaigned social security reform 2000 2004 presidential elections attempted put issue national agenda proposal introduce voluntary personal accounts set heated debate among reformers program advocates scores experts queuing advocate politically diverse range recommendations number recommendations taking form competing bills congress despite intense level activity president never able get traction ideas little momentum consensus reform much discussion political debate recent years one might think every possible diagnosis remedy social securitys longterm financial challenges offered debated yet little mention central issue financing social securitynamely longterm fertility rate indeed us fertility rate expected return levels seen 1950s mid1960s subject social security reform would likely never come higher birthrates would financing crisis projected workforce decades ahead could support growing numbers elderly americans financing shortfall politicians would gladly leave program alone unfortunately fertility projected rise levels seen earlier eras consequently social security indeed face substantial longterm financial shortfall social security takes center stage national debate policymakers need take time understand critical relationship fertility social security financing well potential implications different reform options indirectly improving worsening american fertility problem time pension financing demographics social security conventional payasyougo staterun pension system taxes collected todays workers used pay benefits todays retirees benefits provided retirees based earnings records course working careers kind payasyougo system defined stylized mathematical formula represented chart 1 critical assumption equation time payasyougo pension system must collect revenue financing keeps pace annual pensionbenefit payments pension financing calculated multiplying payrolltax rate average earnings workers tax applies e total number workers paying system w pension benefits determined multiplying average pension paid p number retirees r parameters established possible reconfigure equation provide interesting insights dynamics payasyougo system ratio someone gets retirement earned working called replacement rate depicted pe ratio retirees workers called dependency ratio represented rw multiplication two ratios used calculate required tax rate necessary keep program solvent fertility course primary determinant number workers time fertility falls oldage dependency ratio increases oldage dependency ratio increases payrolltax rates must also rise maintain pensionfinancing balance unless replacement rates cut shown chart 1 taking replacement rates 50 percent 70 percent examples movement oldage dependency ratio 20 60 requires substantial payrolltax hikefrom 10 14 percent payroll 30 42 percent payroll respectively course high payrolltax rates would significant negative consequences employment economic growth 160 demographic dynamic pension financing shown chart 1 reflects prototypical payasyougo state pension scheme course nearly every countrys state pension detailed provisions make unique different basic structure assumed equation nonetheless main point equation presented chart 1that state pension financing dependent demographic forces driving oldage dependency ratiois evident moves reform state pension systems around world avoid crushing tax hikes sure problems plaguing state pensions due part rising longevity united states instance male life expectancy 65 increased 53 years 1940 2009 women increased 63 years 2 much europe japan lifespans increased even dramatically period unfortunately rules state pension schemes changed sufficiently reflect increases longevity result state pensions paying benefits workers spending increasing proportion lives retirement course living longer positive development ready remedy state pension financinglonger working lives fall birthrates alarming harder address shown chart 2 decline total fertility rate tfrthe average number live births woman childbearing yearsover period 1950 2000 08 22 among worlds richest nations implications falling birthrates startling consider beginning become evident particularly europe japan one many examples germany number people twenties already dropped 25 percent since 1980s astoundingly population germany expected drop 82 million 2000 68 million 2050 3 impact falling fertility pension financing clear fewer workers future mean either higher payroll taxes lower pension benefits effect falling fertility seen clearly projected increases oldage dependency ratios countries around world shown chart 3 160 inherent contradictions social insurance though policymakers expended considerable effort trying understand address difficulty financing state pensions rising oldage dependency ratios worried far less understanding dramatic fall fertility policymakers assumed fertility endogenous factora given determined factors outside state pension structure government policy particular well known improved medical care infants declining infant mortality reduces fertility substantial evidence particular relationship public pension schemes fertility indeed exist foreign may sound modern ear motivation children earlier times economic security old age parents became frail less productive expected one adult children would take care married couples thus invested numerous children part ensure next generation would economic capacity provide final years staterun social security schemes government largely absorbed family responsibility married couples much diminished economic incentive children counting onand paying forgovernmentbased oldage support socialexpenditure data complied united nations population division organization economic cooperation development oecd reveal fertility rates industrial democracies decline social security spending measured percentage gdp increases 4 moreover 2005 study economists michele boldrin mariacristina de nardi larry jones provides strong empirical support insight fertility dilemma scholars looked longterm trends social security spending fertility rates around world estimated using regression analysis governmentrun pension system equal 10 percent countrys economy suppresses tfr country 07 16 children controlling variables finding extraordinary given industrialized countries tfrs well 20 research confirms program size matters bigger generous social security scheme steeper fertility decline 5 relationship social insurance fertility points toward internal contradiction social insurance model finance programs providing retired elderly society needs growing workingage population presence statebased pension benefitparticularly largereduces incentive younger workers children thus us social security like government pension plans world built fundamental poorly understood contradiction reduces economic incentive within family invest children even remains everdependent new generation productive workers keep program afloat insight turns recent revelation paper presented family research council historian allan carlson pointed early 1940 gunnar myrdal swedish economist observed harvard lecture social insurance pensions contained contradiction 6 human history adult children safety net elderly taking care aging parents often homes social insurance government takes resources workers finance direct government assistance old age effectively absorbing entirely family responsibility social insurance depends productive workforce pay taxes families less economic incentive children counting onand paying forgovernmentbased oldage support fact social security fertility inversely related surprising fact social teaching catholic churchparticularly concept subsidiaritywarns policymakers carefully consider proper balance among societal institutions according teaching similar protestant understanding sphere sovereignty higher levels societal institutionsthose farther removed daily lives citizens central government authoritiesmust respect roles lower level institutions taking rights responsibilities properly handled communities families individuals concept subsidiarity particularly important protecting rights responsibilities family time catholic social teaching allows governments institute social policies promoting common good individual families citizens would better group policy place question social security matter balance modern wealthy societies would agree proper government provide level common social assistance insurance elderly assure senior citizen left destitute final years regardless family situation yet society economy stronger families remain vibrant independentproducing children caring much possible although countries facing severe fertility problems united states us tfr remains well levels seen earlier decades well levels necessary assure stable financing social security shown chart 4 intermediate set assumptions trustees social security program assume us tfr settle rate 20 long run 21 tfr needed replace population time relatively low fertility rising longevity gap social security revenue spending become wide stay way indefinitely shown chart 5 social security income payroll taxes plus taxes collected benefit payments hover 5 percent gdp coming years today social security spending comparable level baby boomers retire spending soar never fall back prior level 2010 social security trustees report projects excess social security spending income reach 1 percent gdp stay coming century inconceivable nation could afford run large permanent deficit social security us social security system would far better financial condition us tfr rose today something closer two generations ago immediate postwar era according 2010 trustees report every 01 increase ultimate tfr decreases social security deficit 6 percent means tfr rose today 20 23 2034 deficit social security would fall 20 percent thus substantially lessening need benefit reductions 7 initially higher fertility reduces tax receipts social security system laborforce participation drop women leave paid labor force give attention raising children longterm workforce expands larger younger generation comes age edward crenshaw kristopher robison note recent study society hold economically baby booms stands good chance ratcheting economic activity children finally enter labor force 8 passing years gap spending revenue narrows larger workingage population matures boosts size economy profamily progrowth reforms size coming social security financing gap large unlikely policymakers wouldor shouldrely entirely expected fertility improvement solve problem programmatic reform necessary starting point sensible approach unyielding opposition increases programs current size especially increases financed tax increases current social security payrolltax rate wage base124 percent wages 106800 since 2009should ceilings taxable wage limit already indexed increase average wage growth year policymakers resist temptation enact tax hike raise wagebase line secure social security reform agreement agreement would lead downward pressure us birthrate social securitys financing gap needs closed robust population growth benefit adjustments best way alter social security benefits redesign system operates automatically adjusts evolving demographic reality social security began male retirees age 65 could expect receive benefits average twelve years today men age 65 receive benefits average sixteen years 2050 average male retiree expected live 19 years reaching age 65 similar trend underway women private insurers selling annuities carefully calibrate monthly payments willing provide fixed premium based uptodate mortality data keep annuity costs line purchase price social security however finance longer longer retirement periods new generation retireeseven though different cohorts pay payrolltax rate working years one way deal problem would set social security normal retirement age administratively determined uptodate lifespan data congress could give administrative authority social security administration set age establishing uniform number retirement years actuarially fair reductions early delayed retirement enacted approach would remove raising retirement age ongoing political consideration shielding political leaders unwelcome pressure issue 9 normal retirement age already scheduled increase age 65 age 67 2027 needs go age 68 keep number years retirement consistent current levels keep pace expected declines mortality improve social security solvency aggressive reform may necessary congressional budget office estimates moving normal retirement age age 70 next fifty yearsthus reducing targeted time full retirement levels experienced persons retiring 1970swould cut social security spending 12 percent fully implemented perhaps important social security benefits adjusted based shifts oldage dependency ratio number retirees workers increases benefits need adjusted downward prevent need tax increases conversely birthrates improve time building automatic adjustment benefit formula mitigate benefit restraint automatically dependency ratio improves united states could model particular reform along lines germany implemented retirement system 10 germanys sustainability factor measures change ratio beneficiaries workers contributing payroll taxes yearly basis ratio increases years ahead weightedadjustment factor could applied us system initial social security benefit formula slightly reducing benefits payable defined group new retirees example today oldage dependency ratio 22 expected reach 36 2050 new dependencyratio adjustment factor would convert shift uniform percentage reduction initial fullbenefit retirement formula minimize annual fluctuations factor could calibrated based tenyear moving average retirees start receiving benefits would longer subject adjustment factor would protected inflation annual costofliving increases implemented automatic adjustment mechanisms policymakers reverse negative impact social security fertility rates today two workers identical wage histories pay contributions get benefits even one numerous children none discussion fixing social security must focus correcting imbalance making reform plan appealing young families easiest way fertilityenhancing reform would build directly social security formula factor reflecting value social security raising additional future contributor like adjustment retirement age adjustment raising children could calculated social security administration adjusted time circumstances warranted calculation would reflect additional value social security families raising children compared calculation would reflect average lifetime earnings benefit payments families time giving appropriate additional benefits workers reared childrenthe future contributors social security system must survive parents multiple children would raising multiple future taxpayers calculation would show expectation net gain social security family compared one without children net gain could partially shared parents retirement years form higher monthly benefits course many noneconomic reasons declining fertility united states societal norms decline religious practice later median age first marriage play roles social security reform able reverse trends little doubt social security partially responsible demographic decline underway since 1970s whatever done changes social security boost fertility therefore top priority reform changes would help restore solvency social security also help ensure america twentyfirst century remains vital dynamic last mr capretta fellow ethics amp public policy center associate director us office management budget 2001 2004 160 1 see us office management budget fy 2000 budget analytical perspectives p 337 2 2010 annual report board trustees old age survivors insurance disability insurance trust funds august 2010 table va3 3 richard jackson germany challenge global aging center strategic international studies march 2003 p 21 4 see oecd social expenditure database 2004 well world population prospect 2002 revision published un population division 5 michele boldrin mariacristina de nardi larry jones fertility social security national bureau economic research working paper 11146 february 2005 6 allan c carlson making social security reform familyfriendly family america april 2005 lt httpwwwprofamorgpubfiafia_1904htmgt 7 2010 annual report board trustees old age survivors insurance disability insurance trust funds august 2010 8 edward crenshaw kristopher robison sociodemographic determinants economic growth agestructure preindustrial heritage sociolinguistic integration social forces 885 july 2010 221740 9 see c eugene steuerle rudolph penner time take federal budget autopilot investors business daily august 29 2005 10 see james c capretta building automatic solvency us social security insights sweden germany brookings institution policy brief 151 march 2006 | 2,586 |
<p>The only thing we have to fear is fear itself… and historians lionizing the suckiest presidents in American history.</p>
<p>If you love big government, war, socialism and bailouts, then Franklin Delano Roosevelt was your man. But, if you believe in economic freedom and personal liberty, then FDR was a horrible president.</p>
<p>Still, he did an awesome Cruella DeVille impression by smoking out of a totally cool cigarette holder, so he had that going for him I guess, right?</p>
<p />
<p>FDR was one of the WORST presidents we have ever had! Don’t believe me? Read the top 5 reasons below.</p>
<p>#5. &#160;FDR criticized being dependent on welfare, while simultaneously creating Social Security and major welfare institutions.</p>
<p>In a speech to congress in 1935, FDR said, “The lessons of history, confirmed by the evidence immediately before me, show conclusively that continued dependence upon relief induces a spiritual and moral disintegration fundamentally destructive to the national fiber. To dole out relief in this way is to administer a narcotic, a subtle destroyer of the human spirit. It is in violation of the traditions of America.”</p>
<p>Oh really, fool? Then why would you put millions of Americans on welfare if it’s so “fundamentally destructive” and “in violation” of our traditions?</p>
<p />
<p>#4. “Man of the people” FDR was a really a friend of the big corporations.&#160;</p>
<p>FDR&#160;created the modern corporatist state that liberals (claim to) hate, by encouraging businesses to form cartels in order to squash their competition. The passage of the National Recovery Act compelled industries to form “code authorities,” and gave them the ability to regulate things such as quality, wages, prices and distribution channels. They were modeled after fascist Italy’s “corporatives,” which engaged in the same type of anti-competitive business practices. In fact, corporatism is widely known as a form of fascism.</p>
<p>But we thought modern-day liberals loved FDR and hated big corporations? Well, I guess whenever you hear a&#160;liberal praising big government and then railing against big corporations you can just say…</p>
<p>#3. FDR ordered animals to be killed and food to be destroyed… while people were starving and suffering from the Great Depression.&#160;</p>
<p>FDR passed the Agricultural Adjustment Act, which was probably the most idiotic law in American history because it initially mandated that farmers slaughter livestock and burn their crops in order to keep prices high and get people to move from the cities to the country.</p>
<p>Hey, here’s a really stupid thought&#160;but, let’s say you’re in the middle of a Great Depression and people are starving… do you think it’s a good idea to destroy food to RAISE &#160;prices? Who would think that was a good idea to tell farmers to just slaughter cows and burn crops? FDR, that’s who.</p>
<p />
<p>Oh and if you thought that kind of economic stupidity died with FDR, you thought wrong. In 1981 the New York Times reported that the federal government demanded that farmers in California dump millions and millions of oranges.</p>
<p>Doug Foster wrote “Oranges are left rotting so as to keep prices high for farmers and to keep consumers from buying oranges at lower prices. Does the government know what it is doing? Does it care? The response of the FDA bureaucrat Ben Darling is, “Oranges are not an essential food. People don’t need oranges.</p>
<p>REALLY? That’s what the government’s response is? We don’t “need” oranges? Well…</p>
<p>#2. FDR waged an all out assault against a co-equal branch of government, the Supreme Court.</p>
<p>When the Supreme Court refused to just rubber stamp everything FDR wanted in the New Deal, he threw a huge hissy fit. Even though the court didn’t invalidate ALL of his precious economic centralization schemes, they did overturn many of the most ridiculous parts like when he tried to cancel everyone’s mortgage debt. SERIOUSLY? That’s a basic violation of the right of contract.</p>
<p>Still, when he was reelected in 1936, he decided to take revenge and&#160;in 1937 pushed his infamous “court packing” scheme, which would make it so that for every Supreme Court judge over the age of seventy, the president could appoint an additional judge or justice. Even FDR’s own party was like “AWW HELL NO” and they rejected the plan in congress, despite the fact that&#160;they had a slight majority at the time and could do it.</p>
<p>What do you think FDR did after that? Back off? Act like an adult? Nah, he got even MORE pissed! FDR started campaigning against members of his own party while the nation’s economy was going into another free fall. Way to act mature Mr. President. Sounds like the type of thing our current president would do.</p>
<p />
<p>Still, FDR basically succeeded in his aims because the Supreme Court got so scared that they started upholding all his ineffective, BS regulatory measures. They called it the “switch in time that saved 9,” and the Supreme Court has basically sucked pretty hard since then.</p>
<p><a href="/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/fdr-packed-court-mcclures-magazine.jpg" type="external" /></p>
<p>#1. FDR stole everyone’s gold.</p>
<p>A lot of people don’t know about this, but FDR issued an executive order that basically stole people’s private gold. In 1933, FDR signed executive order number 6102,&#160;“forbidding the Hoarding of&#160;gold coin, gold&#160;bullion, and&#160;gold certificateswithin the continental United States”.</p>
<p>I mean seriously, what the hell is that? He STOLE people’s gold and prosecuted people for having private property. The Secret Service even got involved in investigating merchants and doing all kinds of nasty stuff that is usually reserved for today’s modern-day DEA agents. Government thugs gonna thug, I guess?</p>
<p>It wasn’t until 1974 when president Gerald Ford&#160;finally&#160;signed a bill that would&#160;“permit United States citizens to purchase, hold, sell, or otherwise deal with gold in the United States or abroad.” &#160;Of course, by that time, Richard Nixon had already taken the U.S. fully off the gold standard and lots of the people who had their stuff stolen and were prosecuted by the Feds were dead already.</p>
<p>Gee thanks, guys.</p>
<p>So those are the top 5 reasons that FDR was one of the suckiest presidents in American history. Modern liberals love this guy, and it makes sense because liberals don’t have a firm grasp on history, otherwise they wouldn’t be liberals.</p>
<p>Can you think of any other reasons why FDR stunk?</p> | false | 1 | thing fear fear historians lionizing suckiest presidents american history love big government war socialism bailouts franklin delano roosevelt man believe economic freedom personal liberty fdr horrible president still awesome cruella deville impression smoking totally cool cigarette holder going guess right fdr one worst presidents ever dont believe read top 5 reasons 5 160fdr criticized dependent welfare simultaneously creating social security major welfare institutions speech congress 1935 fdr said lessons history confirmed evidence immediately show conclusively continued dependence upon relief induces spiritual moral disintegration fundamentally destructive national fiber dole relief way administer narcotic subtle destroyer human spirit violation traditions america oh really fool would put millions americans welfare fundamentally destructive violation traditions 4 man people fdr really friend big corporations160 fdr160created modern corporatist state liberals claim hate encouraging businesses form cartels order squash competition passage national recovery act compelled industries form code authorities gave ability regulate things quality wages prices distribution channels modeled fascist italys corporatives engaged type anticompetitive business practices fact corporatism widely known form fascism thought modernday liberals loved fdr hated big corporations well guess whenever hear a160liberal praising big government railing big corporations say 3 fdr ordered animals killed food destroyed people starving suffering great depression160 fdr passed agricultural adjustment act probably idiotic law american history initially mandated farmers slaughter livestock burn crops order keep prices high get people move cities country hey heres really stupid thought160but lets say youre middle great depression people starving think good idea destroy food raise 160prices would think good idea tell farmers slaughter cows burn crops fdr thats oh thought kind economic stupidity died fdr thought wrong 1981 new york times reported federal government demanded farmers california dump millions millions oranges doug foster wrote oranges left rotting keep prices high farmers keep consumers buying oranges lower prices government know care response fda bureaucrat ben darling oranges essential food people dont need oranges really thats governments response dont need oranges well 2 fdr waged assault coequal branch government supreme court supreme court refused rubber stamp everything fdr wanted new deal threw huge hissy fit even though court didnt invalidate precious economic centralization schemes overturn many ridiculous parts like tried cancel everyones mortgage debt seriously thats basic violation right contract still reelected 1936 decided take revenge and160in 1937 pushed infamous court packing scheme would make every supreme court judge age seventy president could appoint additional judge justice even fdrs party like aww hell rejected plan congress despite fact that160they slight majority time could think fdr back act like adult nah got even pissed fdr started campaigning members party nations economy going another free fall way act mature mr president sounds like type thing current president would still fdr basically succeeded aims supreme court got scared started upholding ineffective bs regulatory measures called switch time saved 9 supreme court basically sucked pretty hard since 1 fdr stole everyones gold lot people dont know fdr issued executive order basically stole peoples private gold 1933 fdr signed executive order number 6102160forbidding hoarding of160gold coin gold160bullion and160gold certificateswithin continental united states mean seriously hell stole peoples gold prosecuted people private property secret service even got involved investigating merchants kinds nasty stuff usually reserved todays modernday dea agents government thugs gon na thug guess wasnt 1974 president gerald ford160finally160signed bill would160permit united states citizens purchase hold sell otherwise deal gold united states abroad 160of course time richard nixon already taken us fully gold standard lots people stuff stolen prosecuted feds dead already gee thanks guys top 5 reasons fdr one suckiest presidents american history modern liberals love guy makes sense liberals dont firm grasp history otherwise wouldnt liberals think reasons fdr stunk | 603 |
<p>Every actor knows the old adage that there are no small parts, only small actors. And those who have worked in a group environment will agree that jobs are much more harmonious if everyone is in sync. For both of these ideas to jell, a production needs good casting directors: people who have the connections, knowledge and the sixth sense to suss out the best talent to fit into the jigsaw puzzle that is a stellar ensemble cast.</p>
<p>“Building the ensemble is finding actors who writers can actually go to in storylines,” says&#160;Dawn Steinberg, exec VP of casting and talent for Sony Pictures TV. She has been there for pivotal moments of TV history such as Aaron Paul nailing his audition for AMC’s “Breaking Bad” and Jeff Garlin screaming into the camera that then-ABC president Paul Lee should hire him for “The Goldbergs.”</p>
<p>Steinberg adds that pilots aren’t usually that long and therefore not all characters are fully developed. The goal, she says, is to have a series where “you’re going to ‘build it out,’ as they say.</p>
<p>“Other characters are going to come into the forefront and other characters are going to have storylines,” she says. “And other characters are going to hold their own opposite the leads. And hopefully, they will have chemistry and several episodes in the writers will go, ‘Did you see that? Those two people have great chemistry.’”</p>
<p>This dynamic can be easier when projects have a lead already in place; after all, as Steinberg says, “if somebody’s cast, that’s one role checked off from what you have to do.” But, in the grander scheme of things, it gives casting directors and creators an idea of what kind of talent the surrounding players will be up against.“Once you have the lead set in a new pilot or story, then you work to cast around that in terms of the kind of actress [or actor],” says Sharon Bialy, who, along with partner Sherry Thomas, cast Hulu’s “The Handmaid’s Tale” after star and exec producer Elisabeth Moss had signed on to the series.</p>
<p>Bialy says they knew Moss’ reputation for being “an incredibly hard worker” and that “she doesn’t suffer fools well.” So, clearly, Bialy says, “one component of putting the ensemble together is to make sure that you have actors of a similar standard who work that way.” Similarly diligent talent including Yvonne Strahovski and Samira Wiley fleshed out that show’s dystopian universe.</p>
<p>Everyone interviewed for this report stresses the need for writers and directors to be able to trust that their creations are safe in the hands of a casting director, with seasoned casting director Tiffany Little Canfield (NBC’s “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/this-is-us/" type="external">This Is Us</a>”; the upcoming Hugh Jackman-starring “The Greatest Showman”) admitting that it can be scary because “it’s often the first time you’re hearing the words out loud during the process.”</p>
<p>If things go well, casting directors get compliments. Liz Flahive, who co-created Netflix’s “GLOW” with Carly Mensch, says of her casting director, Jennifer Euston: “She’s a unicorn who can find other unicorns. She’s very connected to us and the script, but she has a mental Rolodex of actors who she loves that you’ve never seen before.”</p>
<p>But the surfeit of quality projects can make for tough competition for talent, even among siblings. John Papsidera has cast all of Christopher Nolan’s movies (except 2002’s “Insomnia”), and he also casts “Westworld,” the HBO sci-fi Western from Nolan’s brother, Jonathan, and sister-in-law, Lisa Joy. He laughs when asked if the Nolans share.</p>
<p>“I know there’s conversations behind my back, which I think is funny,” Papsidera says. “I don’t think there’s any hard line of ‘I want to use that person, don’t use them.’ I just think it depends and it differs because you’re looking for something very different. Television requires longer deals, more commitment. That kind of separates the talent pool.”</p>
<p>But he believes that, because of Nolan and Joy’s script and vision for “Westworld,” “we got amazing feature actors” and “an amazing ensemble” that includes Thandie Newton, Jeffrey Wright and Evan Rachel Wood.</p>
<p>Not surprisingly, many see limited series as a best-of-both-worlds scenario because of the shorter contracts and buzzy moments, as when Nicole Kidman won the Emmy for HBO’s “Big Little Lies.” That gives A-listers incentive to take smaller parts in ensembles. “I love limited series so much,” says Sony TV’s Steinberg, who believes seeing the ABC miniseries “Rich Man, Poor Man” in her formative years may have&#160;had life-altering repercussions. “The fun with limited series is that … the exclusivity allows you — if you can figure out the time — to get other actors and just assemble a really great team of people: Names from theater, names from television, names from movies.”</p>
<p>Of course, not all ensemble parts are meant for star power. In fact, the beauty of a good ensemble part is that the character must be interesting enough, but not too distracting that audiences are mentally checking the actor’s IMDb credits. Papsidera cites Barry Keoghan, who played George in Christopher Nolan’s “Dunkirk,” as an example.</p>
<p>“When I first met Barry, there’s something quiet and sad in his essence,” Papsidera says. “When we started putting together the boat and who was on the boat with [star] Mark Rylance, Barry I pushed hard for, because I thought he had that essence that would break your heart. Not only was his look great and it would differentiate him from the other guys on the boat, but also there carries with him real vulnerably as a counterbalance to Mark and Tom [Hardy].”</p>
<p>Papsidera, who also works on Showtime’s long-running drama “Ray Donovan,” says he knows that it’s “harder to constantly try and freshen” older shows and sometimes you have to “put your dukes up and part of what I do is to convince agents and managers why their clients should be in my projects.” And certainly his casting Susan Sarandon in that series this year helped get actors in the door for smaller parts.</p>
<p>Sources also confirm that ensemble projects are also some of the best ways to counter a dearth of diversity and fight stereotypes. “I always look at the relationships,” says “ <a href="http://variety.com/2017/tv/news/tv-shows-to-watch-nov-27-marvelous-mrs-maisel-this-is-us-1202621795/" type="external">This Is Us</a>” casting director Little Canfield. “What are the important relationships in the script? How much do those relationships depend on archetypes: a leading man, a leading lady. We love to mess with the rules and mess with the ideas, but in order to do that you have to understand how it’s done. If you’re making a choice, you have to understand what the normal way to do it is.”</p>
<p>She mentions casting Justin Hartley as the show’s muscular pretty boy, Kevin, as an example because that character’s “story is he’s underestimated because he looks like a football player or he spends all his time in the gym.” Specifically, she says, “he looks like an actor. He looks like an actor on&#160;a sitcom.” She bended some rules by getting Milo Ventimiglia to play the family’s troubled father, Jack.</p>
<p>“The part of Jack in our original breakdown was sort of an Everyman young Tom Hanks type,” Little Canfield says. “Milo is not a young Tom Hanks type. He’s edgy. He’s got a great working-class vibe. He’s incredibly handsome. He’s really fit and all of those things. It would take him out of an Everyman type. But we reached out to him and he read the role and said, ‘I connect with that role.’ And he came in and when he auditioned, it changed our perspective of what that role would be or could be.”</p>
<p>And while “This Is Us” is about an extended family, Little Canfield says this part of casting wasn’t nearly as challenging as finding actors who looked like older or younger versions of the same character for the tearjerker’s notorious flashback scenes. “Sometimes I have to actually remind people, do you look exactly like your brother?,” she says.</p>
<p>Little Canfield also acknowledges the work of hair, makeup and costume crews who work with her to establish “This Is Us” and other projects’ period elements. She also cast Showtime’s “I’m Dying up Here,” spending nights in standup clubs on the hunt for people who “just feel like they come from a different time” and both “comedians who could act” and “actors who could do standup comedy” for this dramedy about the 1970s standup circuit in Los Angeles. Similarly, Flahive and Mensch’s “GLOW” needed to fill their women’s wrestling series with actresses who could wrestle, but who also looked like people who would not be cast in traditional roles in the early 1980s.</p>
<p>“A lot of casting was building forward from what we wanted to see on TV and then building backward,” says Mensch. “We’re a wrestling show and a lot of what wrestling is about is kind of taking on stereotypes and boogie men in the culture in any given moment.”</p>
<p>She says they needed “characters who could take us on the journey” of what it felt like to play an Arab stereotype (a part that went to Sunita Mani) or an out-of-work Blaxploitation actress (which went to Sydelle Noel). Even star Alison Brie had to fight for her role as the overly enthusiastic hot mess with the Russian wrestling persona, Ruth Wilder; the creators first wrote her off as being too pretty and together. Only Kia Stevens came with any actual wrestling experience.</p>
<p>Casting director Papsidera might have the most honest approach to his job.</p>
<p>“At the end of the day what I do and what I try to do, is match an actor’s soul and their essence to something that’s two-dimensional on a page,” he says.</p> | false | 1 | every actor knows old adage small parts small actors worked group environment agree jobs much harmonious everyone sync ideas jell production needs good casting directors people connections knowledge sixth sense suss best talent fit jigsaw puzzle stellar ensemble cast building ensemble finding actors writers actually go storylines says160dawn steinberg exec vp casting talent sony pictures tv pivotal moments tv history aaron paul nailing audition amcs breaking bad jeff garlin screaming camera thenabc president paul lee hire goldbergs steinberg adds pilots arent usually long therefore characters fully developed goal says series youre going build say characters going come forefront characters going storylines says characters going hold opposite leads hopefully chemistry several episodes writers go see two people great chemistry dynamic easier projects lead already place steinberg says somebodys cast thats one role checked grander scheme things gives casting directors creators idea kind talent surrounding players againstonce lead set new pilot story work cast around terms kind actress actor says sharon bialy along partner sherry thomas cast hulus handmaids tale star exec producer elisabeth moss signed series bialy says knew moss reputation incredibly hard worker doesnt suffer fools well clearly bialy says one component putting ensemble together make sure actors similar standard work way similarly diligent talent including yvonne strahovski samira wiley fleshed shows dystopian universe everyone interviewed report stresses need writers directors able trust creations safe hands casting director seasoned casting director tiffany little canfield nbcs us upcoming hugh jackmanstarring greatest showman admitting scary often first time youre hearing words loud process things go well casting directors get compliments liz flahive cocreated netflixs glow carly mensch says casting director jennifer euston shes unicorn find unicorns shes connected us script mental rolodex actors loves youve never seen surfeit quality projects make tough competition talent even among siblings john papsidera cast christopher nolans movies except 2002s insomnia also casts westworld hbo scifi western nolans brother jonathan sisterinlaw lisa joy laughs asked nolans share know theres conversations behind back think funny papsidera says dont think theres hard line want use person dont use think depends differs youre looking something different television requires longer deals commitment kind separates talent pool believes nolan joys script vision westworld got amazing feature actors amazing ensemble includes thandie newton jeffrey wright evan rachel wood surprisingly many see limited series bestofbothworlds scenario shorter contracts buzzy moments nicole kidman emmy hbos big little lies gives alisters incentive take smaller parts ensembles love limited series much says sony tvs steinberg believes seeing abc miniseries rich man poor man formative years may have160had lifealtering repercussions fun limited series exclusivity allows figure time get actors assemble really great team people names theater names television names movies course ensemble parts meant star power fact beauty good ensemble part character must interesting enough distracting audiences mentally checking actors imdb credits papsidera cites barry keoghan played george christopher nolans dunkirk example first met barry theres something quiet sad essence papsidera says started putting together boat boat star mark rylance barry pushed hard thought essence would break heart look great would differentiate guys boat also carries real vulnerably counterbalance mark tom hardy papsidera also works showtimes longrunning drama ray donovan says knows harder constantly try freshen older shows sometimes put dukes part convince agents managers clients projects certainly casting susan sarandon series year helped get actors door smaller parts sources also confirm ensemble projects also best ways counter dearth diversity fight stereotypes always look relationships says us casting director little canfield important relationships script much relationships depend archetypes leading man leading lady love mess rules mess ideas order understand done youre making choice understand normal way mentions casting justin hartley shows muscular pretty boy kevin example characters story hes underestimated looks like football player spends time gym specifically says looks like actor looks like actor on160a sitcom bended rules getting milo ventimiglia play familys troubled father jack part jack original breakdown sort everyman young tom hanks type little canfield says milo young tom hanks type hes edgy hes got great workingclass vibe hes incredibly handsome hes really fit things would take everyman type reached read role said connect role came auditioned changed perspective role would could us extended family little canfield says part casting wasnt nearly challenging finding actors looked like older younger versions character tearjerkers notorious flashback scenes sometimes actually remind people look exactly like brother says little canfield also acknowledges work hair makeup costume crews work establish us projects period elements also cast showtimes im dying spending nights standup clubs hunt people feel like come different time comedians could act actors could standup comedy dramedy 1970s standup circuit los angeles similarly flahive menschs glow needed fill womens wrestling series actresses could wrestle also looked like people would cast traditional roles early 1980s lot casting building forward wanted see tv building backward says mensch wrestling show lot wrestling kind taking stereotypes boogie men culture given moment says needed characters could take us journey felt like play arab stereotype part went sunita mani outofwork blaxploitation actress went sydelle noel even star alison brie fight role overly enthusiastic hot mess russian wrestling persona ruth wilder creators first wrote pretty together kia stevens came actual wrestling experience casting director papsidera might honest approach job end day try match actors soul essence something thats twodimensional page says | 876 |
<p>Before critics even released reviews of “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/justice-league/" type="external">Justice League</a>,” the DC blockbuster raised eyebrows when Warner Bros. and Rotten Tomatoes both <a href="http://variety.com/2017/film/news/rotten-tomatoes-justice-league-rating-1202614739/" type="external">delayed review ratings</a>&#160;until a day before the movie’s premiere.</p>
<p>Following numerous setbacks including <a href="http://variety.com/2017/film/news/justice-league-reshoots-1202502433/" type="external">extensive reshoots</a> and directorial shifts after <a href="http://variety.com/2017/film/news/justice-league-zack-snyder-daughter-dead-joss-whedon-1202440505/" type="external">Zack Snyder stepped away</a> from the project following his daughter’s death, the film received mixed reviews.</p>
<p>From DC Comic’s extended universe, “ <a href="http://variety.com/2017/film/news/best-batman-actor-poll-1202614916/" type="external">Justice League</a>” picks up where “Batman v Superman” left off and stars Ben Affleck as Batman, Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman, Ezra Miller as the Flash, Henry Cavill as Superman, Ray Fisher as Cyborg, and Jason Momoa as Aquaman.</p>
<p>In general, critics say “Justice League” falls somewhere between <a href="http://variety.com/2017/film/news/wonder-woman-review-round-up-1202447702/" type="external">box-office sensation “Wonder Woman,”</a> and the <a href="http://variety.com/2016/film/news/batman-v-superman-review-round-up-1201736676/" type="external">under-performing “Batman v Superman.”</a> Most praised the chemistry of the cast along with the its direction, considering it’s the product of two filmmakers, while others panned the bland villain, Steppenwolf and pointed out the universe’s shortcomings compared to rival Marvel.</p>
<p>Variety’s Owen Gleiberman penned one of the movie’s more positive reviews, writing, “The movie is no cheat. It’s a tasty franchise delivery system that kicks a certain series back into gear.”</p>
<p>“Justice League” opens Nov. 17. See highlights from the critical response below:</p>
<p><a href="http://variety.com/2017/film/reviews/justice-league-review-ben-affleck-gal-gadot-1202614266/" type="external">Variety’s Owen Gleiberman:</a></p>
<p>“Justice League,” the latest link of Tinkertoy in the <a href="http://variety.com/t/dc-comics/" type="external">DC Comics</a> universe, has been conceived, in each and every frame, to correct the sins of “Batman v Superman.” It’s not just a sequel — it’s an act of franchise penance. The movie, which gathers up half a dozen comic-book immortals and lets them butt heads on their way to kicking ass, is never messy or bombastic. It’s light and clean and simple (at times almost too simple), with razory repartee and combat duels that make a point of not going on for too long.”</p>
<p><a href="http://www.indiewire.com/2017/11/justice-league-review-zack-snyder-joss-whedon-avengers-1201897286/" type="external">Indiewire’s Ben Kohn:</a></p>
<p>“‘Justice League’ offers a tepid mea culpa, attempting to liven the material (with a third-act assist from Joss Whedon, who finished the movie when Snyder stepped away for tragic personal reasons). Taking more than one page from Marvel’s first ‘Avengers’ installment, ‘Justice League’ rounds up the current spate of active D.C. franchise superheroes, and the resulting 119-minute pileup of showdowns and one-liners is an undeniably tighter, more engaging experience. It’s also a tired, conventional attempt to play by the rules, with ‘hold for laughs’ moments shoehorned between rapid-fire action — a begrudging concession that the Marvel formula works, and a shameless attempt to replicate it.”</p>
<p><a href="http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-justice-league-review-20171115-story.html" type="external">Los Angeles Times’ Kenneth Turan:</a></p>
<p>As directed by Zack Snyder, and, more importantly, co-written by Chris Terrio and Joss Whedon, character is more than destiny here. It is the key reason ‘Justice League’ is a seriously satisfying superhero movie, one that, rife with lines like ‘the stench of your fear is making my soldiers hungry,’ actually feels like the earnest comic books of our squandered youth. Unlike the glib denizens of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, residents of the DC Extended Universe have always had a somber gravitas, a sense that the weight of the world’s troubles might all but crush them.”</p>
<p><a href="http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/reviews/peter-travers-justice-league-keeps-it-light-for-better-or-worse-w511641" type="external">Rolling Stone’s Peter Travers:</a></p>
<p>“For those who loathe Zack Snyder’s ‘Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice,’ and they are legion, ‘Justice League’ will be just the corrective followup they’re looking for. Granted, BvS got a bad rap for staying true to the dark instincts of the <a href="http://variety.com/2017/biz/news/dc-comics-eddie-berganza-editor-fired-sexual-assault-claims-1202613678/" type="external">DC Comics</a> universe from which it emerged. It’s just that director Snyder lacked the artistic cred that Christopher Nolan brought to his ‘Dark Knight’ trilogy, to put it mildly. Instead of the Freudian gloom and doom of the Caped Crusader (Ben Affleck) and the Man of Steel (Henry Cavill) hating on each other, this coming together of DC’s heavy hitters takes so many happy pills it almost overdoses on them. No one sings ‘the sun’ll come out tomorrow’ in this movie. But the attitude is so bright and optimistic that you might mistake it for a fun ride on the Marvel express.”</p>
<p><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/15/movies/justice-league-review-wonder-woman-batman-dc-comics.html" type="external">New York Times’&#160;Manohla Dargis:</a></p>
<p>“Mr. Snyder remains regrettably committed to a dark, desaturated palette that borders on the murky, and this movie’s chaotic, unimaginative action scenes can drag on forever. But the touches of humor in ‘Justice League’ lighten the whole thing tonally and are a relief after the dirgelike ‘Batman v Superman,’ which he ran into the ground with a two-and-a-half-hour running time. (‘Justice League’ clocks in at a not-exactly fleet two hours.) Written by Chris Terrio and Joss Whedon, the new movie shows a series that’s still finding its footing as well as characters who, though perhaps not yet as ostensibly multidimensional as Marvel’s, may be more enduring (and golden). It has justice, and it has banter. And while it could have used more hanging out, more breeziness, it is a start.”</p>
<p><a href="http://ew.com/movies/2017/11/15/justice-league-review/" type="external">Entertainment Weekly’s&#160;Chris Nashawaty:</a></p>
<p>“There are things to like in ‘Justice League.’ The chemistry between the old and new castmembers being the main one, thanks to Whedon and co-writer Chris Terrio. And the handful of call-back cameos from Amy Adams’ Lois Lane, Diane Lane’s Martha Kent, and Connie Nielsen’s Queen Hippolyta are all welcome without overstaying that welcome (the same goes for newcomers like J.K. Simmons’ Commissioner Gordon). It’s obvious to anyone watching ‘Justice League’ next to the other DC films that the studio brass handed down a mandate to lighten the mood and make things funnier and more Marvel-y. And, to an extent, ‘Justice League’ accomplishes that. But it also feels like so much attention was paid to the smaller, fizzier character moments that the bigger picture of the film’s overarching plot was a second or third priority. Some day, hopefully soon, DC will get the recipe right again and duplicate Wonder Woman’s storytelling magic. But today isn’t that day, and Justice League unfortunately isn’t that film.”</p>
<p><a href="http://www.ign.com/articles/2017/11/15/justice-league-review" type="external">IGN’s Jim Vejvoda:</a></p>
<p>“‘Justice League’ has some good moments and some bad ones, but it ultimately ekes out just enough entertainment value to warrant a look-see. That said, ‘Justice League seldom delivers any truly ‘wow!’ moments of finally seeing these awesome superheroes assembled together onscreen the way ‘The Avengers’ did. This first big screen union of DC Comics’ top-tier superheroes is ultimately just an adequate adventure flick. It’s marred by a very choppy story, a run-of-the-mill villain, some shoddy visual effects, and an overall haphazard execution.”</p>
<p><a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/movies/2017/11/15/review-justice-league-makes-satisfying-supergroup-effort-despite-some-bumps/856972001/" type="external">USA Today’s Brian Truitt:</a>&#160;</p>
<p>“Justice League is as solid an outing as any superhero fan could hope, with a clear family vibe: Wonder Woman and Batman prove to be a dynamic mom-and-dad duo while the fastest kid around steals the show. A better effort than ‘Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice’ and a worthy follow-up to runaway hit ‘Wonder Woman,’ ‘Justice League’ does the DC icons proud with some high-profile additions and a strong if unspectacular effort full of fun character moments.”</p>
<p><a href="https://chicago.suntimes.com/entertainment/fun-justice-league-cleverly-assembles-a-superhuman-fight-club/" type="external">Chicago Sun Times’&#160;Richard Roeper:</a></p>
<p>“Doesn’t take much imagination to know how it’s all going to turn out — but the fun in “Justice League” is in seeing Affleck’s Batman and Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman teaming up with Ezra Miller’s Barry Allen/Flash, Jason Momoa’s Arthur Curry/Aquaman and Ray Fisher’s Victor Stone/Cyborg. It’s a putting-the-band-together origins movie, executed with great fun and energy. About those actors playing the Fab Five (with room for more to come). They’re a wonderful (and ridiculously good-looking) group of performers, and they play well together. Thanks to a nifty screenplay by Chris Terrio and Joss Whedon and just the right mix of ‘heavy-iosity’ and humor in the directorial tone of Zack Snyder, ‘Justice League’ marks a solid step forward for the DC Comics Extended Universe.”</p>
<p><a href="http://www.tampabay.com/features/movies/Why-Justice-League-nearly-gets-it-right-but-still-has-DC-movie-problems_162640681" type="external">Tampa Bay Times’ Steve Persall:</a></p>
<p>“This time, universe keeper Zack Snyder nearly gets it right. Justice League is yet another DC movie without a wowza villain, weighed down by origins stories and redundant CGI effects. Yet it’s slightly lighter on its feet, funnier not in a Ragnarok way but able to crack a smile now and then.&#160;Justice League does remain fun as it unravels, an upgrade from every other DC flick. Yet a movie intended as the culmination of DC lore instead feels like just another sequel set-up. You’ll need to wait through seven minutes of end credits to get the villains this movie deserved.”</p> | false | 1 | critics even released reviews justice league dc blockbuster raised eyebrows warner bros rotten tomatoes delayed review ratings160until day movies premiere following numerous setbacks including extensive reshoots directorial shifts zack snyder stepped away project following daughters death film received mixed reviews dc comics extended universe justice league picks batman v superman left stars ben affleck batman gal gadot wonder woman ezra miller flash henry cavill superman ray fisher cyborg jason momoa aquaman general critics say justice league falls somewhere boxoffice sensation wonder woman underperforming batman v superman praised chemistry cast along direction considering product two filmmakers others panned bland villain steppenwolf pointed universes shortcomings compared rival marvel varietys owen gleiberman penned one movies positive reviews writing movie cheat tasty franchise delivery system kicks certain series back gear justice league opens nov 17 see highlights critical response varietys owen gleiberman justice league latest link tinkertoy dc comics universe conceived every frame correct sins batman v superman sequel act franchise penance movie gathers half dozen comicbook immortals lets butt heads way kicking ass never messy bombastic light clean simple times almost simple razory repartee combat duels make point going long indiewires ben kohn justice league offers tepid mea culpa attempting liven material thirdact assist joss whedon finished movie snyder stepped away tragic personal reasons taking one page marvels first avengers installment justice league rounds current spate active dc franchise superheroes resulting 119minute pileup showdowns oneliners undeniably tighter engaging experience also tired conventional attempt play rules hold laughs moments shoehorned rapidfire action begrudging concession marvel formula works shameless attempt replicate los angeles times kenneth turan directed zack snyder importantly cowritten chris terrio joss whedon character destiny key reason justice league seriously satisfying superhero movie one rife lines like stench fear making soldiers hungry actually feels like earnest comic books squandered youth unlike glib denizens marvel cinematic universe residents dc extended universe always somber gravitas sense weight worlds troubles might crush rolling stones peter travers loathe zack snyders batman v superman dawn justice legion justice league corrective followup theyre looking granted bvs got bad rap staying true dark instincts dc comics universe emerged director snyder lacked artistic cred christopher nolan brought dark knight trilogy put mildly instead freudian gloom doom caped crusader ben affleck man steel henry cavill hating coming together dcs heavy hitters takes many happy pills almost overdoses one sings sunll come tomorrow movie attitude bright optimistic might mistake fun ride marvel express new york times160manohla dargis mr snyder remains regrettably committed dark desaturated palette borders murky movies chaotic unimaginative action scenes drag forever touches humor justice league lighten whole thing tonally relief dirgelike batman v superman ran ground twoandahalfhour running time justice league clocks notexactly fleet two hours written chris terrio joss whedon new movie shows series thats still finding footing well characters though perhaps yet ostensibly multidimensional marvels may enduring golden justice banter could used hanging breeziness start entertainment weeklys160chris nashawaty things like justice league chemistry old new castmembers main one thanks whedon cowriter chris terrio handful callback cameos amy adams lois lane diane lanes martha kent connie nielsens queen hippolyta welcome without overstaying welcome goes newcomers like jk simmons commissioner gordon obvious anyone watching justice league next dc films studio brass handed mandate lighten mood make things funnier marvely extent justice league accomplishes also feels like much attention paid smaller fizzier character moments bigger picture films overarching plot second third priority day hopefully soon dc get recipe right duplicate wonder womans storytelling magic today isnt day justice league unfortunately isnt film igns jim vejvoda justice league good moments bad ones ultimately ekes enough entertainment value warrant looksee said justice league seldom delivers truly wow moments finally seeing awesome superheroes assembled together onscreen way avengers first big screen union dc comics toptier superheroes ultimately adequate adventure flick marred choppy story runofthemill villain shoddy visual effects overall haphazard execution usa todays brian truitt160 justice league solid outing superhero fan could hope clear family vibe wonder woman batman prove dynamic momanddad duo fastest kid around steals show better effort batman v superman dawn justice worthy followup runaway hit wonder woman justice league dc icons proud highprofile additions strong unspectacular effort full fun character moments chicago sun times160richard roeper doesnt take much imagination know going turn fun justice league seeing afflecks batman gal gadots wonder woman teaming ezra millers barry allenflash jason momoas arthur curryaquaman ray fishers victor stonecyborg puttingthebandtogether origins movie executed great fun energy actors playing fab five room come theyre wonderful ridiculously goodlooking group performers play well together thanks nifty screenplay chris terrio joss whedon right mix heavyiosity humor directorial tone zack snyder justice league marks solid step forward dc comics extended universe tampa bay times steve persall time universe keeper zack snyder nearly gets right justice league yet another dc movie without wowza villain weighed origins stories redundant cgi effects yet slightly lighter feet funnier ragnarok way able crack smile then160justice league remain fun unravels upgrade every dc flick yet movie intended culmination dc lore instead feels like another sequel setup youll need wait seven minutes end credits get villains movie deserved | 842 |
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<p>What is really happening in Egypt? Are the latest developments a progressive step forward or a regressive step backward for the millions of Egyptians seeking political change primarily through prolonged mass mobilizations in the streets?</p>
<p>It’s been over a month since a military coup d’état, with popular support, ousted the country’s first democratically elected government July 3 after only one year in office, following an earlier military coup with popular support that brought down dictator Hosni Mubarak.</p>
<p>There are diametrically opposed interpretations about what is taking place in Egypt. One fact remains certain, however. In 1952 during the overthrow of the monarchy, and in 2011during the overthrow of the dictatorship, and in 2013 during the overthrow of the newly elected government, the military was the ultimate power.&#160; It has no intention to forego that power regardless of the outcome of the next election in 2014.</p>
<p>President Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB), the candidate of the Freedom and Justice Party, remains in jail (or “incommunicado, as the media prefers), along with other imprisoned former government functionaries and MB followers. Most are awaiting trial on a variety of charges, as though it was the Brotherhood that launched the coup.</p>
<p>Some 250 people, almost all of them Morsi supporters have been slain by military and security forces when they demonstrated against the coup. The protests are continuing, and the military crackdown is becoming increasingly fierce.</p>
<p>The 450,000-strong armed forces, led by Gen. Abdul Fatah al-Sisi, dismissed the government just after popular anti-Morsi protests brought many millions of Egyptians into the streets June 30 to demand the president’s ouster. (In terms of the unusually huge crowds, this article just says “millions” because both sides tend to exaggerate their protest numbers.)</p>
<p>Sisi, who was named defense minister by Morsi, selected an interim government until new elections. Not one of the chosen 34 cabinet members belongs to the Muslim Brotherhood, but 11 of them are veterans of the Mubarak regime. It seems doubtful that the MB and its political groups and associates that have produced majorities in five elections (presidential and parliamentary), will be allowed to contend for power.</p>
<p>The return of elements of the Mubarak regime is beginning to draw media attention. Writing in the Washington Post from Cairo July 19, Abigail Hauslohner stated: “Egypt’s new power dynamic following the coup is eerily familiar. Gone are the Islamist rulers from the Muslim Brotherhood. Back are the faces of the old guard, many closely linked to Mubarak’s reign or to the all-powerful generals.”</p>
<p>Professor Joseph Massad, who teaches Modern Arab Politics and Intellectual History at Columbia University, was highly critical of the coup in a July 14 article in Counterpunch: “What is clear for now, with the massive increase of police and army repression with the participation of the public, is that what this coalition has done is strengthen the Mubarakists and the army and weakened calls for a future Egyptian democracy, real or just procedural. Egypt is now ruled by an army whose top leadership was appointed and served under Mubarak, and is presided over by a judge appointed by Mubarak (Interim President Adly Mansour) and is policed by the same police used by Mubarak. People are free to call it a coup or not, but what Egypt has now is Mubarakism without Mubarak.”</p>
<p>There is no direct evidence that the U.S. was behind the coup. Of course, Washington has long maintained intimate contact with the leaders of the armed forces and the Cairo government. It seems to have had as close a relationship with Morsi as it did with Mubarak and now with coup leader Gen. Sisi. There is an indirect connection, however, according to journalist Emad Mekay, writing in Aljazeera, July 10:</p>
<p>A review of dozens of U.S. federal government documents shows Washington has quietly funded senior Egyptian opposition figures who called for toppling of the country’s now-deposed president Mohamed Morsi. Documents obtained by the Investigative Reporting Program at UC Berkeley show the U.S. channeled funding through a State Department program to promote democracy in the Middle East region. This program vigorously supported activists and politicians who have fomented unrest in Egypt, after autocratic president Hosni Mubarak was ousted in a popular uprising.</p>
<p>The State Department’s program, dubbed by U.S. officials as a “democracy assistance” initiative, is part of a wider Obama administration effort to try to stop the retreat of pro-Washington secularists, and to win back influence in Arab Spring countries that saw the rise of Islamists, who largely oppose U.S. interests in the Middle East. Activists bankrolled by the program include an exiled Egyptian police officer who plotted the violent overthrow of the Morsi government, an anti-Islamist politician who advocated closing mosques and dragging preachers out by force, as well as a coterie of opposition politicians who pushed for the ouster of the country’s first democratically elected leader, government documents show.</p>
<p>President Obama has proclaimed neutrality in this matter and seems to have positions himself above the conflict, but Washington’s every practical deed has been supportive of the military and the military-dominated interim civilian leadership.</p>
<p>President Obama refused to characterize the overthrow as a coup, which of course it was, because to do so would legally terminate the annual bribe of $1.3 billion to the Egyptian armed forces — a token of America’s gratitude for maintaining good relations with Israel. On July 31, U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel announced that the Pentagon would participate in mid-September war games with the Egyptian army as its had done throughout the years of dictatorship.</p>
<p>The task of obliquely justifying the putsch fell to Secretary of State John Kerry. On July 17, he opined that before the coup there was “an extraordinary situation in Egypt of life and death, of the potential of civil war and enormous violence and you now have a constitutional process proceeding forward very rapidly. So we have to measure all of those facts against the law, and that’s exactly what we will do.”&#160; On Aug. 1, he went further, alleging that the Egyptian army was “restoring order.” The next day, Egypt Independent reported, that an MB spokesperson “called Kerry’s comments ‘alarming,’ and accused the U.S. administration of being ‘complicit’ in the military coup.”</p>
<p>The U.S. and several countries, mostly western, are leading a very public “reconciliation” campaign essentially aimed at of convincing the leadership of the MB to capitulate, accept the overthrow, end the protests and “swallow the reality” of defeat. It is being portrayed as a peace effort, with no criticism directed toward the military that broke the law and evidently future jail terms for some MB leaders, including Morsi, who didn’t.</p>
<p>Clearly, it is just a matter of time—an “I” to be dotted, a “T” to be crossed—before Obama and Sisi will embrace in public.</p>
<p>A curious anti-Morsi coalition—a seemingly unprincipled amalgam of left, center and right, each with somewhat different agendas that they expect to advance by liquidating the Islamist government—has galvanized behind the military junta and is following its “roadmap” to the next elections.</p>
<p>Included in the coup-supporting coalition are (1) a large portion of the youthful protestors who launched the January 2011 Tahrir Square freedom struggle against the single-party rule of Mubarak’s now disbanded National Democratic Party, including such organizations such as the April 6 Youth Movement and Tamarod; (2) opposition liberal, left, and secularist groups who have combined in the National Salvation Front, plus worker groups who demonstrated in the name of their unions; and (3) the many supporters of the old Mubarak regime joyfully emerging from the shadows to support the military that in 2011 forced their leader’s resignation and imprisonment.</p>
<p>Communist groups, underground for decades, materialized during the 2011 uprising. They all supported the second uprising too, but are not playing a significant role. The Egyptian Communist Party heartily backed Morsi’s overthrow and strongly argued it was a popular revolt, not a military coup. Other Marxist groups, viewing the MB as a reactionary right wing formation, similarly backed the anti-MB rebellion.</p>
<p>Most anti-Morsi organizations, including groups affiliated with the National Salvation Front, joined pro-military demonstrations July 26 called by Gen. Sisi himself to provide an additional popular mandate for increasing the suppression of “violence and terrorism,” primarily to crush continuing Brotherhood demonstrations. The interim cabinet declared: “Based on the mandate given by the people to the state … the cabinet has delegated the interior ministry to proceed with all legal measures to confront acts of terrorism and road-blocking.” The MB has not perpetrated any acts of “terrorism,” so the reference must have been to the Salafi struggle for power in Sinai. Road-blocking refers to two large long-lasting sit-down protests in Cairo by anti-coup forces.</p>
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<p /> | false | 1 | download article pdf really happening egypt latest developments progressive step forward regressive step backward millions egyptians seeking political change primarily prolonged mass mobilizations streets month since military coup détat popular support ousted countrys first democratically elected government july 3 one year office following earlier military coup popular support brought dictator hosni mubarak diametrically opposed interpretations taking place egypt one fact remains certain however 1952 overthrow monarchy 2011during overthrow dictatorship 2013 overthrow newly elected government military ultimate power160 intention forego power regardless outcome next election 2014 president mohamed morsi muslim brotherhood mb candidate freedom justice party remains jail incommunicado media prefers along imprisoned former government functionaries mb followers awaiting trial variety charges though brotherhood launched coup 250 people almost morsi supporters slain military security forces demonstrated coup protests continuing military crackdown becoming increasingly fierce 450000strong armed forces led gen abdul fatah alsisi dismissed government popular antimorsi protests brought many millions egyptians streets june 30 demand presidents ouster terms unusually huge crowds article says millions sides tend exaggerate protest numbers sisi named defense minister morsi selected interim government new elections one chosen 34 cabinet members belongs muslim brotherhood 11 veterans mubarak regime seems doubtful mb political groups associates produced majorities five elections presidential parliamentary allowed contend power return elements mubarak regime beginning draw media attention writing washington post cairo july 19 abigail hauslohner stated egypts new power dynamic following coup eerily familiar gone islamist rulers muslim brotherhood back faces old guard many closely linked mubaraks reign allpowerful generals professor joseph massad teaches modern arab politics intellectual history columbia university highly critical coup july 14 article counterpunch clear massive increase police army repression participation public coalition done strengthen mubarakists army weakened calls future egyptian democracy real procedural egypt ruled army whose top leadership appointed served mubarak presided judge appointed mubarak interim president adly mansour policed police used mubarak people free call coup egypt mubarakism without mubarak direct evidence us behind coup course washington long maintained intimate contact leaders armed forces cairo government seems close relationship morsi mubarak coup leader gen sisi indirect connection however according journalist emad mekay writing aljazeera july 10 review dozens us federal government documents shows washington quietly funded senior egyptian opposition figures called toppling countrys nowdeposed president mohamed morsi documents obtained investigative reporting program uc berkeley show us channeled funding state department program promote democracy middle east region program vigorously supported activists politicians fomented unrest egypt autocratic president hosni mubarak ousted popular uprising state departments program dubbed us officials democracy assistance initiative part wider obama administration effort try stop retreat prowashington secularists win back influence arab spring countries saw rise islamists largely oppose us interests middle east activists bankrolled program include exiled egyptian police officer plotted violent overthrow morsi government antiislamist politician advocated closing mosques dragging preachers force well coterie opposition politicians pushed ouster countrys first democratically elected leader government documents show president obama proclaimed neutrality matter seems positions conflict washingtons every practical deed supportive military militarydominated interim civilian leadership president obama refused characterize overthrow coup course would legally terminate annual bribe 13 billion egyptian armed forces token americas gratitude maintaining good relations israel july 31 us defense secretary chuck hagel announced pentagon would participate midseptember war games egyptian army done throughout years dictatorship task obliquely justifying putsch fell secretary state john kerry july 17 opined coup extraordinary situation egypt life death potential civil war enormous violence constitutional process proceeding forward rapidly measure facts law thats exactly do160 aug 1 went alleging egyptian army restoring order next day egypt independent reported mb spokesperson called kerrys comments alarming accused us administration complicit military coup us several countries mostly western leading public reconciliation campaign essentially aimed convincing leadership mb capitulate accept overthrow end protests swallow reality defeat portrayed peace effort criticism directed toward military broke law evidently future jail terms mb leaders including morsi didnt clearly matter timean dotted crossedbefore obama sisi embrace public curious antimorsi coalitiona seemingly unprincipled amalgam left center right somewhat different agendas expect advance liquidating islamist governmenthas galvanized behind military junta following roadmap next elections included coupsupporting coalition 1 large portion youthful protestors launched january 2011 tahrir square freedom struggle singleparty rule mubaraks disbanded national democratic party including organizations april 6 youth movement tamarod 2 opposition liberal left secularist groups combined national salvation front plus worker groups demonstrated name unions 3 many supporters old mubarak regime joyfully emerging shadows support military 2011 forced leaders resignation imprisonment communist groups underground decades materialized 2011 uprising supported second uprising playing significant role egyptian communist party heartily backed morsis overthrow strongly argued popular revolt military coup marxist groups viewing mb reactionary right wing formation similarly backed antimb rebellion antimorsi organizations including groups affiliated national salvation front joined promilitary demonstrations july 26 called gen sisi provide additional popular mandate increasing suppression violence terrorism primarily crush continuing brotherhood demonstrations interim cabinet declared based mandate given people state cabinet delegated interior ministry proceed legal measures confront acts terrorism roadblocking mb perpetrated acts terrorism reference must salafi struggle power sinai roadblocking refers two large longlasting sitdown protests cairo anticoup forces | 835 |
<p>A civil rights organization filed a class-action lawsuit Thursday against the state of Nevada, alleging systemic failures in its public representation of defendants who cannot afford lawyers.</p>
<p>The complaint, filed in Carson City District Court by the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada, accuses the state and Gov. Brian Sandoval of neglecting their constitutional responsibilities to provide sufficient indigent defense in rural counties.</p>
<p>According to the complaint, the state lacks oversight of multiple rural counties and their system of contracting attorneys to represent the accused. The ACLU asked the court to require Nevada to modify its systems to comply with constitutional protections.</p>
<p>“Although these problems are occurring at the county level, ultimately the state has the responsibility to fix this,” ACLU legal director Amy Rose said in a Wednesday interview.</p>
<p>Sandoval spokeswoman Mari St. Martin said the governor’s office will review the complaint.</p>
<p>“The filing of a lawsuit is disappointing, as the Office of the Governor had previously worked in collaboration with the Supreme Court, the Legislature and other advocacy groups on this issue,” she said in an email Thursday. “Governor Sandoval had taken significant steps to improve rural indigent defense including signing into law a measure which created a rural judicial district. This provides greater access to justice for many living in rural communities.”</p>
<p>Several counties use a system where contracted attorneys are paid regardless of the defense they provide. With a flat fee, Rose said, the lawyers pay for more expenses out of pocket. She said this is particularly true in Nevada’s rural areas, where travel costs over large counties come into play.</p>
<p>Rose said this and several other factors discourage the lawyers from providing a proper defense to people who cannot otherwise pay for legal representation. She said many of the contracted attorneys have private practices and, with a large caseload on their hands, are more likely to devote time to cases where they will get paid more.</p>
<p>The complaint alleges that Nevada’s policies violate the right to a meaningful defense, protected by the Sixth Amendment and the Nevada Constitution, as well as due process rights recognized in the 14th Amendment.</p>
<p>“They are entitled to a meaningful defense, and they’re not getting that” Rose said.</p>
<p>Time for action</p>
<p>Rose cited one of the plaintiffs named in the lawsuit, Diane Davis of Pahrump. When Davis could no longer afford her lawyer, the same lawyer was appointed to represent her in her arson and identity theft cases.</p>
<p>The lawsuit claims the attorney initially planned to help her fight the charges, but when he was appointed as her public defender, he pressured her to take a plea deal.</p>
<p>Other appointed lawyers applied similar pressure to others in her situation, according to the complaint.</p>
<p>“As a public defender with a large caseload, I have to prioritize,” Davis’ current attorney recently said at a court hearing, according to the lawsuit. “Her case is important to me, yes, but so are all of my other clients’ cases.”</p>
<p>Nevada’s current system requires counties with populations above 100,000, such as Washoe and Clark, to have a county public defense office. The rural counties cited in the complaint are White Pine, Douglas, Mineral, Nye, Esmeralda, Churchill, Pershing, Eureka, Lander, Lincoln and Lyon.</p>
<p>Rose said the ACLU realized the scope of the problem in 2008 and since has advocated for a system overhaul.</p>
<p>“This isn’t a new issue,” she said.</p>
<p>She said the state has been made aware of the problems in its system but has failed to show it was going to fix them.</p>
<p>The group most recently supported Senate Bill 377, a bill that — in its original form — would have addressed many of the issues raised in the organization’s lawsuit, she said. The final version of the bill created a commission to study Nevada’s indigent defense issues. The bill was signed into law by Sandoval this summer.</p>
<p>But Rose said the time for studying is over.</p>
<p>“We’ve looked at this problem for about a decade, and now it’s time to do something about it,” she said.</p>
<p>‘They mean well’</p>
<p>A Boston-based constitutional rights group, Sixth Amendment Center, previously has studied Nevada’s disparity in resources available to its rural defendants versus those in Clark and Washoe counties. It highlighted many of the same issues addressed in the recent complaint.</p>
<p>The 2013 report, “Reclaiming Justice,” documents a steady erosion of Sixth Amendment protections within Nevada. State government has no oversight over the way the counties handle their public defense system, the report said, adding that there were no standards the counties had to meet to ensure attorneys hired could adequately provide indigent defense.</p>
<p>David Carroll, the organization’s executive director, said the limited number of resources available to rural Nevada counties makes it harder for them to delegate the appropriate time and care needed for criminal defense cases.</p>
<p>Carroll said Nevada is one of a handful of states that puts the onus of paying for defense on the counties. The rural counties do not have the population to generate the tax revenue needed to fund sufficient public defense. He said in many cases, the states most in need of better indigent defense are the ones that cannot afford it. He doesn’t blame the counties and said he thinks “they mean well.”</p>
<p>“The best they can isn’t what the Constitution calls for,” he said.</p>
<p>Contact Mike Shoro at <a href="" type="internal">[email protected]</a> or 702-387-5290. Follow <a href="https://twitter.com/mike_shoro" type="external">@mike_shoro</a> on Twitter.</p>
<p>Lawsuit’s demands</p>
<p>Among other demands, the complaint asks for:</p>
<p>• Impose a deadline for Nevada to bring defense modifications to the court.</p>
<p>• Require the state to formulate a plan to revamp its systems so they are constitutionally compliant.</p>
<p>• Prevent the Nevada government from continuing to allow inadequate public defense of those charged with a crime.</p>
<p>• Require Nevada to propose training standards for those appointed to represent indigent defendants.</p>
<p>• Stop the practice of flat-fee contracts for indigent defense.</p>
<p /> | false | 1 | civil rights organization filed classaction lawsuit thursday state nevada alleging systemic failures public representation defendants afford lawyers complaint filed carson city district court american civil liberties union nevada accuses state gov brian sandoval neglecting constitutional responsibilities provide sufficient indigent defense rural counties according complaint state lacks oversight multiple rural counties system contracting attorneys represent accused aclu asked court require nevada modify systems comply constitutional protections although problems occurring county level ultimately state responsibility fix aclu legal director amy rose said wednesday interview sandoval spokeswoman mari st martin said governors office review complaint filing lawsuit disappointing office governor previously worked collaboration supreme court legislature advocacy groups issue said email thursday governor sandoval taken significant steps improve rural indigent defense including signing law measure created rural judicial district provides greater access justice many living rural communities several counties use system contracted attorneys paid regardless defense provide flat fee rose said lawyers pay expenses pocket said particularly true nevadas rural areas travel costs large counties come play rose said several factors discourage lawyers providing proper defense people otherwise pay legal representation said many contracted attorneys private practices large caseload hands likely devote time cases get paid complaint alleges nevadas policies violate right meaningful defense protected sixth amendment nevada constitution well due process rights recognized 14th amendment entitled meaningful defense theyre getting rose said time action rose cited one plaintiffs named lawsuit diane davis pahrump davis could longer afford lawyer lawyer appointed represent arson identity theft cases lawsuit claims attorney initially planned help fight charges appointed public defender pressured take plea deal appointed lawyers applied similar pressure others situation according complaint public defender large caseload prioritize davis current attorney recently said court hearing according lawsuit case important yes clients cases nevadas current system requires counties populations 100000 washoe clark county public defense office rural counties cited complaint white pine douglas mineral nye esmeralda churchill pershing eureka lander lincoln lyon rose said aclu realized scope problem 2008 since advocated system overhaul isnt new issue said said state made aware problems system failed show going fix group recently supported senate bill 377 bill original form would addressed many issues raised organizations lawsuit said final version bill created commission study nevadas indigent defense issues bill signed law sandoval summer rose said time studying weve looked problem decade time something said mean well bostonbased constitutional rights group sixth amendment center previously studied nevadas disparity resources available rural defendants versus clark washoe counties highlighted many issues addressed recent complaint 2013 report reclaiming justice documents steady erosion sixth amendment protections within nevada state government oversight way counties handle public defense system report said adding standards counties meet ensure attorneys hired could adequately provide indigent defense david carroll organizations executive director said limited number resources available rural nevada counties makes harder delegate appropriate time care needed criminal defense cases carroll said nevada one handful states puts onus paying defense counties rural counties population generate tax revenue needed fund sufficient public defense said many cases states need better indigent defense ones afford doesnt blame counties said thinks mean well best isnt constitution calls said contact mike shoro mshororeviewjournalcom 7023875290 follow mike_shoro twitter lawsuits demands among demands complaint asks impose deadline nevada bring defense modifications court require state formulate plan revamp systems constitutionally compliant prevent nevada government continuing allow inadequate public defense charged crime require nevada propose training standards appointed represent indigent defendants stop practice flatfee contracts indigent defense | 566 |
<p>While most the focus is on star quarterbacks and headlines are demanded by surprise injuries, the attention of those actually in each NFL training camp is on key battles that players, coaches and media in attendance see every day.</p>
<p>A survey of TSX insiders covering every team reveals those battles that are most discussed in each camp around the league.</p>
<p>Many of these are battles for so-called lesser positions, like the fifth wide receiver. That’s the case with the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Dallas-Cowboys/" type="external">Dallas Cowboys</a>, with Brice Butler, Andy Jones and Noah Brown. Or for backup or slot cornerback, a popular situation in many camps, including the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/New_York_Giants/" type="external">New York Giants</a>.</p>
<p>Some battles are just battles. In Cincinnati, the always-feisty linebacker, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Vontaze-Burfict/" type="external">Vontaze Burfict</a>, who has a history of disciplinary problems, hit running back <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Giovani-Bernard/" type="external">Giovani Bernard</a> at the knees, which put an edge on things because Bernard is coming off a torn ACL. Oh yeah, and this was in a non-contact drill.</p>
<p>In Davie, Florida, the battle is between two men for two positions, as left tackle Laremy Tunsil and defensive end <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Charles-Harris/" type="external">Charles Harris</a> square off in each practice in a heated battle to keep their respective positions. Harris has speed, Tunsil technique. It is a fun battle to watch.</p>
<p>Here are the battles watched closely from every NFL camp, as reported by TSX insiders covering each team:</p>
<p>DALLAS COWBOYS</p>
<p>–Fifth receiver spot among Brice Butler, Andy Jones and Noah Brown. This will be tough, possibly forcing Cowboys to keep six receivers. Butler is having an amazing camp, not dropping a ball. Jones and Brown are younger and kept up with Butler catch-for-catch and both can also play in the slot.</p>
<p>NEW YORK GIANTS</p>
<p>–Backup slot cornerback. The Giants found out last year what life is like without <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Dominique-Rodgers-Cromartie/" type="external">Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie</a>, their slot cornerback. He was forced from the wild-card game in Green Bay with a thigh injury, leaving the Giants with no quality depth. Packers quarterback <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Aaron_Rodgers/" type="external">Aaron Rodgers</a> went right after the replacements, including former cornerback Trevin Wade, and the results weren’t pretty. The Giants didn’t draft to fill this position, but will instead look to younger guys, such as Mykkele Thompson and Donte Deayon, to compete for the job. If the Giants have an injury to cornerbacks Janoris Jenkins or Eli Apple, Rodgers-Cromartie is likely first to step in, which would leave that slot cornerback position open to whichever player is his backup.</p>
<p>PHILADELPHIA EAGLES</p>
<p>–Shelton Gibson vs. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Marcus_Johnson/" type="external">Marcus Johnson</a> for the sixth and final wide receiver spot. Johnson, a 2016 undrafted free agent who spent time on the Eagles’ practice squad last year, is having an excellent camp and appeared to move ahead of fifth-round rookie Shelton Gibson, who continues to drop too many passes.</p>
<p>WASHINGTON REDSKINS</p>
<p>–Junior Galette vs. Preston Smith at outside linebacker. Intriguing battle to watch on the right side as the Redskins try to generate a better pass rush. This is a big year for Smith, who dropped from nine sacks as a rookie, including a playoff loss to Green Bay, to 4.5 last year, when he was called out by coaches and teammates for his spotty production. Galette has the track record — 22 total sacks in 2013 and 2014 with New Orleans — but has missed two consecutive years with torn Achilles’ tendons. Galette still shows good burst and gave left tackle <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Trent-Williams/" type="external">Trent Williams</a> fits in the early part of camp. These two will have an advantage on outside linebacker Trent Murphy, who is suspended the first four games for violating the NFL’s drug policy.</p>
<p>CHICAGO BEARS</p>
<p>— <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Bryce-Callahan/" type="external">Bryce Callahan</a> vs. Kyle Fuller at right cornerback. With Marcus Cooper still suffering from a hamstring injury, the Bears have looked largely at Callahan at right corner with a few glimpses of Fuller. Both players have solid zone skills, but Callahan appeared more willing to attack the ball in coverage than Fuller, and is more physical. Callahan has been a key contributor in the past as a nickel back, but was plagued by nagging injuries last year.</p>
<p>DETROIT LIONS</p>
<p>–Cyrus Kouandjio vs. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Greg_Robinson/" type="external">Greg Robinson</a> at left tackle. Kouandjio and Robinson are the two leading candidates to start at left tackle for the Lions this fall, and they split reps with the first-team offense at the team’s first padded practice of training camp Tuesday. The Lions are looking for a short-term replacement for Taylor Decker, who underwent shoulder surgery in June and is expected to miss the first half or so of the season. Both Kouandjio and Robinson joined the Lions on the final day of June minicamp, so this is the first up-close look coaches are getting at the players.</p>
<p>GREEN BAY PACKERS</p>
<p>–Kevin King vs. Ladarius Gunter vs. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Quinten-Rollins/" type="external">Quinten Rollins</a> at cornerback. The Packers added free-agent cornerback Davon House in free agency, and he appears to be a lock to start at one corner. The other job is entirely up for grabs. Gunter finished the 2016 season as the top corner in Green Bay’s decimated secondary. While Gunter competed well, his pedestrian 4.67 speed in the 40-yard dash was — and always will be — an issue. Rollins, Green Bay’s second-round pick in 2015, battled a groin injury and inconsistency last season. Opponents had a ridiculous 133.8 passer rating against Rollins. Foes also completed 71.4 percent of passes directed at Rollins, and he allowed seven touchdown passes. The Packers then drafted the 6-foot-3, 200-pound King with the first pick of the second round. Early on in camp, all three players played with the first team.</p>
<p>MINNESOTA VIKINGS</p>
<p>–Ryan Quigley vs. Taylor Symmank for punter. Don’t assume Quigley, the five-year veteran signed in free agency, will win the punting job this summer. Symmank has no regular-season games on his resume, but what he has is the superior leg strength. He spent the first week of camp booming punts. A couple of them were 57-yarders with over 5.0-second hang times. What Quigley has is a more controlled game that makes him better, at this point, when it comes to directional punting. Special teams coordinator Mike Priefer isn’t blinded by straight power, preferring that his punters punt to specific spots with specific hang times so that the cover guys can do their jobs.</p>
<p>ATLANTA FALCONS</p>
<p>–Cornerback. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jalen-Collins/" type="external">Jalen Collins</a>, who started in the Super Bowl, was working with the third-team defense on Tuesday. He was also on the special teams knit-cap/scout team. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Desmond-Trufant/" type="external">Desmond Trufant</a> and <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Robert-Alford/" type="external">Robert Alford</a> are working with the first-team. C.J Goodwin and Deja Olatoye were working with the second team. Collins took over for Alford at right cornerback down the stretch of last season after Trufant went out because of a pectoral injury. Alford moved over to left cornerback.</p>
<p>CAROLINA PANTHERS</p>
<p>— <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Vernon-Butler/" type="external">Vernon Butler</a> vs. Star Lotulelei at defensive tackle. A second-year pro, Butler is taking a lot of the repetitions and looks good. If the 2016 first-round draft pick keeps up this pace, he could be ready to displace Lotulelei as the primary cog in the middle of the defensive line. Lotulelei had offseason shoulder surgery, so his durability could become a factor as well.</p>
<p>NEW ORLEANS SAINTS</p>
<p>–Rookie No. 1 draft choice Ryan Ramczyk vs. Khalif Barnes at left tackle. This is a close competition to see who will start while <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Terron-Armstead/" type="external">Terron Armstead</a> recovers from recent shoulder surgery. Ramczyk has received the most snaps with the first unit and has held his own, but the distribution of first-team snaps has more to do with the coaches trying to learn as much as they can about the rookie and accelerate his development than it does with a front-runner in the competition.</p>
<p>TAMPA BAY BUCCANEERS</p>
<p>–Devante Bond vs. Kendell Beckwith at linebacker. The Bucs will have a new strong-side linebacker this season. Bond spent last season on injured reserve but is working with the first-team defense. Beckwith, at 6-3, 251 pounds, is larger than most Bucs linebackers but plays fast and physical. He also is a former teammate of MLB Kwon Alexander. After the first four days of camp, Beckwith probably improved as much as any player on the team.</p>
<p>ARIZONA CARDINALS</p>
<p>–Running back. Head coach <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Bruce-Arians/" type="external">Bruce Arians</a> wants more of a two-back system. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/David_Johnson/" type="external">David Johnson</a> and <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Chris_Johnson/" type="external">Chris Johnson</a> will get the bulk of that work. Behind them are five running backs competing for two or three spots. Entering the team’s first preseason game at the Hall of Fame, Elijhaa Penny seems to have the inside track on the No. 3 spot based on how he performed in training. Andre Ellington, was beset by injuries since joining the league in 2013. Rookie T.J. Logan looks like a shoo-in to make the team, at least as a kick returner, and could pose problems for Kerwynn Williams and rookie James Summers.</p>
<p>LOS ANGELES RAMS</p>
<p>–Kayvon Webster vs. E.J. Gaines at cornerback. Three years ago, Gaines stepped up as a rookie to earn a starting role with the Rams and went into 2015 eyeing an even bigger year. But a foot injury in training camp cost him an entire season and he returned to mixed reviews last season. The Rams brought in Webster as competition, and the two have had a spirited battle for a starting position opposite <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Trumaine-Johnson/" type="external">Trumaine Johnson</a>. Both are responding, with Gaines coming up with an interception on a tipped ball against <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jared-Goff/" type="external">Jared Goff</a> on Monday, and Webster showing up big-time in 7-on-7 and 11-on-11 drills. Webster has a history with new Rams defensive coordinator <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Wade_Phillips/" type="external">Wade Phillips</a>, having played under him in Denver.</p>
<p>SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS</p>
<p>–Cole Hikutini, George Kittle, Vance McDonald and Garrett Celek are in the competition for the starting position and roster spots at tight end. The rookies (Hikutini and Kittle) have held the advantage over the veterans in the early going. Hikutini put on a nice show Monday when given an opportunity created by Kittle’s hamstring injury. The duel for the starting spot — and roster spots in general — is wide open.</p>
<p>SEATTLE SEAHAWKS</p>
<p>–The competition at running back appears to be a fierce one for the Seahawks this camp. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Thomas-Rawls/" type="external">Thomas Rawls</a>, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Eddie-Lacy/" type="external">Eddie Lacy</a> and <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/CJ-Prosise/" type="external">C.J. Prosise</a> are the top trio of the group. The battle for fourth and fifth on the depth chart will take most of camp to figure out. Alex Collins, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Mike_Davis/" type="external">Mike Davis</a> and Chris Carson have received plenty of work in the opening days of camp with each getting chances with the first-team unit.</p>
<p>BUFFALO BILLS</p>
<p>–Reggie Ragland vs. Preston Brown at middle linebacker. The Bills need to figure out who is going to be the middle linebacker in the 4-3, and some believed Ragland — the 2016 second-round pick who missed his entire rookie season — would take control. He really hasn’t, and fourth-year veteran Brown is clearly entrenched, at least through five practices. Ragland could end up contending for the weak outside spot, but right now, Brown — who has led the Bills in defensive snaps played three years in a row — is out-pacing Ragland inside.</p>
<p>MIAMI DOLPHINS</p>
<p>–Left tackle Laremy Tunsil vs. defensive end Charles Harris. These aren’t two guys battling for the same position. It is Miami’s last two first-round picks (Tunsil in 2016, Harris in 2017) going head-to-head in what is becoming the best matchup of training camp. It doesn’t happen often because technically, Harris is a second-teamer behind Andre Branch. But Harris is a pass-rushing specialist and every now and then in both 11-on-11 and one-on-one drills these two battle. Harris has used his quick first step to get around Tunsil a few times, but Tunsil used technique, strength and speed to gain a slight overall edge.</p>
<p>NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS</p>
<p>–Geneo Grissom, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Kony-Ealy/" type="external">Kony Ealy</a> and Deatrich Wise Jr. at defensive end. These three appear to be the front-runners to replace Rob Ninkovich at the vacated left end spot. Grissom is taking the first-team reps in camp, but hasn’t played any meaningful snaps in his first two seasons and was cut out of camp last year. Ealy was healthy, but not on the field to open camp because he had a “thing” with head coach <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Bill_Belichick/" type="external">Bill Belichick</a>. Wise has been impressive in his first few workouts, but clearly has a long way to go toward a possible starting job or even rotational reps. This battle is wide open.</p>
<p>NEW YORK JETS</p>
<p>–No. 2 receiver. Literally every receiver in camp will get an opportunity to line up opposite No. 1 wideout Quincy Enunwa. Robby Anderson entered camp as the favorite, but had a couple of bad drops in the first practice and had a slight hamstring injury during the third workout. Chris Harper, a two-year veteran with 14 career catches, may have vaulted into the lead with a handful of impressive catches, including a 35-yarder on Tuesday that elicited applause from his teammates.</p>
<p>BALTIMORE RAVENS</p>
<p>–Defensive end. The Ravens were hurt when Lawrence Guy signed with the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/New_England_Patriots/" type="external">New England Patriots</a> in the offseason. However, this provided an opportunity for Brent Urban, Bronson Kaufusi and rookie Chris Wormley to battle for that starting role. Urban, a third-year player, is imposing at 6-foot-7, 300 pounds, but he must show he can stay healthy. Kaufusi, a second-year player, is also looking to bounce back after missing all of last season with a broken ankle. Wormley was a third-round pick from Michigan and is a solid fit in the Ravens’ 3-4 scheme.</p>
<p>CINCINNATI BENGALS</p>
<p>–Not a position battle, but tempers flared Tuesday when linebacker Vontaze Burfict hit running back Giovani Bernard at his knees during a non-contact drill. Bernard is coming back from a torn ACL suffered late last season. Burfict, who has a history of disciplinary issues, appeared to shove running backs coach Kyle Caskey during the ensuing scuffle. “We are wasting time pushing and shoving,” head coach <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Marvin_Lewis/" type="external">Marvin Lewis</a> told reporters following Tuesday’s practice.</p>
<p>CLEVELAND BROWNS</p>
<p>–Shon Coleman and <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Cameron-Erving/" type="external">Cameron Erving</a> at right tackle. Both are getting plenty of practice time. Coleman is working at left tackle on days when <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Joe_Thomas/" type="external">Joe Thomas</a> is rested. Coach <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Hue-Jackson/" type="external">Hue Jackson</a> said Coleman’s work at left tackle isn’t hampering his growth at right tackle. The Browns need a right tackle to replace Austin Pasztor, who started 15 games last year.</p>
<p>PITTSBURGH STEELERS</p>
<p>–Backup inside linebacker. Tyler Matakevich vs. L.J. Fort and <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Steven_Johnson/" type="external">Steven Johnson</a>. It’s not a battle for a starting job, but it figures to be an important role this season. Vince Williams, who was the top reserve the past four seasons, steps into the starting role with <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Lawrence-Timmons/" type="external">Lawrence Timmons</a>‘ departure. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Ryan-Shazier/" type="external">Ryan Shazier</a> has not been able to stay healthy in any of his first three seasons and Williams was called upon to start a number of games in his absence. When Williams missed practice Sunday and Monday due a heat-related illness, it was Matakevich who played with the first-team defense.</p>
<p>HOUSTON TEXANS</p>
<p>–Marcus Gilchrist’s arrival should inject competition into the safety position, which is in flux after <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Quintin-Demps/" type="external">Quintin Demps</a> signed with the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Chicago_Bears/" type="external">Chicago Bears</a> this offseason. Gilchrist has starting experience and is healthy now. He could push Andre Hal or Corey Moore for a starting job if he learns the defense quickly enough.</p>
<p>INDIANAPOLIS COLTS</p>
<p>–Wide receiver. Yes, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/TY-Hilton/" type="external">T.Y. Hilton</a> and Donte’ Moncrief are the Colts’ top two receivers. But the big question continues to be who will end up as the team’s No. 3 and No. 4 receivers. It appears to be a three-player race with <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Phillip-Dorsett/" type="external">Phillip Dorsett</a>, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Kamar-Aiken/" type="external">Kamar Aiken</a> and Chester Rogers fighting it out for the job. Dorsett, Indianapolis’ 2015 first-round draft pick, had issues with injuries his first two seasons in the league. Aiken was a veteran free-agent signee who spent his previous three seasons in Baltimore. Rogers, a former undrafted free agent from Grambling who impressed during training camp last year, had extensive work with the first-team offense over the final month of the 2016 season.</p>
<p>JACKSONVILLE JAGUARS</p>
<p>— <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Leonard-Fournette/" type="external">Leonard Fournette</a> vs. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Chris-Ivory/" type="external">Chris Ivory</a> at running back. The veteran Ivory is still running with the first unit, but it’s likely only a matter of time until Fournette replaces him. Ivory battled with <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/TJ-Yeldon/" type="external">T.J. Yeldon</a> a year ago for the starting job, with Yeldon holding the upper hand with 13 starts to Ivory’s one start. But as far as production, Yeldon held only a 465-439 margin in rushing yards while Ivory led in average yards per attempt, 3.8 to 3.6. Fournette, the No. 4 overall pick, looked strong in training camp thus far, breaking off several lengthy runs with his size and speed. Yeldon is still in the picture, but will likely be used mostly as a third-down back.</p>
<p>TENNESSEE TITANS</p>
<p>–LeShaun Sims vs. Adoree’ Jackson at cornerback. With the revamping of the secondary, it was assumed that first-round pick Jackson would team with free agent <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Logan-Ryan/" type="external">Logan Ryan</a> as the Titans’ starting cornerbacks. But Sims, who started the final few games last season as a rookie, isn’t going down without a fight. He has remained with the first unit through four days of camp work, and is keeping Jackson on the second team.</p>
<p>DENVER BRONCOS</p>
<p>–No. 3 wide receiver. Bennie Fowler has the upper hand because of his size, experience and toughness. He went on a vegan diet over the offseason, which he said has him in the best shape of his career. Rookie Carlos Henderson struggled early but made some good catches Sunday and Monday. Second-year veteran <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jordan_Taylor/" type="external">Jordan Taylor</a> is also in the mix, but he doesn’t fit the body template of a typical No. 3 receiver. Cody Latimer, the Broncos’ 2014 second-round pick, also is battling for playing time, but he continues to struggle with consistency.</p>
<p>KANSAS CITY CHIEFS</p>
<p>–The Chiefs’ wide receiver group is among one of the tighter competitions in camp. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Tyreek-Hill/" type="external">Tyreek Hill</a>, Chris Conley and 2017 fourth-round pick Jehu Chesson appear locks for what probably will be six active roster spots. Albert Wilson, De’Anthony Thomas, Demarcus Robinson and Seantavius Jones appear to be the front-runners for the final three spots. Wilson brings the most experience and is the oldest receiver on the roster at age 25. Thomas gets an edge due to his special teams value, especially in the return game. Robinson excelled during OTAs, but Jones has turned the most heads so far in camp. Marcus Kemp is a sleeper among the undrafted rookie free agents. The Chiefs also signed veterans Corey Washington and Robert Wheelwright this week.</p>
<p>LOS ANGELES CHARGERS</p>
<p>— <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Kellen_Clemens/" type="external">Kellen Clemens</a> vs. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Cardale-Jones/" type="external">Cardale Jones</a> at backup quarterback. Clemens is everything a team wants in a backup in that he has winning experience as a starter and he is a solid teammate and a contributor in the quarterbacks’ room. But he’s also 34 years old, just one year younger than starter <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Philip_Rivers/" type="external">Philip Rivers</a>. Jones was acquired just before camp and the former Ohio State star caught head coach <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Anthony-Lynn/" type="external">Anthony Lynn</a>‘s eye last season when they both were at Buffalo, but is a project.</p>
<p>OAKLAND RAIDERS</p>
<p>–Eddie Vanderdoes vs. Treyvon Hester at defensive tackle. Hester, a seventh-round pick, got a head start in that he was present throughout the offeseason program while Vanderdoes, taken in the third round, could not participate because his class at UCLA had not graduated.</p>
<p>Hester opened with the first team — in part because Jihad Ward and Mario Edwards Jr. were both injured — but after four days of practice, Vanderdoes appeared to have the upper hand. The Raiders are desperately seeking an interior pass rush.</p>
<p>— <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Frank-Cooney/" type="external">Frank Cooney</a>, founder and publisher of The Sports Xchange and NFLDraftScout.com, is in his sixth decade covering football and is a member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame Selection Committee.</p> | false | 1 | focus star quarterbacks headlines demanded surprise injuries attention actually nfl training camp key battles players coaches media attendance see every day survey tsx insiders covering every team reveals battles discussed camp around league many battles socalled lesser positions like fifth wide receiver thats case dallas cowboys brice butler andy jones noah brown backup slot cornerback popular situation many camps including new york giants battles battles cincinnati alwaysfeisty linebacker vontaze burfict history disciplinary problems hit running back giovani bernard knees put edge things bernard coming torn acl oh yeah noncontact drill davie florida battle two men two positions left tackle laremy tunsil defensive end charles harris square practice heated battle keep respective positions harris speed tunsil technique fun battle watch battles watched closely every nfl camp reported tsx insiders covering team dallas cowboys fifth receiver spot among brice butler andy jones noah brown tough possibly forcing cowboys keep six receivers butler amazing camp dropping ball jones brown younger kept butler catchforcatch also play slot new york giants backup slot cornerback giants found last year life like without dominique rodgerscromartie slot cornerback forced wildcard game green bay thigh injury leaving giants quality depth packers quarterback aaron rodgers went right replacements including former cornerback trevin wade results werent pretty giants didnt draft fill position instead look younger guys mykkele thompson donte deayon compete job giants injury cornerbacks janoris jenkins eli apple rodgerscromartie likely first step would leave slot cornerback position open whichever player backup philadelphia eagles shelton gibson vs marcus johnson sixth final wide receiver spot johnson 2016 undrafted free agent spent time eagles practice squad last year excellent camp appeared move ahead fifthround rookie shelton gibson continues drop many passes washington redskins junior galette vs preston smith outside linebacker intriguing battle watch right side redskins try generate better pass rush big year smith dropped nine sacks rookie including playoff loss green bay 45 last year called coaches teammates spotty production galette track record 22 total sacks 2013 2014 new orleans missed two consecutive years torn achilles tendons galette still shows good burst gave left tackle trent williams fits early part camp two advantage outside linebacker trent murphy suspended first four games violating nfls drug policy chicago bears bryce callahan vs kyle fuller right cornerback marcus cooper still suffering hamstring injury bears looked largely callahan right corner glimpses fuller players solid zone skills callahan appeared willing attack ball coverage fuller physical callahan key contributor past nickel back plagued nagging injuries last year detroit lions cyrus kouandjio vs greg robinson left tackle kouandjio robinson two leading candidates start left tackle lions fall split reps firstteam offense teams first padded practice training camp tuesday lions looking shortterm replacement taylor decker underwent shoulder surgery june expected miss first half season kouandjio robinson joined lions final day june minicamp first upclose look coaches getting players green bay packers kevin king vs ladarius gunter vs quinten rollins cornerback packers added freeagent cornerback davon house free agency appears lock start one corner job entirely grabs gunter finished 2016 season top corner green bays decimated secondary gunter competed well pedestrian 467 speed 40yard dash always issue rollins green bays secondround pick 2015 battled groin injury inconsistency last season opponents ridiculous 1338 passer rating rollins foes also completed 714 percent passes directed rollins allowed seven touchdown passes packers drafted 6foot3 200pound king first pick second round early camp three players played first team minnesota vikings ryan quigley vs taylor symmank punter dont assume quigley fiveyear veteran signed free agency win punting job summer symmank regularseason games resume superior leg strength spent first week camp booming punts couple 57yarders 50second hang times quigley controlled game makes better point comes directional punting special teams coordinator mike priefer isnt blinded straight power preferring punters punt specific spots specific hang times cover guys jobs atlanta falcons cornerback jalen collins started super bowl working thirdteam defense tuesday also special teams knitcapscout team desmond trufant robert alford working firstteam cj goodwin deja olatoye working second team collins took alford right cornerback stretch last season trufant went pectoral injury alford moved left cornerback carolina panthers vernon butler vs star lotulelei defensive tackle secondyear pro butler taking lot repetitions looks good 2016 firstround draft pick keeps pace could ready displace lotulelei primary cog middle defensive line lotulelei offseason shoulder surgery durability could become factor well new orleans saints rookie 1 draft choice ryan ramczyk vs khalif barnes left tackle close competition see start terron armstead recovers recent shoulder surgery ramczyk received snaps first unit held distribution firstteam snaps coaches trying learn much rookie accelerate development frontrunner competition tampa bay buccaneers devante bond vs kendell beckwith linebacker bucs new strongside linebacker season bond spent last season injured reserve working firstteam defense beckwith 63 251 pounds larger bucs linebackers plays fast physical also former teammate mlb kwon alexander first four days camp beckwith probably improved much player team arizona cardinals running back head coach bruce arians wants twoback system david johnson chris johnson get bulk work behind five running backs competing two three spots entering teams first preseason game hall fame elijhaa penny seems inside track 3 spot based performed training andre ellington beset injuries since joining league 2013 rookie tj logan looks like shooin make team least kick returner could pose problems kerwynn williams rookie james summers los angeles rams kayvon webster vs ej gaines cornerback three years ago gaines stepped rookie earn starting role rams went 2015 eyeing even bigger year foot injury training camp cost entire season returned mixed reviews last season rams brought webster competition two spirited battle starting position opposite trumaine johnson responding gaines coming interception tipped ball jared goff monday webster showing bigtime 7on7 11on11 drills webster history new rams defensive coordinator wade phillips played denver san francisco 49ers cole hikutini george kittle vance mcdonald garrett celek competition starting position roster spots tight end rookies hikutini kittle held advantage veterans early going hikutini put nice show monday given opportunity created kittles hamstring injury duel starting spot roster spots general wide open seattle seahawks competition running back appears fierce one seahawks camp thomas rawls eddie lacy cj prosise top trio group battle fourth fifth depth chart take camp figure alex collins mike davis chris carson received plenty work opening days camp getting chances firstteam unit buffalo bills reggie ragland vs preston brown middle linebacker bills need figure going middle linebacker 43 believed ragland 2016 secondround pick missed entire rookie season would take control really hasnt fourthyear veteran brown clearly entrenched least five practices ragland could end contending weak outside spot right brown led bills defensive snaps played three years row outpacing ragland inside miami dolphins left tackle laremy tunsil vs defensive end charles harris arent two guys battling position miamis last two firstround picks tunsil 2016 harris 2017 going headtohead becoming best matchup training camp doesnt happen often technically harris secondteamer behind andre branch harris passrushing specialist every 11on11 oneonone drills two battle harris used quick first step get around tunsil times tunsil used technique strength speed gain slight overall edge new england patriots geneo grissom kony ealy deatrich wise jr defensive end three appear frontrunners replace rob ninkovich vacated left end spot grissom taking firstteam reps camp hasnt played meaningful snaps first two seasons cut camp last year ealy healthy field open camp thing head coach bill belichick wise impressive first workouts clearly long way go toward possible starting job even rotational reps battle wide open new york jets 2 receiver literally every receiver camp get opportunity line opposite 1 wideout quincy enunwa robby anderson entered camp favorite couple bad drops first practice slight hamstring injury third workout chris harper twoyear veteran 14 career catches may vaulted lead handful impressive catches including 35yarder tuesday elicited applause teammates baltimore ravens defensive end ravens hurt lawrence guy signed new england patriots offseason however provided opportunity brent urban bronson kaufusi rookie chris wormley battle starting role urban thirdyear player imposing 6foot7 300 pounds must show stay healthy kaufusi secondyear player also looking bounce back missing last season broken ankle wormley thirdround pick michigan solid fit ravens 34 scheme cincinnati bengals position battle tempers flared tuesday linebacker vontaze burfict hit running back giovani bernard knees noncontact drill bernard coming back torn acl suffered late last season burfict history disciplinary issues appeared shove running backs coach kyle caskey ensuing scuffle wasting time pushing shoving head coach marvin lewis told reporters following tuesdays practice cleveland browns shon coleman cameron erving right tackle getting plenty practice time coleman working left tackle days joe thomas rested coach hue jackson said colemans work left tackle isnt hampering growth right tackle browns need right tackle replace austin pasztor started 15 games last year pittsburgh steelers backup inside linebacker tyler matakevich vs lj fort steven johnson battle starting job figures important role season vince williams top reserve past four seasons steps starting role lawrence timmons departure ryan shazier able stay healthy first three seasons williams called upon start number games absence williams missed practice sunday monday due heatrelated illness matakevich played firstteam defense houston texans marcus gilchrists arrival inject competition safety position flux quintin demps signed chicago bears offseason gilchrist starting experience healthy could push andre hal corey moore starting job learns defense quickly enough indianapolis colts wide receiver yes ty hilton donte moncrief colts top two receivers big question continues end teams 3 4 receivers appears threeplayer race phillip dorsett kamar aiken chester rogers fighting job dorsett indianapolis 2015 firstround draft pick issues injuries first two seasons league aiken veteran freeagent signee spent previous three seasons baltimore rogers former undrafted free agent grambling impressed training camp last year extensive work firstteam offense final month 2016 season jacksonville jaguars leonard fournette vs chris ivory running back veteran ivory still running first unit likely matter time fournette replaces ivory battled tj yeldon year ago starting job yeldon holding upper hand 13 starts ivorys one start far production yeldon held 465439 margin rushing yards ivory led average yards per attempt 38 36 fournette 4 overall pick looked strong training camp thus far breaking several lengthy runs size speed yeldon still picture likely used mostly thirddown back tennessee titans leshaun sims vs adoree jackson cornerback revamping secondary assumed firstround pick jackson would team free agent logan ryan titans starting cornerbacks sims started final games last season rookie isnt going without fight remained first unit four days camp work keeping jackson second team denver broncos 3 wide receiver bennie fowler upper hand size experience toughness went vegan diet offseason said best shape career rookie carlos henderson struggled early made good catches sunday monday secondyear veteran jordan taylor also mix doesnt fit body template typical 3 receiver cody latimer broncos 2014 secondround pick also battling playing time continues struggle consistency kansas city chiefs chiefs wide receiver group among one tighter competitions camp tyreek hill chris conley 2017 fourthround pick jehu chesson appear locks probably six active roster spots albert wilson deanthony thomas demarcus robinson seantavius jones appear frontrunners final three spots wilson brings experience oldest receiver roster age 25 thomas gets edge due special teams value especially return game robinson excelled otas jones turned heads far camp marcus kemp sleeper among undrafted rookie free agents chiefs also signed veterans corey washington robert wheelwright week los angeles chargers kellen clemens vs cardale jones backup quarterback clemens everything team wants backup winning experience starter solid teammate contributor quarterbacks room hes also 34 years old one year younger starter philip rivers jones acquired camp former ohio state star caught head coach anthony lynns eye last season buffalo project oakland raiders eddie vanderdoes vs treyvon hester defensive tackle hester seventhround pick got head start present throughout offeseason program vanderdoes taken third round could participate class ucla graduated hester opened first team part jihad ward mario edwards jr injured four days practice vanderdoes appeared upper hand raiders desperately seeking interior pass rush frank cooney founder publisher sports xchange nfldraftscoutcom sixth decade covering football member pro football hall fame selection committee | 1,984 |
<p>Although he has, in most respects, been gone from the scene for the better part of a decade, Ariel Sharon’s death this month has nonetheless hit Israel hard. His military career was among the most exemplary in a nation that has seen far more than its share of great warriors. And by the end of his political career (if not at every point throughout it), Sharon was widely respected and admired. The sudden end of his premiership in 2006 left many in Israel with a sense of missed opportunity and unexplored possibility. But perhaps more deeply than that, his death signals the passing from the political scene of Israel’s founding generation. Sharon was the last prime minister who participated personally in the nation’s founding, and there will not be another. Israel has clung to its founders as long as it could.</p>
<p>In the 1990s, Israelis tried out two leaders from the younger generation—Benjamin Netanyahu and Ehud Barak—but reached back for Sharon in an hour of crisis, as the second intifada raged. It is not hard to see why. In the decades after their nation’s founding, Israelis had grown accustomed to larger-than-life leaders, world-historical figures who had played important roles in the realization of what, if not for that amazing generation, could easily have remained an impossible dream.</p>
<p>Although Israel’s president, Shimon Peres, was a member of that generation, the presidency is a ceremonial role, and Israeli politics no longer lives in the shadow of that nation’s founding generation. This has been increasingly clear for a decade and more, of course, but Sharon’s passing makes it an unavoidable fact. It has not been an easy fact for Israelis to get used to, in a variety of ways—some more obvious than others.</p>
<p>Being governed by plain old politicians, rather than men and women of historical stature who fought impossible odds to bring a new nation into being, has been a painful letdown for a society rightly accustomed to living in awe of its own existence. But more than that, Israelis have had a hard time letting go of the founding intensity that has characterized their politics; they have had a hard time getting used to the fact that their country is no longer in the process of being born, but is, for all the never-ending threats to its security, an established presence on the world stage.</p>
<p>The result is a nation peculiarly unwilling to acknowledge its achievements or to contend with the deep problems that remain unaddressed at the core of its civic and national life. Israel’s national anthem is a melancholy song of hope that there might someday be an Israel. Its political and (especially) legal system exists in a constant state of emergency, insistently unwilling to recognize in itself sources of precedents and traditions that might stabilize things. Many of the most promising members of the up-and-coming generation of Israeli professionals and intellectuals—people born into a nation in its third or fourth decade, whose connection to the founding was their grandparents—still live with a yearning for the profound source of meaning that a Zionism that had yet to achieve its principal goal offered prior generations. They have trouble finding such meaning in the mundane tasks of self-government and perpetuation.</p>
<p>This is a problem that Americans once experienced too. Ours also is, to a degree unequaled in the modern era almost anywhere except in Israel, a founded nation. And the first three generations of Americans lived in every sense under the shadow of the founding generation.</p>
<p>Every president in the 48-year stretch from George Washington through Andrew Jackson claimed some connection to the revolution (with Jackson making endless hay of having been captured by British troops as a young boy and cut in the face for refusing to be of use to them), just as every one of Israel’s prime ministers in its first 48 years (until Netanyahu’s election in 1996) had been involved in its founding. And when those with direct memory of or involvement in the revolution passed from the scene, the United States was left not only with decidedly lesser leaders in charge but with a palpable unease about what should come next.</p>
<p>The greatest expression of that anxiety came from the greatest member of America’s third generation. On January 27, 1838, the Young Men’s Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois, invited an up-and-coming lawyer in town to address the students about an important public question. The 28-year-old attorney, Abraham Lincoln, chose as his subject a question to which he thought his countrymen needed to turn their attention: “The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions.” And he could see clearly why turning to that subject was difficult for America, because the nation in his day (at 63 years of age, almost exactly Israel’s age today) was confronting the challenge of moving from a mode of ambitious founding to a mode of grateful preservation that might allow its people to build on the best of what they had inherited while addressing the terrible problems left unresolved by the founding. Americans of his generation, Lincoln said, lived in a thriving nation blessed with great advantages that, as far as they were concerned, had always been there:</p>
<p>We, when mounting the stage of existence, found ourselves the legal inheritors of these fundamental blessings. We toiled not in the acquirement or establishment of them—they are a legacy bequeathed us, by a once hardy, brave, and patriotic, but now lamented and departed race of ancestors. Theirs was the task (and nobly they performed it) to possess themselves, and through themselves, us, of this goodly land; and to uprear upon its hills and its valleys, a political edifice of liberty and equal rights; ’tis ours only, to transmit these, the former, unprofaned by the foot of an invader; the latter, undecayed by the lapse of time and untorn by usurpation, to the latest generation that fate shall permit the world to know. This task of gratitude to our fathers, justice to ourselves, duty to posterity, and love for our species in general, all imperatively require us faithfully to perform.</p>
<p>That task is, in a word, the task of conservatism—the task of building on the given, not creating something wholly new. It was the task to which Lincoln thought his nation needed to turn if it was to overcome the enormous political and moral challenges it faced without destroying itself. And the move from a mode of founding to a mode of conservation and improvement would be no easy feat for a nation whose founding was so dramatic and which, until so recently, had lived with the direct memory of that founding. But that directness could no longer be appealed to, Lincoln worried:</p>
<p>I do not mean to say, that the scenes of the revolution are now or ever will be entirely forgotten; but that like every thing else, they must fade upon the memory of the world, and grow more and more dim by the lapse of time. In history, we hope, they will be read of, and recounted, so long as the bible shall be read—but even granting that they will, their influence cannot be what it heretofore has been. Even then, they cannot be so universally known, nor so vividly felt, as they were by the generation just gone to rest.</p>
<p>At the close of that struggle, nearly every adult male had been a participator in some of its scenes. The consequence was, that of those scenes, in the form of a husband, a father, a son or brother, a living history was to be found in every family—a history bearing the indubitable testimonies of its own authenticity, in the limbs mangled, in the scars of wounds received, in the midst of the very scenes related—a history, too, that could be read and understood alike by all, the wise and the ignorant, the learned and the unlearned. But those histories are gone. They can be read no more forever. They were a fortress of strength; but, what invading foeman could never do, the silent artillery of time has done; the leveling of its walls. They are gone. They were a forest of giant oaks; but the all-resistless hurricane has swept over them, and left only, here and there, a lonely trunk, despoiled of its verdure, shorn of its foliage; unshading and unshaded, to murmur in a few gentle breezes, and to combat with its mutilated limbs, a few more ruder storms, then to sink, and be no more.</p>
<p>They were the pillars of the temple of liberty; and now, that they have crumbled away, that temple must fall, unless we, their descendants, supply their places with other pillars, hewn from the solid quarry of sober reason.</p>
<p>In that wise but still youthful reflection on the problem of how a nation might address its flaws by revering and building on its greatest strengths—the problem that would occupy him for the rest of his life—Lincoln laid an awful lot of weight on pure rational persuasion. “Passion has helped us; but can do so no more,” he told the students as he neared the close of his remarks. “It will in future be our enemy. Reason, cold, calculating, unimpassioned reason, must furnish all the materials for our future support and defense.”</p>
<p>Twenty-three years later, as Lincoln stood on the steps of the Capitol having just taken on the presidency in an hour of terrible crisis, he was still wary of pure passion in the life of a nation, but he was less certain that pure reason was enough. “Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection,” he said at the conclusion of his first Inaugural Address. “The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.”</p>
<p>He had discovered the secret link between the spirit of pride and reverence for an extraordinary founding and the spirit of preservation and improvement of a cherished inheritance. He had discovered memory.</p>
<p>Israel’s strengths and weaknesses, its challenges and its problems, are very different from ours. But maybe what it needs, as it moves out of the shadow of its founding, is not so different from what America needed as the last of its founding generation passed away. It needs a way to revere those who brought it into being while still seeing clearly what they left unresolved at home and abroad. It needs to find the strength to deal with its problems in the very memory of its founding, and in the legacy built up since. It needs to see itself as the mature, impressive, complicated, full-blown nation that it is.</p>
<p>And it could probably use a Lincoln, too—but who couldn’t?</p> | false | 1 | although respects gone scene better part decade ariel sharons death month nonetheless hit israel hard military career among exemplary nation seen far share great warriors end political career every point throughout sharon widely respected admired sudden end premiership 2006 left many israel sense missed opportunity unexplored possibility perhaps deeply death signals passing political scene israels founding generation sharon last prime minister participated personally nations founding another israel clung founders long could 1990s israelis tried two leaders younger generationbenjamin netanyahu ehud barakbut reached back sharon hour crisis second intifada raged hard see decades nations founding israelis grown accustomed largerthanlife leaders worldhistorical figures played important roles realization amazing generation could easily remained impossible dream although israels president shimon peres member generation presidency ceremonial role israeli politics longer lives shadow nations founding generation increasingly clear decade course sharons passing makes unavoidable fact easy fact israelis get used variety wayssome obvious others governed plain old politicians rather men women historical stature fought impossible odds bring new nation painful letdown society rightly accustomed living awe existence israelis hard time letting go founding intensity characterized politics hard time getting used fact country longer process born neverending threats security established presence world stage result nation peculiarly unwilling acknowledge achievements contend deep problems remain unaddressed core civic national life israels national anthem melancholy song hope might someday israel political especially legal system exists constant state emergency insistently unwilling recognize sources precedents traditions might stabilize things many promising members upandcoming generation israeli professionals intellectualspeople born nation third fourth decade whose connection founding grandparentsstill live yearning profound source meaning zionism yet achieve principal goal offered prior generations trouble finding meaning mundane tasks selfgovernment perpetuation problem americans experienced also degree unequaled modern era almost anywhere except israel founded nation first three generations americans lived every sense shadow founding generation every president 48year stretch george washington andrew jackson claimed connection revolution jackson making endless hay captured british troops young boy cut face refusing use every one israels prime ministers first 48 years netanyahus election 1996 involved founding direct memory involvement revolution passed scene united states left decidedly lesser leaders charge palpable unease come next greatest expression anxiety came greatest member americas third generation january 27 1838 young mens lyceum springfield illinois invited upandcoming lawyer town address students important public question 28yearold attorney abraham lincoln chose subject question thought countrymen needed turn attention perpetuation political institutions could see clearly turning subject difficult america nation day 63 years age almost exactly israels age today confronting challenge moving mode ambitious founding mode grateful preservation might allow people build best inherited addressing terrible problems left unresolved founding americans generation lincoln said lived thriving nation blessed great advantages far concerned always mounting stage existence found legal inheritors fundamental blessings toiled acquirement establishment themthey legacy bequeathed us hardy brave patriotic lamented departed race ancestors task nobly performed possess us goodly land uprear upon hills valleys political edifice liberty equal rights tis transmit former unprofaned foot invader latter undecayed lapse time untorn usurpation latest generation fate shall permit world know task gratitude fathers justice duty posterity love species general imperatively require us faithfully perform task word task conservatismthe task building given creating something wholly new task lincoln thought nation needed turn overcome enormous political moral challenges faced without destroying move mode founding mode conservation improvement would easy feat nation whose founding dramatic recently lived direct memory founding directness could longer appealed lincoln worried mean say scenes revolution ever entirely forgotten like every thing else must fade upon memory world grow dim lapse time history hope read recounted long bible shall readbut even granting influence heretofore even universally known vividly felt generation gone rest close struggle nearly every adult male participator scenes consequence scenes form husband father son brother living history found every familya history bearing indubitable testimonies authenticity limbs mangled scars wounds received midst scenes relateda history could read understood alike wise ignorant learned unlearned histories gone read forever fortress strength invading foeman could never silent artillery time done leveling walls gone forest giant oaks allresistless hurricane swept left lonely trunk despoiled verdure shorn foliage unshading unshaded murmur gentle breezes combat mutilated limbs ruder storms sink pillars temple liberty crumbled away temple must fall unless descendants supply places pillars hewn solid quarry sober reason wise still youthful reflection problem nation might address flaws revering building greatest strengthsthe problem would occupy rest lifelincoln laid awful lot weight pure rational persuasion passion helped us told students neared close remarks future enemy reason cold calculating unimpassioned reason must furnish materials future support defense twentythree years later lincoln stood steps capitol taken presidency hour terrible crisis still wary pure passion life nation less certain pure reason enough though passion may strained must break bonds affection said conclusion first inaugural address mystic chords memory stretching every battlefield patriot grave every living heart hearthstone broad land yet swell chorus union touched surely better angels nature discovered secret link spirit pride reverence extraordinary founding spirit preservation improvement cherished inheritance discovered memory israels strengths weaknesses challenges problems different maybe needs moves shadow founding different america needed last founding generation passed away needs way revere brought still seeing clearly left unresolved home abroad needs find strength deal problems memory founding legacy built since needs see mature impressive complicated fullblown nation could probably use lincoln toobut couldnt | 878 |
<p>The decision last week by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius to reject the appeals of scores of religious leaders and retain a very narrow “religious” exemption from Obamacare’s so-called contraception mandate has ignited <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203718504577178833194483196.html" type="external">an uproar among Catholic leaders</a>, as well it should—because it’s hard to fathom a government dictate more offensive than this one.</p>
<p>Here’s how we got where we are: Obamacare includes within its massive delegation of power to the federal government the authority to define what constitutes “preventive services” that must be covered by all health-insurance plans sold and purchased in the United States, including plans sponsored by employers. Services defined by HHS as preventive for purposes of this provision are required under the new law to be covered by the insurer or employer with no charge to the insurance plan’s enrollees.</p>
<p>Last August, in the course of writing <a href="http://www.regulations.gov/#!documentDetail;D=HHS-OS-2011-0023-0002" type="external">a rule</a>&#160;that would determine preventive health services for women, HHS decided that free contraception and sterilization services are a must. As a practical matter, that means all health-insurance plans sold in the United States in the very near future will include full coverage of products that terminate pregnancies, since some products classified by the FDA as contraceptives—and thus covered under the HHS definition—also act as abortifacients. While it is true that many insurance plans cover such products today, that’s mainly been the choice of the insurers and employers sponsoring the plans. HHS has now made such coverage obligatory nationwide, thus forcing tens of millions of pro-life Americans to pay for “services” with their health-insurance premiums that they find morally objectionable. (Grandfathered plans are exempt from this and other Obamacare rules, but the number qualifying for grandfathered status is expected to decline precipitously in the next couple of years.)</p>
<p>Bad as all that is, it gets worse. Not only must Catholics who work for non-Catholic employers pay for such products with their premiums, HHS also wants religious employers to cover such products in their health plans. Knowing that Catholic leaders and others would strongly object to this requirement, HHS included in the regulation issued last August a narrow exemption from this requirement for employers that are basically houses of worship. Much larger religiously affiliated institutions, such as Catholic universities, hospitals, and charitable enterprises, do not fit within the HHS exemption.</p>
<p>Not surprisingly, Catholic leaders were more than alarmed by the promulgation of this rule and have spent the time since its publication imploring the Obama White House and HHS to reverse course and loosen the exemption definition so that the full array of Catholic institutions and social-service agencies could get out from under this onerous and pernicious requirement. Among the more prominent groups that have weighed in on this are Catholic Charities USA, the University of Notre Dame, and the <a href="http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/health-care-with-a-conscience" type="external">network of Catholic hospitals</a>&#160;that serve millions of U.S. patients every year.</p>
<p>This is not exactly a who’s-who list of the Catholic Right. If ever there were a group of Catholic institutions to which you would think that the Obama administration would want to be accommodating, this would be it.</p>
<p>And so, what was the administration’s reaction to the pleadings of these friendly leaders? Basically, the back of the hand. Last Friday, Secretary Sebelius <a href="http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/2012pres/01/20120120a.html" type="external">announced</a>&#160;that religious organizations that do not fit within the previously stated exemption criteria will have only one additional year to comply with the regulation’s requirements.</p>
<p>On one level, this was a truly stunning decision. Everything the administration has been doing in recent months has been political, with reelection plainly the primary motivation. But on the surface, this looks to be anything but a smart political move. With one decision, the Obama White House has made it all but impossible to sustain a serious Catholic argument in its favor. The veneer of religious tolerance, so carefully cultivated by Obama in the 2008 campaign, has now been completely stripped away.</p>
<p>On another level, however, there’s nothing at all surprising about what has transpired. Indeed, with Obamacare, it was inevitable—only a matter of time.</p>
<p>The central purpose of Obamacare—and the reason it was and is so strenuously opposed by so many Americans—is to transfer all of the critical decisions about how American health care operates to the federal government. Despite what the president contends, it is a federal takeover. The federal bureaucracy is now in the driver’s seat.</p>
<p>And, with the federal government now calling all of the shots, it is a foregone conclusion that a decidedly secularist and utilitarian point of view will be pervasive in everything that is done. It is simply beyond the capacity of the modern federal government to even consider arguments questioning the wisdom of governmental policies promoting free and abundant contraception. Indeed, it is an article of faith in the modern bureaucratic context that pushing such “prevention” measures onto the American public is one more step on the long march to a more just and humane society.</p>
<p>This is the environment in which we live. The hard truth is that the federal government cannot be trusted today with these kinds of decisions, and there’s no prospect of that changing anytime soon. That’s a big reason why Obamacare should never have been allowed to pass in the first place. Just the sight of Catholic leaders’ being forced to go begging before federal officials ought to be enough to convince most Americans that handing over so much power over such sensitive matters to the federal government was a terrible, terrible mistake.</p>
<p>If the Sebelius decision is allowed to stand, large Catholic institutions all over the country will be forced to stop offering health coverage to their workers, because continuing to do so will be incompatible with their mission. And when they drop that coverage, they will be forced by Obamacare to pay huge fines to the federal government ($2,000 per worker at the outset). For a Catholic institution with 5,000 employees, that’s $10 million that won’t go toward helping the poor, taking care of patients, or educating future leaders.</p>
<p>It is possible that the Obama administration will pull a political stunt later this year and broaden the exemption to curry favor with some gullible voters just before the election. But even if that were to happen, the real lesson of this episode should not be lost on anyone. Obamacare has handed over immense power to a federal government that is essentially hostile to religious sentiments. That’s a very dangerous state of affairs. Job number one must be to reverse course and replace Obamacare with a program more consistent with our Constitution and values.</p>
<p>James C. Capretta is a fellow at the <a href="" type="internal">Ethics and Public Policy Center</a>. He was an associate director at the Office of Management and Budget from 2001 to 2004.</p> | false | 1 | decision last week health human services secretary kathleen sebelius reject appeals scores religious leaders retain narrow religious exemption obamacares socalled contraception mandate ignited uproar among catholic leaders well shouldbecause hard fathom government dictate offensive one heres got obamacare includes within massive delegation power federal government authority define constitutes preventive services must covered healthinsurance plans sold purchased united states including plans sponsored employers services defined hhs preventive purposes provision required new law covered insurer employer charge insurance plans enrollees last august course writing rule160that would determine preventive health services women hhs decided free contraception sterilization services must practical matter means healthinsurance plans sold united states near future include full coverage products terminate pregnancies since products classified fda contraceptivesand thus covered hhs definitionalso act abortifacients true many insurance plans cover products today thats mainly choice insurers employers sponsoring plans hhs made coverage obligatory nationwide thus forcing tens millions prolife americans pay services healthinsurance premiums find morally objectionable grandfathered plans exempt obamacare rules number qualifying grandfathered status expected decline precipitously next couple years bad gets worse must catholics work noncatholic employers pay products premiums hhs also wants religious employers cover products health plans knowing catholic leaders others would strongly object requirement hhs included regulation issued last august narrow exemption requirement employers basically houses worship much larger religiously affiliated institutions catholic universities hospitals charitable enterprises fit within hhs exemption surprisingly catholic leaders alarmed promulgation rule spent time since publication imploring obama white house hhs reverse course loosen exemption definition full array catholic institutions socialservice agencies could get onerous pernicious requirement among prominent groups weighed catholic charities usa university notre dame network catholic hospitals160that serve millions us patients every year exactly whoswho list catholic right ever group catholic institutions would think obama administration would want accommodating would administrations reaction pleadings friendly leaders basically back hand last friday secretary sebelius announced160that religious organizations fit within previously stated exemption criteria one additional year comply regulations requirements one level truly stunning decision everything administration recent months political reelection plainly primary motivation surface looks anything smart political move one decision obama white house made impossible sustain serious catholic argument favor veneer religious tolerance carefully cultivated obama 2008 campaign completely stripped away another level however theres nothing surprising transpired indeed obamacare inevitableonly matter time central purpose obamacareand reason strenuously opposed many americansis transfer critical decisions american health care operates federal government despite president contends federal takeover federal bureaucracy drivers seat federal government calling shots foregone conclusion decidedly secularist utilitarian point view pervasive everything done simply beyond capacity modern federal government even consider arguments questioning wisdom governmental policies promoting free abundant contraception indeed article faith modern bureaucratic context pushing prevention measures onto american public one step long march humane society environment live hard truth federal government trusted today kinds decisions theres prospect changing anytime soon thats big reason obamacare never allowed pass first place sight catholic leaders forced go begging federal officials ought enough convince americans handing much power sensitive matters federal government terrible terrible mistake sebelius decision allowed stand large catholic institutions country forced stop offering health coverage workers continuing incompatible mission drop coverage forced obamacare pay huge fines federal government 2000 per worker outset catholic institution 5000 employees thats 10 million wont go toward helping poor taking care patients educating future leaders possible obama administration pull political stunt later year broaden exemption curry favor gullible voters election even happen real lesson episode lost anyone obamacare handed immense power federal government essentially hostile religious sentiments thats dangerous state affairs job number one must reverse course replace obamacare program consistent constitution values james c capretta fellow ethics public policy center associate director office management budget 2001 2004 | 606 |
<p>President Trump and Republican House and Senate leaders deserve credit for enacting the 2017 tax reform. But the specifics of that law indicate that it won’t have positive economic or political results to match President Ronald Reagan’s 1981 and 1986 tax reform bills or the Kennedy administration tax cuts of 1964-1965.</p>
<p>To understand why, we must grasp the economics and politics of taxation. Both go back at least to Aristotle in the 4th century B.C.</p>
<p>The first economic fact is that everyone’s income originates from two sources of wealth: people and property (or as Nobel laureate Theodore Schultz dubbed them around 1960, “human capital” and “nonhuman capital”). As a result, our gross income (before taxes and social benefits) entirely comprises labor compensation (wages, salaries, fringe benefits) and property compensation (interest, dividends, rents, royalties, capital gains). But we receive this labor and property income in different proportions, and these different proportions tend to determine our party affiliation and voting habits.</p>
<p>When discussing differences among governments, Aristotle concluded that the “real criterion should be property,” because “it is a matter of accident whether those in power be few or many, the one in oligarchies, the other in democracies. It just happens that way because everywhere the rich are few and the poor are many.”</p>
<p>James Madison extended Aristotle’s reasoning when he argued in Federalist No. 10: “From the protection of the different and unequal faculties of acquiring property, possession of different degrees and kinds of property immediately results; and from the influence of these on the sentiments and views of the respective proprietors, ensues a division of the society into different interests and parties.” Hence “the most common and durable source of factions has been the various and unequal distribution of property.”</p>
<p />
<p>As the first chart shows, generally speaking, voters who identify themselves as Democrats disproportionately receive labor compensation, and those who identify themselves as Republicans disproportionately receive property compensation, while independent voters fall in between. This pattern has existed as far back as we have data on income and voting. (The voter data come from the biannual American National Election Studies, and the income data from the U.S. Treasury. By focusing on income taxes, we leave aside federal social insurance, which follows a different economic and political logic, and was mostly ignored by the 2017 tax reform.)</p>
<p>The economics and politics of taxation help explain the yo-yo pattern of top marginal income tax rates and the share paid by the top 1 percent of taxpayers, as reflected in the second chart. All major hikes in top marginal income tax rates have occurred under Democratic presidents (notably Woodrow Wilson, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama), while significant reductions occurred mostly under Republican presidents (Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Reagan, George W. Bush, and Trump). The major Democratic Party exception was John F. Kennedy, whose plan cut top tax rates from 91 percent to 70 percent, and, among Republicans, the exceptions were Presidents Richard Nixon and George H.W. Bush (both were defeated or resigned).</p>
<p />
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>These same facts also contradict the economic orthodoxy on taxation of both liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans.</p>
<p>On one hand, liberal Democrats’ politics of envy — seeking to reduce the share of income received by the top 1 percent — is politically self-defeating, because every major change in top income tax rates coincided with proportional inverse moves in the share of tax paid by the top 1 percent. This implies that there is a Laffer Curve for the top 1 percent, but not the top 50 percent or 25 percent, or perhaps even the top 10 percent of taxpayers.</p>
<p>On the other hand, the facts show that the reductions in top marginal income tax rates have done all the heavy lifting. When these are accounted for, reductions in tax rates on corporate income and capital gains have actually reduced the shares paid by the top 1 percent. This explains why the Reagan tax reforms were enacted only with the support of so-called “Reagan Democrats” in Congress, while not a single Democrat voted for the 2017 tax reform.</p>
<p>The major difference between the Reagan and Trump tax reforms is that while Reagan’s reforms cut the top marginal income tax rate from 70 percent to 28 percent (to 33 percent including deduction phaseouts), they also equalized the top tax rates on all labor and property income. The 2017 tax reform cut the top personal income tax rate only slightly, while keeping the top tax rates on labor income substantially higher than on property income: the so-called “Warren Buffet’s secretary problem.”</p>
<p>Having participated in the successful Reagan tax reforms of 1981 and 1986, I was, relatively speaking, an optimist about the prospects for tax reform in 2017. When pessimists claimed a year ago that tax reform was dead, I argued that a tax reform bill would be enacted by Congress, a judgment that proved correct. But that same experience now suggests that the 2017 tax reform will have much smaller positive economic and political results — roughly in proportion to the much smaller reductions in the top marginal tax rates and failure to equalize the tax treatment of Main Street and Wall Street.</p>
<p>John D. Mueller is the Lehrman Institute Fellow in Economics at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and author of&#160;Redeeming Economics: Rediscovering the Missing Element. From 1979 until 1988 he was staff economist to the House Republican Conference, of which Rep. Jack Kemp of New York was chairman.</p> | false | 1 | president trump republican house senate leaders deserve credit enacting 2017 tax reform specifics law indicate wont positive economic political results match president ronald reagans 1981 1986 tax reform bills kennedy administration tax cuts 19641965 understand must grasp economics politics taxation go back least aristotle 4th century bc first economic fact everyones income originates two sources wealth people property nobel laureate theodore schultz dubbed around 1960 human capital nonhuman capital result gross income taxes social benefits entirely comprises labor compensation wages salaries fringe benefits property compensation interest dividends rents royalties capital gains receive labor property income different proportions different proportions tend determine party affiliation voting habits discussing differences among governments aristotle concluded real criterion property matter accident whether power many one oligarchies democracies happens way everywhere rich poor many james madison extended aristotles reasoning argued federalist 10 protection different unequal faculties acquiring property possession different degrees kinds property immediately results influence sentiments views respective proprietors ensues division society different interests parties hence common durable source factions various unequal distribution property first chart shows generally speaking voters identify democrats disproportionately receive labor compensation identify republicans disproportionately receive property compensation independent voters fall pattern existed far back data income voting voter data come biannual american national election studies income data us treasury focusing income taxes leave aside federal social insurance follows different economic political logic mostly ignored 2017 tax reform economics politics taxation help explain yoyo pattern top marginal income tax rates share paid top 1 percent taxpayers reflected second chart major hikes top marginal income tax rates occurred democratic presidents notably woodrow wilson franklin roosevelt bill clinton barack obama significant reductions occurred mostly republican presidents warren g harding calvin coolidge reagan george w bush trump major democratic party exception john f kennedy whose plan cut top tax rates 91 percent 70 percent among republicans exceptions presidents richard nixon george hw bush defeated resigned 160 facts also contradict economic orthodoxy taxation liberal democrats conservative republicans one hand liberal democrats politics envy seeking reduce share income received top 1 percent politically selfdefeating every major change top income tax rates coincided proportional inverse moves share tax paid top 1 percent implies laffer curve top 1 percent top 50 percent 25 percent perhaps even top 10 percent taxpayers hand facts show reductions top marginal income tax rates done heavy lifting accounted reductions tax rates corporate income capital gains actually reduced shares paid top 1 percent explains reagan tax reforms enacted support socalled reagan democrats congress single democrat voted 2017 tax reform major difference reagan trump tax reforms reagans reforms cut top marginal income tax rate 70 percent 28 percent 33 percent including deduction phaseouts also equalized top tax rates labor property income 2017 tax reform cut top personal income tax rate slightly keeping top tax rates labor income substantially higher property income socalled warren buffets secretary problem participated successful reagan tax reforms 1981 1986 relatively speaking optimist prospects tax reform 2017 pessimists claimed year ago tax reform dead argued tax reform bill would enacted congress judgment proved correct experience suggests 2017 tax reform much smaller positive economic political results roughly proportion much smaller reductions top marginal tax rates failure equalize tax treatment main street wall street john mueller lehrman institute fellow economics ethics public policy center author of160redeeming economics rediscovering missing element 1979 1988 staff economist house republican conference rep jack kemp new york chairman | 559 |
<p>A week before the White House announcement that President Obama would meet Pope Francis at the Vatican during a presidential trip to Europe in late March, Secretary of State John Kerry had a lengthy meeting with Vatican secretary of state Pietro Parolin. According to Vatican sources with direct knowledge of what transpired, Parolin drove the entire conversation, emphasizing at some length the Holy See’s concerns over the Health and Human Services contraceptive/abortifacient mandate that has put the bishops of the United States, and many Catholic institutions, on a collision course with the government unparalleled in U.S. Catholic history.</p>
<p>None of that, of course, was discussed by Secretary Kerry in his subsequent remarks to the press, which focused on a future meeting between President Obama and Pope Francis.</p>
<p>Thus it should have come as no surprise that, when the White House announced on January 21 that the visit to Pope Francis would take place on March 27, the administration’s spin machine was whirling at high RPMs: “The president looks forward to discussing with Pope Francis their shared commitment to fighting poverty and growing inequality.” In other words: The administration looks forward to getting a nice photo to insert into the communiqué it has already written on the president’s meeting with the pope, which is a rather obvious attempt to use the Holy See and Pope Francis as allies in the class-warfare campaign the administration manifestly intends to run in the 2014 congressional cycle, the administration’s record over the past six years not being a very attractive campaign platform.</p>
<p>The Holy See and the pope are quite aware of what’s afoot here. Cautions and suspicions nurtured by a long experience of politicians trying to conscript the Vatican and the Supreme Pontiff for their own purposes have been reinforced by the input the pope and his closest associates have received from various sources — including Vatican representatives at international institutions who have been contesting aspects of the administration’s foreign policy for six years. So while it is obvious that President Obama and Pope Francis will discuss problems of world poverty, and just as obvious that the White House will harp on the word “inequality” in its briefings and press releases on the meeting, there will certainly be other things on the mind of Pope Francis, Cardinal Parolin, and other senior Vatican officials when they meet with the president, the secretary of state, and other administration officials.</p>
<p>The pope and his associates are quite aware that the administration is not above trying to drive a wedge between the U.S. bishops and the Vatican on the HHS-mandate question; and however the White House, certain Catholics, and some journalists spin the post-meeting story, it can be reasonably assumed that the pope and his senior officials have no intention of creating any such daylight for the administration to exploit. Pope Francis has spoken with considerable vigor about the importance of national bishops’ conferences in the life of the Church. It seems very unlikely that he would deliberately undercut the work of the bishops’ conference that has done the most to bring Catholic social teaching to bear on public policy, and has done so in a genuinely dialogical, not authoritarian, way — the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.</p>
<p>Notwithstanding his (entirely appropriate) admonitions that the Church must better communicate the “Yes” that makes sense of the “No” the Church must sometimes pronounce, Pope Francis is also a formidable man who “reads” the world and the powers of the world with the caution appropriate to a man who has recommended a close reading of Robert Hugh Benson’s dystopian novel,&#160;Lord of the World, in daily Mass homilies and conversation. Thus for all his genuine warmth and friendliness, Jorge Mario Bergoglio takes a pastor’s critical view of the culture of lifestyle libertinism embodied in the administration’s HHS mandate and its embrace of the most unregulated abortion license imaginable. And the pope who charged the Church throughout the world to be a “field hospital” serving the walking wounded of post-modernity is not unaware that the Obama administration’s policies are gravely impeding the capacity of the Church in the United States — its school, hospitals, and social-services agencies — to be agents of the healing ministries to which Pope Francis has summoned Catholics.</p>
<p>Pope Francis is neither economist nor politician, as he has said. He is, above all, a pastor, who approaches every encounter with a pastor’s eye and heart. He knows that American bishops have tried to reach the president as pastors — pastors with grave concerns about how his administration’s policies impede their work — and that those approaches have failed. He will, surely, try to reach the president as a pastor, not as another player contesting with the principalities and powers on a global political chessboard. But that approach will be informed by his knowledge of how his American brother-bishops have tried to bring what is closest to their pastors’ hearts to the president’s attention, without success.</p>
<p>There is a surprising amount of skepticism about this papal-presidential encounter in much of the Roman press corps. In November 2008, the huge magazine kiosk near Rome’s Largo Argentina tram stop was filled with journals from all over the world, the vast majority of their covers displaying messianic portraits of Barack Obama, looking out into the empyrean as if reflecting on his descent from a higher plane of existence. The bloom is very much off that rose, especially among the Anglophone scribes in the city, whatever their tendency to fall into White House spin traps on occasion. And while the Italian press can be counted on to dramatize anything, one senses very little giddiness in the rest of their colleagues as they await President Obama’s second visit to the Vatican. Messianic hopes, frustrated, tend to lead to dampened expectations.</p>
<p>None of this will be reflected in White House spin on pope-meets-president, any more than Cardinal Parolin’s firm talk with John Kerry about religious freedom in America was reflected in the State Department’s comments on that encounter. That script has already been written, for a play whose story-line was determined by the White House political managers months ago. What remains to be seen is whether Pope Francis, who combines winsomeness and steel in a unique personality, will be able to convey to President Obama that he, the president, is placing unnecessary impediments in the way of the pope’s agenda for the reform of the Church.</p>
<p>It should prove an interesting conversation, although the full details of it are not likely to become clear for some time.</p>
<p>—&#160;George Weigel is Distinguished Senior Fellow of Washington’s Ethics and Public Policy Center, where he holds the William E. Simon Chair in Catholic Studies.</p> | false | 1 | week white house announcement president obama would meet pope francis vatican presidential trip europe late march secretary state john kerry lengthy meeting vatican secretary state pietro parolin according vatican sources direct knowledge transpired parolin drove entire conversation emphasizing length holy sees concerns health human services contraceptiveabortifacient mandate put bishops united states many catholic institutions collision course government unparalleled us catholic history none course discussed secretary kerry subsequent remarks press focused future meeting president obama pope francis thus come surprise white house announced january 21 visit pope francis would take place march 27 administrations spin machine whirling high rpms president looks forward discussing pope francis shared commitment fighting poverty growing inequality words administration looks forward getting nice photo insert communiqué already written presidents meeting pope rather obvious attempt use holy see pope francis allies classwarfare campaign administration manifestly intends run 2014 congressional cycle administrations record past six years attractive campaign platform holy see pope quite aware whats afoot cautions suspicions nurtured long experience politicians trying conscript vatican supreme pontiff purposes reinforced input pope closest associates received various sources including vatican representatives international institutions contesting aspects administrations foreign policy six years obvious president obama pope francis discuss problems world poverty obvious white house harp word inequality briefings press releases meeting certainly things mind pope francis cardinal parolin senior vatican officials meet president secretary state administration officials pope associates quite aware administration trying drive wedge us bishops vatican hhsmandate question however white house certain catholics journalists spin postmeeting story reasonably assumed pope senior officials intention creating daylight administration exploit pope francis spoken considerable vigor importance national bishops conferences life church seems unlikely would deliberately undercut work bishops conference done bring catholic social teaching bear public policy done genuinely dialogical authoritarian way united states conference catholic bishops notwithstanding entirely appropriate admonitions church must better communicate yes makes sense church must sometimes pronounce pope francis also formidable man reads world powers world caution appropriate man recommended close reading robert hugh bensons dystopian novel160lord world daily mass homilies conversation thus genuine warmth friendliness jorge mario bergoglio takes pastors critical view culture lifestyle libertinism embodied administrations hhs mandate embrace unregulated abortion license imaginable pope charged church throughout world field hospital serving walking wounded postmodernity unaware obama administrations policies gravely impeding capacity church united states school hospitals socialservices agencies agents healing ministries pope francis summoned catholics pope francis neither economist politician said pastor approaches every encounter pastors eye heart knows american bishops tried reach president pastors pastors grave concerns administrations policies impede work approaches failed surely try reach president pastor another player contesting principalities powers global political chessboard approach informed knowledge american brotherbishops tried bring closest pastors hearts presidents attention without success surprising amount skepticism papalpresidential encounter much roman press corps november 2008 huge magazine kiosk near romes largo argentina tram stop filled journals world vast majority covers displaying messianic portraits barack obama looking empyrean reflecting descent higher plane existence bloom much rose especially among anglophone scribes city whatever tendency fall white house spin traps occasion italian press counted dramatize anything one senses little giddiness rest colleagues await president obamas second visit vatican messianic hopes frustrated tend lead dampened expectations none reflected white house spin popemeetspresident cardinal parolins firm talk john kerry religious freedom america reflected state departments comments encounter script already written play whose storyline determined white house political managers months ago remains seen whether pope francis combines winsomeness steel unique personality able convey president obama president placing unnecessary impediments way popes agenda reform church prove interesting conversation although full details likely become clear time 160george weigel distinguished senior fellow washingtons ethics public policy center holds william e simon chair catholic studies | 605 |
<p>Israel’s embattled prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, lashed out at the media and his political opponents in an animated speech to hundreds of enthusiastic supporters on Wednesday, seeking to deliver a powerful show of force as he battles a slew of corruption allegations that have threatened to drive him from office.</p>
<p>Netanyahu’s Likud Party organized Wednesday’s rally in response to a swirling police investigation into suspected corruption, bribery and fraud by the longtime Israeli leader.</p>
<p>Party leaders described the gathering as an attempt to counter what they believe is a campaign by a hostile media and overzealous police and prosecutors. But the gathering was also seen as a test of Netanyahu’s popularity and control over his party. For now, Likud appears to be firmly behind its leader, and any internal opposition remains in check.</p>
<p>Addressing the packed convention hall, Netanyahu accused the “leftist” media and political opposition of pushing for an indictment to topple him because they cannot defeat him at the ballot box. Some estimated the crowd numbered at least 2,000.</p>
<p>“The left and the media, and they’re the same thing, you know, they are mustering an obsessive, unprecedented hunt against me and my family to carry out a regime change,” he said.</p>
<p>Netanyahu also blamed the media for ousting two right-wing Israeli governments in the 1990s and held them responsible for the “disaster” of the Oslo Accords signed with the Palestinians in 1993, suicide bombings on public buses in the 1990s, and the second intifada in the early 2000s.</p>
<p>“Their aim is to apply illegitimate and nonstop pressure on law enforcement so they file an indictment at any price, with no connection to the truth, with no connection to justice,” he said.</p>
<p>The speech resorted to a familiar strategy to Netanyahu. During a three-decade political career, he has frequently attacked the media, political opposition, Israel’s Arab minority and the Palestinians in an attempt to rally Likud and portray himself as a victim.</p>
<p>Former prime minister Ehud Barak, one of the targets of Netanyahu’s sniping, rebuffed Netanyahu’s comments saying “there’s no hunt, there’s corruption.”</p>
<p>Yair Lapid, a former finance minister under Netanyahu who heads the Yesh Atid party, tweeted after the prime minister’s speech that it “crossed every line.”</p>
<p>“What we saw this evening wasn’t a rally of support for Netanyahu but a rally in support of corruption,” Lapid said.</p>
<p>Netanyahu made no mention of the police or prosecutors handling the investigation. But he warned the Palestinians against hoping for his political demise. Palestinian leaders “will be disappointed too, because it won’t happen,” he said.</p>
<p>Likud leaders put heavy pressure on party activists to attend the rally. The gathering had a festive, at times raucous atmosphere, with activists hoisting Israeli flags, banners criticizing the media and chanting “Bibi, King of Israel,” using his nickname. One banner read, “enough with the putsch attempt” and a second decried the “fake news” with an English expletive.</p>
<p>Netanyahu, the second-longest serving leader in Israeli history, is engulfed in a series of scandals relating to alleged financial misdeeds and supposed illicit ties to executives in media, international business and Hollywood.</p>
<p>Israeli police investigators say they suspect Netanyahu of being involved in bribery, fraud and breach of trust in a pair of cases.</p>
<p>Netanyahu’s former chief of staff and longtime confidant, Ari Harow, recently signed a settlement connected to a separate case in which he agreed to testify against his former mentor. This has raised speculation that Netanyahu could be indicted soon, and has sparked opposition calls for him to step down.</p>
<p>Netanyahu has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing and called the accusations a witch hunt.</p>
<p>David Bitan, Likud’s parliamentary whip and a close Netanyahu ally, said some 1,500 people were signed up for Wednesday’s event and he hoped even more would attend — including all the party’s top officials and ministers.</p>
<p>No one in the party has come out against Netanyahu yet — reflecting both loyalty and the fear of crossing him.</p>
<p>Internal criticism has emerged only from those outside of politics. Limor Livnat, a former Likud Cabinet minister, has condemned the attacks on the police and prosecution and said that Netanyahu should step aside if indicted.</p>
<p>Israel’s justice minister has said Netanyahu would not have to step down even if he is indicted. That means his short-term future will likely depend on whether he can maintain political and public backing.</p>
<p>Avraham Diskin, a political scientist at Jerusalem’s Hebrew University, said there is no immediate threat and the goal of Wednesday’s rally was to quash any thoughts of trying to challenge him.</p>
<p>“Netanyahu is tightening the bolts and exerting his authority,” he said. “The whole point it to scare any of the ‘pretenders’ against getting ideas in their head. He’s conveying that he is still powerful and everyone should keep their knives holstered.”</p>
<p>Netanyahu has escaped several scandals before, but the scope of the latest accusations appears to pose his stiffest challenge yet.</p>
<p>One investigation involving Netanyahu, dubbed by police as “File 1000,” reportedly concerns claims he improperly accepted lavish gifts from wealthy supporters, including Australian billionaire James Packer and Hollywood producer Arnon Milchan.</p>
<p>The second investigation, “File 2000,” reportedly concerns Netanyahu’s alleged attempts to strike a deal with publisher Arnon Mozes of the Yediot Ahronot newspaper group to promote legislation to weaken Yediot’s main competitor in exchange for more favorable coverage of Netanyahu by Yediot.</p>
<p>A third investigation, “File 3000,” relates to a possible conflict of interests involving the purchase of German submarines, in which Netanyahu’s cousin and personal attorney represented the German firm involved in the deal.</p>
<p>Netanyahu has dismissed the suspicions as “background noise” and vowed to push forward.</p> | false | 1 | israels embattled prime minister benjamin netanyahu lashed media political opponents animated speech hundreds enthusiastic supporters wednesday seeking deliver powerful show force battles slew corruption allegations threatened drive office netanyahus likud party organized wednesdays rally response swirling police investigation suspected corruption bribery fraud longtime israeli leader party leaders described gathering attempt counter believe campaign hostile media overzealous police prosecutors gathering also seen test netanyahus popularity control party likud appears firmly behind leader internal opposition remains check addressing packed convention hall netanyahu accused leftist media political opposition pushing indictment topple defeat ballot box estimated crowd numbered least 2000 left media theyre thing know mustering obsessive unprecedented hunt family carry regime change said netanyahu also blamed media ousting two rightwing israeli governments 1990s held responsible disaster oslo accords signed palestinians 1993 suicide bombings public buses 1990s second intifada early 2000s aim apply illegitimate nonstop pressure law enforcement file indictment price connection truth connection justice said speech resorted familiar strategy netanyahu threedecade political career frequently attacked media political opposition israels arab minority palestinians attempt rally likud portray victim former prime minister ehud barak one targets netanyahus sniping rebuffed netanyahus comments saying theres hunt theres corruption yair lapid former finance minister netanyahu heads yesh atid party tweeted prime ministers speech crossed every line saw evening wasnt rally support netanyahu rally support corruption lapid said netanyahu made mention police prosecutors handling investigation warned palestinians hoping political demise palestinian leaders disappointed wont happen said likud leaders put heavy pressure party activists attend rally gathering festive times raucous atmosphere activists hoisting israeli flags banners criticizing media chanting bibi king israel using nickname one banner read enough putsch attempt second decried fake news english expletive netanyahu secondlongest serving leader israeli history engulfed series scandals relating alleged financial misdeeds supposed illicit ties executives media international business hollywood israeli police investigators say suspect netanyahu involved bribery fraud breach trust pair cases netanyahus former chief staff longtime confidant ari harow recently signed settlement connected separate case agreed testify former mentor raised speculation netanyahu could indicted soon sparked opposition calls step netanyahu repeatedly denied wrongdoing called accusations witch hunt david bitan likuds parliamentary whip close netanyahu ally said 1500 people signed wednesdays event hoped even would attend including partys top officials ministers one party come netanyahu yet reflecting loyalty fear crossing internal criticism emerged outside politics limor livnat former likud cabinet minister condemned attacks police prosecution said netanyahu step aside indicted israels justice minister said netanyahu would step even indicted means shortterm future likely depend whether maintain political public backing avraham diskin political scientist jerusalems hebrew university said immediate threat goal wednesdays rally quash thoughts trying challenge netanyahu tightening bolts exerting authority said whole point scare pretenders getting ideas head hes conveying still powerful everyone keep knives holstered netanyahu escaped several scandals scope latest accusations appears pose stiffest challenge yet one investigation involving netanyahu dubbed police file 1000 reportedly concerns claims improperly accepted lavish gifts wealthy supporters including australian billionaire james packer hollywood producer arnon milchan second investigation file 2000 reportedly concerns netanyahus alleged attempts strike deal publisher arnon mozes yediot ahronot newspaper group promote legislation weaken yediots main competitor exchange favorable coverage netanyahu yediot third investigation file 3000 relates possible conflict interests involving purchase german submarines netanyahus cousin personal attorney represented german firm involved deal netanyahu dismissed suspicions background noise vowed push forward | 551 |
<p>GLENDALE, Ariz. — When the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Dallas-Cowboys/" type="external">Dallas Cowboys</a> and the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Arizona-Cardinals/" type="external">Arizona Cardinals</a> get together, it is unwise to leave the stadium early or change the channel.</p>
<p>Three of the past four times they met, the game wasn’t decided until the last play, twice going to overtime.</p>
<p>The Cardinals won all four of those games, but the Cowboys stopped the streak with a 28-17 victory on Monday night at University of Phoenix Stadium.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Dak-Prescott/" type="external">Dak Prescott</a> threw two touchdown passes, Ezekiel Elliot ran for a score, and the Cowboys, who gained just 57 total yards in the first half, rebounded from a humbling 42-17 loss in Denver the previous week.</p>
<p>“Dak was an animal today,” Elliott said. “He came out there and made some big plays. Sometimes he has to use his feet to get out of the pocket and make those downfield throws, but he played amazing.”</p>
<p>The Cardinals fell to 1-2, but as disappointed as <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Bruce-Arians/" type="external">Bruce Arians</a> was with the Monday night result, the Arizona coach found a positive.</p>
<p>“When you look at the big picture,” he said, “we’re one game out of first place in our division and we have a big division game next week (at home against the 49ers). This one is over with, and we’ll learn from it.”</p>
<p>The Cowboys were leading 21-14 after Prescott found Brice Butler in the end zone for a 37-yard touchdown pass with just under 12 minutes left. Prescott was under pressure, rolled out to his right and hung the pass up in the air. Butler outleaped cornerback <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Justin-Bethel/" type="external">Justin Bethel</a> for the ball and hauled it in for the score.</p>
<p>“It was just good to have that happen tonight,” Butler said of his touchdown grab, “(Dak) saw me and he threw it up there, and I had to go and get that thing. Old-school scramble. When you see the quarterback go to the right, you go to the high pylon.”</p>
<p>“We have to finish better,” Bethel said. “It was a game that came down to the fourth quarter and we had a chance to win, but we couldn’t pull it out at the end like we needed to.”</p>
<p>The Cardinals looked as if they were on their way to tying the game, but a 16-play drive resulted in a 37-yard field goal from <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Phil_Dawson/" type="external">Phil Dawson</a>.</p>
<p>Prescott and the Cowboys made the Cardinals pay for that as the Dallas quarterback rolled out to his right once again and found Butler again for a 53-yard completion.</p>
<p>Elliott capped things with an 8-yard touchdown run with 4:57 remaining. A week after finishing with just 8 yards on nine carries against the Broncos, he ran for 80 yards on 22 carries against the Cardinals.</p>
<p>Six minutes into the third quarter, Prescott hooked up with wide receiver <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Dez_Bryant/" type="external">Dez Bryant</a> to give the Cowboys their first lead of the game at 14-7. Elliott broke a 20-yard run on the previous play to give the Cowboys the ball at the Arizona 15-yard line before Prescott found Bryant over the middle.</p>
<p>Initially, it appeared the Cardinals had him stopped well short of the end zone, but Bryant kept moving the pile, and after a second, third and fourth effort, got the ball to cross the plane for the touchdown.</p>
<p>“We just have to make sure we rally to the ball carrier a little bit better in that situation,” said Cardinals cornerback <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Patrick-Peterson/" type="external">Patrick Peterson</a>, who was playing zone coverage and wasn’t shadowing Bryant one-on-one on that particular play.</p>
<p>The Cardinals needed their star wide receiver to match the effort, and <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Larry_Fitzgerald/" type="external">Larry Fitzgerald</a>, 34, obliged. He hauled in a 37-yard bomb from <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Carson_Palmer/" type="external">Carson Palmer</a> down the left sideline and two plays later caught a 15-yard touchdown to tie the score at 14.</p>
<p>The catch, Fitzgerald’s 10th of the game at that point, gave him 98 receiving yards, moving him ahead of <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Marvin_Harrison/" type="external">Marvin Harrison</a> (14,580) for eighth place on the league’s all-time receiving yards list. He finished the night with 13 catches for 149 yards and one touchdown.</p>
<p>“That’s Fitz. That’s Monday night,” Arians said. “He’s a Monday player.”</p>
<p>Palmer was 29 of 47 for 325 yards and two touchdowns with no interceptions. Prescott, meanwhile, completed 13 of 18 passes for 183 yards with no interceptions.</p>
<p>The score was tied 7-7 at halftime, although the Cardinals were lamenting the fact they weren’t ahead by at least a touchdown.</p>
<p>They scored on their first possession, completing an eight-play, 82-yard drive when Palmer hit wide receiver Jaron Brown for a 25-yard strike over the middle in the end zone. Palmer was 5 of 5 for 79 yards in the series with 20-yard completions to tight end <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jermaine_Gresham/" type="external">Jermaine Gresham</a> and running back Andre Ellington.</p>
<p>After forcing the Cowboys to punt, the Cardinals mounted another long, time-consuming drive. Palmer completed each of his first six passes, including a 17-yarder to Ellington, before throwing the ball away to snap his streak of 11 straight completions.</p>
<p>He thought he had a 10-yard touchdown throw to Brown, but the play was negated by a holding penalty on right tackle Jared Veldheer. The Cardinals had to settle for a field-goal try, but kicker Phil Dawson’s 36-yard attempt was wide right. After a drive that nearly lasted nine full minutes, Arizona came away with nothing.</p>
<p>It was Dawson’s third missed field goal in three games and the turn of events stung the Cardinals.</p>
<p>“You get all excited because you think you have a touchdown,” Palmer said. “Again, we put ourselves in a long situation, a third-and-long, and it’s just very difficult against a smart defense. When you do that, like we did a number of times, it’s difficult to convert those.”</p>
<p>The Cowboys, who had accounted for only 4 yards of offense in their first two possessions, scored the fourth time they had the ball when Prescott called a keeper on first-and-goal at the 10-yard line and leaped toward the end zone, flipping end over end as he was met by the goal line by Arizona defenders Antoine Bethea and Bethel.</p>
<p>The Cardinals outgained the Cowboys 152 yards to 52 in the first half.</p>
<p>The Cowboys were playing without two starters on defense — cornerback <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Nolan-Carroll/" type="external">Nolan Carroll</a> (concussion) and inside linebacker Anthony Hitchens (knee). The Cardinals were once again without left tackle D.J. Humphries (knee), left guard Mike Iupati (triceps), inside linebacker Deone Bucannon (ankle) and wide receiver <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/John_Brown/" type="external">John Brown</a> (quadriceps).</p>
<p>Before the game, players, owners and executives from both teams locked arms in a show of solidarity during the national anthem. The Cowboys players and management, including owner <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jerry_Jones/" type="external">Jerry Jones</a>, knelt briefly before the large U.S. flag that covers the playing surface was unfurled.</p>
<p>That drew some boos from the crowd, but the Cowboys contingent quickly rose to its feet before the anthem began. Anthem singer <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jordin_Sparks/" type="external">Jordin Sparks</a> had a reference to a Bible verse written on her hand: “Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute.” Proverbs 31:8-9.</p>
<p>“I think this team, this organization, players, coaches, staff, everyone did the right thing,” Prescott said of the Cowboys’ pregame decision. “We came together. We had a lot of dialogue. Talked about what we wanted to do, just as a sign of the unity we want to bring in this country and just help everything that’s going on right now. I think we did a great job.”</p>
<p>NOTES: Dallas made its 79th appearance on “Monday Night Football,” second most in NFL history behind the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Miami-Dolphins/" type="external">Miami Dolphins</a> (82). … With a 4-yard reception in the first quarter, Cardinals WR Larry Fitzgerald extended his consecutive games with a catch to 198 games, the third-longest such streak in league history behind <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jerry_Rice/" type="external">Jerry Rice</a> (274) and <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Tony_Gonzalez/" type="external">Tony Gonzalez</a> (211). … Cowboys WR Dez Bryant appeared in his 100th NFL game. … Earlier Monday, the Cardinals elevated TE Ricky Seals-Jones from the practice squad to the 53-man active roster and released LB Phil Wheeler. It was the third time that Wheeler, a 10-year veteran, was released since originally signing with Arizona on July 27.</p> | false | 1 | glendale ariz dallas cowboys arizona cardinals get together unwise leave stadium early change channel three past four times met game wasnt decided last play twice going overtime cardinals four games cowboys stopped streak 2817 victory monday night university phoenix stadium dak prescott threw two touchdown passes ezekiel elliot ran score cowboys gained 57 total yards first half rebounded humbling 4217 loss denver previous week dak animal today elliott said came made big plays sometimes use feet get pocket make downfield throws played amazing cardinals fell 12 disappointed bruce arians monday night result arizona coach found positive look big picture said one game first place division big division game next week home 49ers one well learn cowboys leading 2114 prescott found brice butler end zone 37yard touchdown pass 12 minutes left prescott pressure rolled right hung pass air butler outleaped cornerback justin bethel ball hauled score good happen tonight butler said touchdown grab dak saw threw go get thing oldschool scramble see quarterback go right go high pylon finish better bethel said game came fourth quarter chance win couldnt pull end like needed cardinals looked way tying game 16play drive resulted 37yard field goal phil dawson prescott cowboys made cardinals pay dallas quarterback rolled right found butler 53yard completion elliott capped things 8yard touchdown run 457 remaining week finishing 8 yards nine carries broncos ran 80 yards 22 carries cardinals six minutes third quarter prescott hooked wide receiver dez bryant give cowboys first lead game 147 elliott broke 20yard run previous play give cowboys ball arizona 15yard line prescott found bryant middle initially appeared cardinals stopped well short end zone bryant kept moving pile second third fourth effort got ball cross plane touchdown make sure rally ball carrier little bit better situation said cardinals cornerback patrick peterson playing zone coverage wasnt shadowing bryant oneonone particular play cardinals needed star wide receiver match effort larry fitzgerald 34 obliged hauled 37yard bomb carson palmer left sideline two plays later caught 15yard touchdown tie score 14 catch fitzgeralds 10th game point gave 98 receiving yards moving ahead marvin harrison 14580 eighth place leagues alltime receiving yards list finished night 13 catches 149 yards one touchdown thats fitz thats monday night arians said hes monday player palmer 29 47 325 yards two touchdowns interceptions prescott meanwhile completed 13 18 passes 183 yards interceptions score tied 77 halftime although cardinals lamenting fact werent ahead least touchdown scored first possession completing eightplay 82yard drive palmer hit wide receiver jaron brown 25yard strike middle end zone palmer 5 5 79 yards series 20yard completions tight end jermaine gresham running back andre ellington forcing cowboys punt cardinals mounted another long timeconsuming drive palmer completed first six passes including 17yarder ellington throwing ball away snap streak 11 straight completions thought 10yard touchdown throw brown play negated holding penalty right tackle jared veldheer cardinals settle fieldgoal try kicker phil dawsons 36yard attempt wide right drive nearly lasted nine full minutes arizona came away nothing dawsons third missed field goal three games turn events stung cardinals get excited think touchdown palmer said put long situation thirdandlong difficult smart defense like number times difficult convert cowboys accounted 4 yards offense first two possessions scored fourth time ball prescott called keeper firstandgoal 10yard line leaped toward end zone flipping end end met goal line arizona defenders antoine bethea bethel cardinals outgained cowboys 152 yards 52 first half cowboys playing without two starters defense cornerback nolan carroll concussion inside linebacker anthony hitchens knee cardinals without left tackle dj humphries knee left guard mike iupati triceps inside linebacker deone bucannon ankle wide receiver john brown quadriceps game players owners executives teams locked arms show solidarity national anthem cowboys players management including owner jerry jones knelt briefly large us flag covers playing surface unfurled drew boos crowd cowboys contingent quickly rose feet anthem began anthem singer jordin sparks reference bible verse written hand speak speak rights destitute proverbs 3189 think team organization players coaches staff everyone right thing prescott said cowboys pregame decision came together lot dialogue talked wanted sign unity want bring country help everything thats going right think great job notes dallas made 79th appearance monday night football second nfl history behind miami dolphins 82 4yard reception first quarter cardinals wr larry fitzgerald extended consecutive games catch 198 games thirdlongest streak league history behind jerry rice 274 tony gonzalez 211 cowboys wr dez bryant appeared 100th nfl game earlier monday cardinals elevated te ricky sealsjones practice squad 53man active roster released lb phil wheeler third time wheeler 10year veteran released since originally signing arizona july 27 | 761 |
<p>SPOILER ALERT: Do not keep reading if you have not seen Season 8, Episode 4 of “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/the-walking-dead/" type="external">The Walking Dead</a>,” titled “Some Guy”</p>
<p>This week’s episode of “ <a href="http://variety.com/2017/tv/news/walking-dead-season-8-episode-3-1202609448/" type="external">The Walking Dead</a>” is all about King Ezekiel (Khary Payton). While it has been fun for the past season or so to root for the character, this episode delves back into the depressing agony of Season 7 as it explores what makes the king the king.</p>
<p>This week begins with a flashback to the Kingdom just before its citizens set out to join the battle against the Saviors. Ezekiel prepares himself in front of a mirror before stepping outside. He delivers a rousing speech to his people, at the end of which they gather around him in celebration. The scene then abruptly cuts to the aftermath of the end of last week’s episode, in which the Kingdom’s soldiers were gunned down just outside a Savior outpost. Ezekiel crawls out from beneath a pile of bodies, uttering a painful wail as he realizes how many of his people are dead.</p>
<p>His chance to grieve is short-lived, as the bodies begin reanimating as walkers. Ezekiel, with a wounded leg, tries to get away but cannot walk due to his injury. A surviving Kingdom-ite appears and helps him to his feet.</p>
<p>Inside the outpost, a group of Saviors break down the heavy machine gun they used to wipe out Ezekiel’s troops. Unbeknownst to them, Carol (Melissa McBride) is inside the outpost. As they move the guns, she shoots them while she is hidden in the drop ceiling. But before she can do anything with the guns, more Saviors arrive and chase her. They decide to let her go in order to move the guns faster and get them to the Sanctuary.</p>
<p>Outside, Ezekiel and his soldier continue to move but encounter more walkers. Before they can figure out what to do, the soldier is shot in the back by a Savior who looks like the lovechild of Jeffrey Dahmer and Chucky. He forces Ezekiel to continue on at gun point, telling him that he plans to take Ezekiel to the Sanctuary and deliver him to Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan). He berates Ezekiel along the way, telling him he is a con man for convincing people that he really is a king.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, Carol has covertly followed the Saviors outside to a waiting truck, where they are loading up the guns to deliver them to the Sanctuary. Carol makes her move but gets pinned down behind a pickup truck as the Saviors open fire.&#160;Built Ford Tough must be more than a slogan because despite the Saviors pumping hundreds of rounds into the truck, not a single one makes it through to Carol.</p>
<p>Ezekiel and the Savior make it to the outside of a fence, on the other side of which is the Saviors with the guns and Carol. Ezekiel makes his move and tries to stab the Savior, but he is knocked to the ground before he can. The Savior mocks him again, painting Ezekiel’s face with blood. They arrive at a gate, but it is shut with a lock and chain. Rather than help Ezekiel over the fence, the Savior decides it will be easier to kill him. As he prepares to kill Ezekiel, Jerry (Cooper Andrews) shows up out of nowhere and splits the Savior in half with his axe.</p>
<p>On the other side of the fence, the Saviors decide to save a few bullets, at which point Carol tells them she can reveal the locations of her comrades. One of the Saviors steps forward to disarm her, at which point she grabs him and uses him as a human shield. These being Saviors, of course they decide to shoot through their friend to get to Carol, forcing her to once again take refuge behind the truck. Unbeknownst to them, however, Carol hit a button that opened a different gate, allowing walkers to pour in and attack the Saviors.</p>
<p>Jerry picks off a few of the walkers approaching he and Ezekiel, but more are coming. When Jerry refers to Ezekiel as “your Majesty,” Ezekiel says there’s no need to call him that. Jerry disagrees. He is also unable to break the lock and the walkers close in on them. He and Ezekiel stand side by side and begin fighting off every walker they can.</p>
<p>Carol now has the remaining Saviors pinned down, but she notices Ezekiel and Jerry on the other side of the fence out of the corner of her eye. She runs to assist them, allowing the Saviors to jump into the truck carrying the guns and escape.</p>
<p>In a flashback, Ezekiel tells Carol more about himself before the apocalypse, of how he was meek and timid in real life and acted out his fantasies of being courageous on stage. He and Carol share a moment as they reminisce on how they became the people they are today.</p>
<p>As they try to figure out how to stop the truck carrying the guns from getting to the Sanctuary, Rick (Andrew Lincoln) and Daryl (Norman Reedus) arrive and give chase. Daryl, on his motorcyle, engages in a high-speed shootout with the Saviors on the truck while Rick follows in a jeep. Daryl wipes out trying to avoid fire from one of the machine guns.</p>
<p>Rick keeps up the chase, with Daryl eventually catching up and shooting the Savior in the back of the truck manning the gun. Rick then pulls up alongside the truck and jumps onboard. He manages to throw the Savior driving out, but the truck goes off the road. Daryl walks up as Rick is pulling himself out of the wreck, apparently unhurt.</p>
<p>Ezekiel, Carol, and Jerry, begin making their way back toward the Kingdom. Ezekiel insists they leave him behind, as he is slowing them down. Carol and Jerry refuse. They come to an industrial waste spill in a creek, where several walkers are trapped and showing the effects of exposure to the chemicals. The trio tries to fight their way through, but Ezekiel again insists that they leave him behind the fend off the walkers while the other two escape. Suddenly, Shiva appears and attacks the walkers. She fights them off at first but they eventually overwhelm her, but her death allows Ezekiel and the others to escape.</p>
<p>The episode ends with Ezekiel, Carol, and Jerry entering the Kingdom. The loved ones of those that were killed want to know what happened, but all Ezekiel can do is walk away.</p> | false | 1 | spoiler alert keep reading seen season 8 episode 4 walking dead titled guy weeks episode walking dead king ezekiel khary payton fun past season root character episode delves back depressing agony season 7 explores makes king king week begins flashback kingdom citizens set join battle saviors ezekiel prepares front mirror stepping outside delivers rousing speech people end gather around celebration scene abruptly cuts aftermath end last weeks episode kingdoms soldiers gunned outside savior outpost ezekiel crawls beneath pile bodies uttering painful wail realizes many people dead chance grieve shortlived bodies begin reanimating walkers ezekiel wounded leg tries get away walk due injury surviving kingdomite appears helps feet inside outpost group saviors break heavy machine gun used wipe ezekiels troops unbeknownst carol melissa mcbride inside outpost move guns shoots hidden drop ceiling anything guns saviors arrive chase decide let go order move guns faster get sanctuary outside ezekiel soldier continue move encounter walkers figure soldier shot back savior looks like lovechild jeffrey dahmer chucky forces ezekiel continue gun point telling plans take ezekiel sanctuary deliver negan jeffrey dean morgan berates ezekiel along way telling con man convincing people really king meanwhile carol covertly followed saviors outside waiting truck loading guns deliver sanctuary carol makes move gets pinned behind pickup truck saviors open fire160built ford tough must slogan despite saviors pumping hundreds rounds truck single one makes carol ezekiel savior make outside fence side saviors guns carol ezekiel makes move tries stab savior knocked ground savior mocks painting ezekiels face blood arrive gate shut lock chain rather help ezekiel fence savior decides easier kill prepares kill ezekiel jerry cooper andrews shows nowhere splits savior half axe side fence saviors decide save bullets point carol tells reveal locations comrades one saviors steps forward disarm point grabs uses human shield saviors course decide shoot friend get carol forcing take refuge behind truck unbeknownst however carol hit button opened different gate allowing walkers pour attack saviors jerry picks walkers approaching ezekiel coming jerry refers ezekiel majesty ezekiel says theres need call jerry disagrees also unable break lock walkers close ezekiel stand side side begin fighting every walker carol remaining saviors pinned notices ezekiel jerry side fence corner eye runs assist allowing saviors jump truck carrying guns escape flashback ezekiel tells carol apocalypse meek timid real life acted fantasies courageous stage carol share moment reminisce became people today try figure stop truck carrying guns getting sanctuary rick andrew lincoln daryl norman reedus arrive give chase daryl motorcyle engages highspeed shootout saviors truck rick follows jeep daryl wipes trying avoid fire one machine guns rick keeps chase daryl eventually catching shooting savior back truck manning gun rick pulls alongside truck jumps onboard manages throw savior driving truck goes road daryl walks rick pulling wreck apparently unhurt ezekiel carol jerry begin making way back toward kingdom ezekiel insists leave behind slowing carol jerry refuse come industrial waste spill creek several walkers trapped showing effects exposure chemicals trio tries fight way ezekiel insists leave behind fend walkers two escape suddenly shiva appears attacks walkers fights first eventually overwhelm death allows ezekiel others escape episode ends ezekiel carol jerry entering kingdom loved ones killed want know happened ezekiel walk away | 530 |
<p>Obamacare’s defenders are doing their best to sustain a triumphant mood these days. In the wake of the late-March surge in exchange enrollment, many proponents of the law have insisted it can no longer be rolled back. As the president put it in his April 1 Mission Accomplished speech announcing the enrollment figures, “The Affordable Care Act is here to stay.”</p>
<p>But just as conservative assertions that the law would collapse of its own weight were premature, so too are today’s liberal proclamations that the debate is over.</p>
<p>Clear-eyed opponents of Obamacare have long understood that once the Supreme Court upheld the law’s individual mandate and President Obama secured reelection in 2012, it was going to be extremely difficult to unwind Obamacare before 2017. The replacement of Obamacare is going to require a sustained political effort.</p>
<p>But its defense is going to require a grueling effort from the left as well, and the president’s insistence that the willingness of 2 percent of the population to enroll in public exchanges means the debate about Obamacare’s viability is over suggests he understands how challenging that effort will be. The enrollment figures mean Obamacare has survived the self-inflicted wounds it suffered from the government’s disastrous website design and implementation failures, but it hardly speaks to the law’s more profound structural problems—which have always been the actual subjects of the debate the president wants to foreclose.</p>
<p>The past six months have taught us that the federal government can’t even design a website properly, and that the kinds of private-sector experts called in to rescue the exchanges from their near-death experience are capable of impressive feats of resuscitation and redesign. Both of those lessons have something to tell us about where American health care should be going, and it’s not what the law’s champions would like to hear.</p>
<p>More important, these early months of implementation have made Obamacare’s flaws clearer to the electorate. The president said the middle class would share in the benefits of his reform plan, with lower costs and more secure coverage. Instead, millions of middle-class families have lost the insurance plans they liked and are now paying higher premiums for coverage they consider inferior. Large and small employers are making adjustments in their plans in response to Obamacare’s taxes and regulatory requirements and are passing the higher costs on to workers in the form of greater cost-sharing and reduced access to care.</p>
<p>It is far from clear that the 8 million or so enrollees in Obamacare’s exchange plans are happy to be there. Some were forced into these exchanges because their plans were canceled, and many others signed up for coverage despite the fact that they find their options unattractive. The truth is that Obamacare is pushing Americans into accepting its bureaucratic constraints through taxes and regulations, including the tax on remaining uninsured.</p>
<p>We should not be surprised that this kind of pressure can push people into signing up. But we should also not be surprised that it offends many Americans who resent being shoved into a government-restricted marketplace. And it seems likely that many more families will find themselves facing displacement, uncertainty, and unattractive options as many small businesses lose their pre-Obamacare coverage this fall and are forced to either spend more or end their employee coverage.</p>
<p>The lawless machinations used to temporarily delay the effects of some of these blows may soften the political pain for Democrats a little for now, and the transformation of Obamacare’s “risk corridor” provision into a slush fund for payoffs to insurers to keep them cooperative may put off some of the trouble too, but both can only do so much. Voters see what’s happening and consistently register their displeasure in opinion polls.</p>
<p>The awakening among voters to Obamacare’s unpleasant realities has created a historic opportunity for the law’s opponents. Citizens are experiencing firsthand the effects of the growth of the liberal welfare state, and most don’t like what they see. This puts them in a frame of mind to consider viable, practical alternatives. Conservatives must not miss this once-in-a-generation opportunity to present the public with a genuine alternative on health care—and thus also with a vision for reforming government more generally.</p>
<p>Recent polls demonstrate just how receptive the public would be to such a message, and just how much Republicans need one. In one mid-March poll by McLaughlin and Associates, for instance, only 32 percent of respondents said they wanted Obamacare to remain on the books. But when asked whether they would simply like to see it repealed or to see it repealed and replaced with a conservative alternative that aims to lower health costs and help people get coverage, only 16 percent chose repeal alone, while 44 percent (including 60&#160;percent of Republican respondents, 43 percent of independents, and 31 percent of Democrats) chose repeal followed by a conservative alternative.</p>
<p>The good news is that a plan capable of galvanizing a strong center-right coalition has come into much clearer focus in recent months. The principles that need to drive reform are widely accepted among the law’s opponents: promotion of a genuine, functioning marketplace for health insurance and health services; avoidance of undue disruption of pre-Obamacare insurance arrangements; a flexible and decentralized regulatory structure that encourages innovation in service delivery; state autonomy and flexibility; access for all Americans to affordable insurance that protects them from catastrophic medical expenses; and secure insurance for those with preexisting medical conditions. Simply put, to bring costs under control and thereby make coverage more widely available, the system needs a much greater market orientation, not more government control.</p>
<p>Several plans introduced in recent months by opponents of Obamacare—inside and outside of Congress—adhere to these principles in different ways. But the plans with the greatest potential (in terms of both policy and politics) are those sponsored by Republican senators Richard Burr, Tom Coburn, and Orrin Hatch and the <a href="http://eppc.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=be333e74ea841be93db60da61&amp;id=c58d64f842&amp;e=4de8d3b2b6" type="external">separate plan drafted by the 2017 Project</a>, a nonprofit advocacy organization dedicated to promoting a conservative reform agenda.</p>
<p>These plans stand out because they embrace a realistic and practical approach to replacing Obamacare. Most important, they provide access to secure health coverage to all Americans without disrupting the employer-based health insurance system. They do this by embracing a tax credit for insurance for any household that does not have access to an employer-financed health plan. This is a matter of simple fairness. The tax subsidy for employer-paid insurance is very generous, but no such subsidy exists for persons buying insurance on their own. A credit would make available to low- and moderate-wage households who must buy coverage on their own a tax benefit comparable to the one for employer plans.</p>
<p>There are 160 million people in employer-based coverage in the United States, and the vast majority are happy with that coverage. No replacement plan will be viable if it looks likely to disrupt these people’s arrangements unnecessarily. The Republican senators’ plan, as well as the one proposed by the 2017 Project, would leave them in place but with a high upper limit on the tax preference, which would both encourage economizing among the most expensive employer plans and help to fund the tax credit for those outside the employer system.</p>
<p>Such an approach would avoid the two pitfalls that have proven most problematic for conservative health-reform proposals in the past. It would demonstrate that market-based health reform can both help the uninsured get covered and avoid massive disruptions in people’s existing arrangements without heavy-handed mandates, taxes, and regulations. And it would do so by giving the government less control of American health care, rather than more, and so moving our system well to the right of where it was before Obamacare.</p>
<p>Some conservatives resist this approach, believing the tax credits too closely resemble an entitlement expansion or that such reform is insufficiently bold because it would leave in place the tax benefit that ties insurance to employment. But both concerns are off the mark.</p>
<p>A tax credit would not create a new federal subsidy for coverage but rather make an existing one more fair and effective: It would extend to everyone else the benefit that today’s tax laws make available only to families with employer-based coverage. It is not possible to make that benefit available to lower-wage households (and therefore to help make them consumers of health coverage) without such an approach—these households do not pay enough taxes to benefit materially from an alternative tax break, such as a deduction.</p>
<p>And a bolder step, like entirely replacing the tax exclusion for employer-based coverage with a credit, would risk stiff resistance from millions of American families and from their employers. In the 2008 presidential contest, Senator John McCain proposed such a complete replacement of the tax preference for employer-paid premiums and faced just such a backlash.</p>
<p>If conservatives embrace the general approach of guarding the employer system from serious shocks and making tax credits available to those outside of it they have an opportunity to highlight the costs and failures of Obamacare while beating that law on every measure that counts with voters. Independent estimates show that this kind of plan could increase enrollment in insurance just as much as Obamacare, with far less expense and without the burdensome regulations, high taxes, and badly misdirected Medicare cuts of Obamacare.</p>
<p>If, on the other hand, conservatives remain divided on how to proceed and do not coalesce to some degree around a viable and practical plan, it will be very difficult to make headway in rolling back Obamacare. The public is unhappy with Obamacare, but if Republican alternatives appear unserious, offer no clear path to reliable insurance for those who have struggled to secure coverage, or seem to promise uncertainty and dislocation for millions of insured families, then displacing Obamacare will become far more difficult.</p>
<p>Conservatives must not let that happen. At stake is not only the future of American health care but the larger struggle to define the relationship between American society and its government.</p>
<p>Conservatives have long argued that today’s welfare state is not only fiscally unsustainable but also profoundly dangerous to some crucial prerequisites for a thriving society, including a commitment to work, family formation, personal liberty, economic growth, and innovation. Obamacare doubles down on this approach, and therefore exacerbates all of the negative consequences of today’s entitlement system. The Congressional Budget Office estimates it will reduce full-time employment by 2.5 million workers. Its heavy reliance on federal regulation and control will strangle innovation in a sector of the economy that badly needs it and risks depressing the quality of American health care. And its expense, which can only remain hidden behind crude budget gimmicks for so long, will inevitably create pressure for massive tax hikes.</p>
<p>In its fundamentally centralizing, consolidating, managerial approach to the role of government, Obamacare embodies the liberal welfare state. By proposing a dynamic, decentralizing, consumer-driven, problem-solving approach to America’s health-financing dilemma in its place, conservatives have a chance to offer the public an alternative governing vision with implications for many other contested policy arenas. It is an opportunity to offer proof that a dynamic economy can be backed with a reliable safety net if we draw upon America’s proud tradition of constitutionalism and democratic-capitalism.</p>
<p>James C. Capretta is a Senior Fellow and Yuval Levin is the Hertog Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | false | 1 | obamacares defenders best sustain triumphant mood days wake latemarch surge exchange enrollment many proponents law insisted longer rolled back president put april 1 mission accomplished speech announcing enrollment figures affordable care act stay conservative assertions law would collapse weight premature todays liberal proclamations debate cleareyed opponents obamacare long understood supreme court upheld laws individual mandate president obama secured reelection 2012 going extremely difficult unwind obamacare 2017 replacement obamacare going require sustained political effort defense going require grueling effort left well presidents insistence willingness 2 percent population enroll public exchanges means debate obamacares viability suggests understands challenging effort enrollment figures mean obamacare survived selfinflicted wounds suffered governments disastrous website design implementation failures hardly speaks laws profound structural 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americans accepting bureaucratic constraints taxes regulations including tax remaining uninsured surprised kind pressure push people signing also surprised offends many americans resent shoved governmentrestricted marketplace seems likely many families find facing displacement uncertainty unattractive options many small businesses lose preobamacare coverage fall forced either spend end employee coverage lawless machinations used temporarily delay effects blows may soften political pain democrats little transformation obamacares risk corridor provision slush fund payoffs insurers keep cooperative may put trouble much voters see whats happening consistently register displeasure opinion polls awakening among voters obamacares unpleasant realities created historic opportunity laws opponents citizens experiencing firsthand effects growth liberal welfare state dont like see puts frame mind consider viable practical alternatives conservatives must miss onceinageneration opportunity present public genuine alternative health careand thus also vision reforming government generally recent polls demonstrate receptive public would message much republicans need one one midmarch poll mclaughlin associates instance 32 percent respondents said wanted obamacare remain books asked whether would simply like see repealed see repealed replaced conservative alternative aims lower health costs help people get coverage 16 percent chose repeal alone 44 percent including 60160percent republican respondents 43 percent independents 31 percent democrats chose repeal followed conservative alternative good news plan capable galvanizing strong centerright coalition come much clearer focus recent months principles need drive reform widely accepted among laws opponents promotion genuine functioning marketplace health insurance health services avoidance undue disruption preobamacare insurance arrangements flexible decentralized regulatory structure encourages innovation service delivery state autonomy flexibility access americans affordable insurance protects catastrophic medical expenses secure insurance preexisting medical conditions simply put bring costs control thereby make coverage widely available system needs much greater market orientation government control several plans introduced recent months opponents obamacareinside outside congressadhere principles different ways plans greatest potential terms policy politics sponsored republican senators richard burr tom coburn orrin hatch separate plan drafted 2017 project nonprofit advocacy organization dedicated promoting conservative reform agenda plans stand embrace realistic practical approach replacing obamacare important provide access secure health coverage americans without disrupting employerbased health insurance system embracing tax credit insurance household access employerfinanced health plan matter simple fairness tax subsidy employerpaid insurance generous subsidy exists persons buying insurance credit would make available low moderatewage households must buy coverage tax benefit comparable one employer plans 160 million people employerbased coverage united states vast majority happy coverage replacement plan viable looks likely disrupt peoples arrangements unnecessarily republican senators plan well one proposed 2017 project would leave place high upper limit tax preference would encourage economizing among expensive employer plans help fund tax credit outside employer system approach would avoid two pitfalls proven problematic conservative healthreform proposals past would demonstrate marketbased health reform help uninsured get covered avoid massive disruptions peoples existing arrangements without heavyhanded mandates taxes regulations would giving government less control american health care rather moving system well right obamacare conservatives resist approach believing tax credits closely resemble entitlement expansion reform insufficiently bold would leave place tax benefit ties insurance employment concerns mark tax credit would create new federal subsidy coverage rather make existing one fair effective would extend everyone else benefit todays tax laws make available families employerbased coverage possible make benefit available lowerwage households therefore help make consumers health coverage without approachthese households pay enough taxes benefit materially alternative tax break deduction bolder step like entirely replacing tax exclusion employerbased coverage credit would risk stiff resistance millions american families employers 2008 presidential contest senator john mccain proposed complete replacement tax preference employerpaid premiums faced backlash conservatives embrace general approach guarding employer system serious shocks making tax credits available outside opportunity highlight costs failures obamacare beating law every measure counts voters independent estimates show kind plan could increase enrollment insurance much obamacare far less expense without burdensome regulations high taxes badly misdirected medicare cuts obamacare hand conservatives remain divided proceed coalesce degree around viable practical plan difficult make headway rolling back obamacare public unhappy obamacare republican alternatives appear unserious offer clear path reliable insurance struggled secure coverage seem promise uncertainty dislocation millions insured families displacing obamacare become far difficult conservatives must let happen stake future american health care larger struggle define relationship american society government conservatives long argued todays welfare state fiscally unsustainable also profoundly dangerous crucial prerequisites thriving society including commitment work family formation personal liberty economic growth innovation obamacare doubles approach therefore exacerbates negative consequences todays entitlement system congressional budget office estimates reduce fulltime employment 25 million workers heavy reliance federal regulation control strangle innovation sector economy badly needs risks depressing quality american health care expense remain hidden behind crude budget gimmicks long inevitably create pressure massive tax hikes fundamentally centralizing consolidating managerial approach role government obamacare embodies liberal welfare state proposing dynamic decentralizing consumerdriven problemsolving approach americas healthfinancing dilemma place conservatives chance offer public alternative governing vision implications many contested policy arenas opportunity offer proof dynamic economy backed reliable safety net draw upon americas proud tradition constitutionalism democraticcapitalism james c capretta senior fellow yuval levin hertog fellow ethics public policy center 160 | 1,071 |
<p>In recent weeks, while the penultimate chapter of the Democratic nomination race has monopolized our attention, John McCain has engaged in a series of auditions of general election themes for his campaign. In early April, he set out on a “Service to America Tour,” highlighting key points of his biography. Two weeks later, he launched his “Time for Action Tour,” which focused on some of the country's most economically depressed regions, and which should by no means be confused with the “Call to Action Tour” that followed and focused on McCain's health care plans. Then last week in Ohio, McCain outlined key elements of his agenda in a speech organized around a description of America in 2013–after his first term. Speaking of the future in the past tense, he sought to describe himself as an ambitious doer.</p>
<p>All of these allowed McCain to raise important issues and to offer some interesting ideas. The health care tour, in particular, yielded a speech (delivered in Tampa, Florida, on April 29) that is to date the best articulation of the conservative vision of health care from a Republican politician. What has not emerged is a coherent campaign narrative: a theme that unites McCain's proposals, his persona, his assessment of the state of the nation today, and the essence of what he plans to offer the voter in November. Indeed, this absence of an organizing principle was painfully evident in his “America in 2013” speech, which was the very model of a themeless pudding.</p>
<p>The titles and the presentation of these assorted events suggest the McCain campaign is looking to ground its messages in duty, honor, and ability, presenting the candidate as a man who has always been ready to step up and act when his country needed him. This was roughly the approach of the Dole campaign in 1996 and (in a rather different way) of the Kerry campaign in 2004, and in both cases it failed to capture the imagination of the electorate. Campaigns need to sell their candidate, to be sure, but successful campaigns usually do so by articulating a candidate's vision of the present moment and the future, and not just his willingness to answer a call. The McCain campaign is currently organized around the candidate's character and persona, and the question is to what governing philosophy McCain's “honor politics” points.</p>
<p>It is of course fairly late in the game to be engaged in basic message development, but McCain's peculiar path to victory in the primaries did not force him to do so earlier. He won, after all, without a base, without much of a strategy, and without an organized campaign apparatus. His various rivals eliminated one another (or, in the case of Giuliani and Thompson, eliminated themselves), and McCain was the man left standing in the end. His defining issue was the war in Iraq, which seems increasingly unlikely to be the issue that defines the general election. The McCain team is therefore in the unusual position of having won the primaries without a clear unifying theme for its candidate's message. The challenge is not to invent a campaign theme from scratch, but to discern and articulate the organizing principle of the candidate's outlook on politics.</p>
<p>McCain himself long ago offered the core of the answer. In announcing his first run for the presidency, in September 1999, McCain declared that if elected he would work to “reform our public institutions to meet the demands of a new day.” So far he has not made the vocabulary of reform a key to his second run for the White House. But a comprehensive reform agenda, which framed America's challenge in terms of revitalizing and reimagining its core public institutions, would be a natural fit for McCain, and for the challenges of the day. It would provide him with the overarching theme for the assorted elements of his approach to public policy.</p>
<p />
<p>A successful McCain campaign would begin with noting what is wrong with the Democrats' main theme: change. In an election year marked by a vague but pervasive sense of anxiety among voters, there is something ironic about the Democratic mantra. Change, after all, is exactly what Americans have been experiencing over the last several decades: changes in the American and the global economy; changes in social and family structure; changes and advances in the technologies of medicine, communication, transportation, and information processing; changes in just about every facet of our lives. Many have been welcome, but all have brought with them unease, especially as they have outpaced the ability of our large public institutions to adapt. Lurking beneath the individual concerns and anxieties that voters express to pollsters is a broad crisis of confidence, grounded in apprehension about the escalating failures of these institutions, from the intelligence community and giant Wall Street banks, to entitlement programs, the immigration system, and beyond.</p>
<p>Many of our public institutions arose to meet the demands of the 20th century. The growth of complex financial markets brought about the Federal Reserve and an evolving regime of financial regulation. The emergence of powerful new technologies brought about agencies, like the Food and Drug Administration and the Federal Aviation Administration, to ensure their safe use. The expenses of longer and healthier lives led to entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare and to a complicated system of employer-based health insurance. The demands of two world wars and a long cold war brought about an integrated American military and a slew of intelligence agencies. And the challenges of managing and regulating all of this led to vast new institutions of governance: from the career federal bureaucracy and the absurdly complex tax code to the modern federal budget process.</p>
<p>These institutions have always had critics, but in recent years the old debates have begun to seem outdated as the circumstances from which they emerged have changed dramatically and the institutions begun to show signs of serious decay. Grave institutional failures have been behind some of the prominent problems of the Bush years. The systemic sclerosis of the intelligence community led American leaders to underestimate al Qaeda's ambitions and to overestimate Iraq's weapons programs. A disorganized domestic response apparatus revealed itself after September 11 and again in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. An overly rigid military (particularly the Army) designed for the Cold War found it difficult to adapt after early setbacks in Iraq and has even resisted a new and winning strategy more recently.</p>
<p>A health care financing system built for the mid-20th-century American economy has been showing strain for decades–just about everyone now agrees it needs a serious redesign. Old-age entitlements designed for a very different population are threatening to go bankrupt and take the federal government right with them. A legal immigration system enacted four decades ago is far out of touch with contemporary needs, while illegal immigration proceeds at a staggering pace.</p>
<p>Regulatory institutions have not fared better, and in just the past several months, we have seen embarrassing breakdowns at the FAA, signs of severe overextension at the FDA, failures of basic oversight in the nation's financial regulatory system, and new causes to worry ab out the readiness of the Federal Reserve to contend with unexpected events. Similar signs of trouble are everywhere. Individually, each of these may be dismissed as a modest problem, of the sort that is always popping up somewhere. But seen together, as they are arriving together, these signs point to a decay that may be the governing problem of the moment.</p>
<p>The left and the right have both largely failed to notice this emerging pattern. For the left, it has been easy these eight years to blame every failure of governance on a failure of execution and to assume that the man in charge of the executive branch is the key to all our troubles. To the extent that they now propose institutional reform–and it is a surprisingly limited extent–leading Democrats have in mind giving government more power and more responsibility: in health care, over the financial markets, in the housing sector. But that is less a response to the emerging decay of our public institutions than an expression of the left's generic approach to great governing problems.</p>
<p>Senators Obama and Clinton, moreover, have almost nothing to say about many of the most prominent institutional crises we face, including immigration, the structure of the military and the intelligence community, and (perhaps most amazingly) entitlements and the looming crisis of our welfare state institutions. Indeed, both have offered health care plans that would import into the private health care market the logic of a Medicare system now facing an $86 trillion unfunded liability.</p>
<p>Republicans, meanwhile, having never been quite at home with the original purposes and ends of some of these institutions, aren't thinking constructively about reforming them (though there are a few exceptions, most notably Newt Gingrich). There has, of course, been debate about the structure of the military and immigration, and Republicans are increasingly thinking creatively about health care as well. But the conservative response to the Bush administration's Medicare prescription drug plan, for instance–a plan that for the first time introduced market incentives into Medicare and quickly proved the power of incentives to reduce costs and improve quality–shows that the right is still fighting the last war and failing to recognize an opportunity to roll back the most egregious elements of the welfare state, by planting conservative principles deep in enemy territory. Conservatives have a chance to fundamentally alter some of the assumptions behind our large public agencies of regulation, governance, and welfare.</p>
<p>The right is well suited to the task of such reform. The overarching lesson of our failing institutions is not that government has failed to reach far enough into American society, but that life in the 21st century is more complex and less predictable than our 20th-century institutions can readily fathom. The answer is not to expand government so it can rescue people from themselves–which is the underlying premise behind just about every plank of Hillary Clinton's and Barack Obama's platforms–but to make the institutions dynamic and flexible enough to advance the causes of economic growth, cultural vitality, and national security.</p>
<p>“A disposition to preserve and an ability to improve” was Edmund Burke's definition of the statesman two centuries ago, and it remains the hallmark of conservatism. While American conservatives have sometimes liked to think of themselves as revolutionaries (or radical counter-revolutionaries), the most significant accomplishments of the conservative movement have actually been targeted reforms that turned existing institutions to conservative ends. The Reagan “revolution” gave us a tax code better suited to entrepreneurship and growth. The Gingrich “revolution” gave us a welfare system with incentives geared toward encouraging independence and initiative. Conservative reform of urban law enforcement, and early efforts at reform of local education (through school choice), have improved what we have, rather than rejecting it. Reform, not revolution, is the conservative path to supporting strong families and free markets.</p>
<p>A reform agenda would be especially well suited to John McCain, as he himself seemed to see in 1999. McCain's conservatism is not fundamentally ideological. He is not especially interested in political “issues” or in abstract ideas about individual rights or the role of government. Rather, he is moved by large challenges and great exertions, and by the imperative of meeting America's commitments. He is a conservative because he believes the right has a more responsible attitude toward meeting these commitments, and is more likely to keep Americans (as individuals and as a nation) strong enough to do great things.</p>
<p>This makes for an awkward marriage between McCain and the conservative movement, but it is a coupling with more opportunities for joint efforts than the two sides realize. Rather than pretend McCain is a traditional movement conservative or that conservatism is a nonideological honor code, the two should seize an opportunity to work together for their rather different ends, with McCain giving voice to the aims and the urgency of reforms, and conservatives offering him the means. They should seek to reform our governing institutions in ways that would turn them to the cause of America's working families (which are the source of America's strengths), and should understand that cause in terms of upwardly mobile aspiration, not bitter and angry desperation.</p>
<p>McCain should paint a picture for the public of the moment we are in: confronted on the one hand with a justified crisis of confidence in our institutions and on the other with proposals from the Democrats driven by a set of liberal ideological commitments that would exacerbate the problem by carelessly expanding government. The cure for what ails us is not change that is simply more of the same–more bureaucracy, a further takeover of the private and domestic spheres that in the name of offering relief steals away more and more of our independence and initiative. The cure, rather, is to plant in the architecture of our largest public institutions the conservative commitments to individual freedom and initiative, to the centrality of parenthood and the family, and to the cause of American strength in the world.</p>
<p>A McCain reform agenda would begin with an effort to help give American families more say over the institutions they rely on most directly.</p>
<p>America's health care system is a product of 20th-century labor policies, and it is struggling to keep up with 21st-century medicine. It puts too many incentives in the wrong places and creates needless uncertainties and tensions. The care is not itself a problem: It is for the most part advanced, high quality medicine, and those with access to it are very happy with it. The problem is that access to insurance coverage is a function of a tax policy grounded in World War II-era employment laws. Many Americans in our modern economy no longer fit the model–not because they are oppressed or put upon, but because they are pursuing prosperity in different ways. Small business employees, the self-employed, freelancers, and those who change jobs frequently find themselves at constant risk of losing health coverage.</p>
<p>The answer is not a program of government subsidies that slowly drives consumers into public insurance–which is what Senators Clinton and Obama propose–and which would create an even less responsive system than the one we now have. (This would replace a slowly decaying 20th-century model with an essentially bankrupt 20th-century model.) The answer is, rather, to treat individuals as individuals, create incentives for cost containment in the private sector, and help the uninsured find private coverage.</p>
<p>To his credit, McCain has already put forward a plan along these lines, which begins gently to separate insurance from employment and to introduce market incentives to contain costs–but he needs to make a concerted effort to explain it and show why it is preferable to the Democrats' approach. The failure of American health coverage is the preeminent domestic concern in this election year, and conservative health care reform is the key to McCain's reform agenda.</p>
<p>Tort reform is another natural issue for McCain, as a companion cause to his health care reform. The existing medical liability regime pits trial lawyers–an unpopular Democratic interest group–against doctors and nurses, and it increases the cost of health care for all. Conservatives have long advocated some modest but meaningful reforms of medical liability, and McCain would be wise to draw on those ideas and make the issue a prominent cause in the coming months.</p>
<p>Democratic politicians have chosen to deny the looming crisis in Social Security and to blithely ignore the even larger and more complicated disaster facing Medicare. McCain has argued for comprehensive Social Security reform in the past and should do so again with renewed vigor. Here again, Republicans have an answer at the ready: a plan for personal accounts for future recipients that leaves those age 55 and over untouched. It is a vital reform in desperate need of a champion to make its case.</p>
<p>Medicare, unfortunately, is a much bigger problem. But the design of the prescription drug benefit passed in 2003 offers a model. As James Capretta has argued, Medicare should be gradually transformed from an open-ended entitlement into a defined-contribution program, which provides individuals with a preset amount (based on average insurance costs in their area) toward the purchase of private or public insurance. Individuals would choose what specific plan to purchase, so plans would compete for their business. Such an approach would not only begin to reverse Medicare's disastrous fiscal course, it would also help contain costs in the larger health care sector (since Medicare's open-ended reimbursement is responsible for a significant portion of health care cost inflation). No politician has had the courage to address Medicare's fiscal troubles. McCain could do so as part of a broader appeal for reform and insist that to ignore the problem is a disgraceful dereliction of responsibility to the future.</p>
<p>McCain also can become a more forceful booster for school choice. The failure of many urban schools, and the underperformance in many rural and suburban schools, is a function of a deeply sclerotic and counterproductive bureaucracy, working in tandem with a powerful union (another Democratic constituency) that resists any hint at reform. Directing his attention to urban schools that underprivilege students who are seriously underprivileged to begin with, McCain should make a case for targeted choice programs, which have worked in a few fortunate cities in the past decade. He can make it clear to middle-class parents that their children's schools need not change if they are working, but that other children desperately need to be given a chance to escape from failing schools.</p>
<p>Tax reform is also a way of supporting lower- and middle-class families while encouraging economic growth. McCain should seek not only to remove unneeded burdens on businesses–as he has already declared his desire to do–but also (and especially) to remove unfair burdens on parents. A major expansion of the child tax credit, applied against payroll as well as income taxes–as proposed by Ramesh Ponnuru and Robert Stein–would be the ideal centerpiece of a McCain tax reform. McCain has made gestures in this direction, but should make this a prominent proposal. It would clearly signal that his agenda is aimed at middle- and lower-class families. And McCain's entire reform platform should be directed to the stresses and concerns of these families.</p>
<p>The housing and credit crisis afflicting the American economy also provides an opportunity to take a fresh look at key elements of the government's role in regulating credit markets and corporate governance. McCain is well suited to take on Wall Street's excesses without attacking its core strengths. The key is not more regulation, but smarter and leaner regulation, which removes unnecessary burdens from businesses but protects America's large new investor class–which did not exist when many of our regulatory institutions were born. It is also time to consider fundamental reforms of the federal reserve system.</p>
<p>As he addresses the institutions that touch the lives of American families, McCain should propose a reform of the federal government itself. He might begin with comprehensive budget reform, promising to work with Congress to redesign the annual federal budget process, with its 11 separate fiefdoms, its inability to produce an orderly budget on time, and its endless opportunities for mischief, waste, and fraud.</p>
<p>McCain could also call for a thorough reappraisal of federal regulatory agencies, beginning with the Food and Drug Administration. The FDA is over a century old and has not been able to keep up with dramatic changes in both technology and the world economy, particularly the globalization of the supply chains for food and medicine. The contamination of pet food resulting from improper practices by a Chinese supplier last year was a loud and clear warning: A similar (and far more terrifying) disaster in the human food supply is easily imaginable under today's regulatory regime. The FDA needs more than new resources; it needs a top-down redesign. Other safety and regulatory agencies, like the FAA, have also shown serious strain in the last few years and require a rethinking.</p>
<p>The failure of America's immigration system, meanwhile, is a problem McCain knows all too well. Rather than raise again the prospect of legal status for illegal aliens, however, McCain might focus on two more urgent priorities: control of the southern border and reform of the legal immigration system. America's immigration laws were written in the mid-1960s and only barely revised since. The system they created is too heavy on family-based immigration and too light on sensible labor-based immigration. It is also almost entirely lacking in any formal elements of assimilation and integration. It needs to be thoroughly redesigned to combine secure borders with open arms and economic benefit with common sense.</p>
<p>Perhaps most important, McCain should propose a comprehensive national security reform agenda. He is well-versed in the need to restructure American diplomacy and to reform the military, the intelligence community, and our homeland security agencies. He has already begun to talk about some reforms of America's foreign policy apparatus (particularly public diplomacy), and even about some reforms to global institutions, seeking to replace the mid-20th-century United Nations with a 21st-century league of democracies. The last few years have offered no shortage of lessons for reforming the organization of the Armed Forces and revisiting the joint command structure, which is showing real strain. The intelligence community, meanwhile, is showing not strain but signs of systemic failure. The Bush administration began some efforts at reform through the creation of a director of national intelligence, but vigorous work is sorely needed. In pursuing both military and intelligence reform, moreover, McCain has a particularly rich storehouse of conservative reform ideas to call upon.</p>
<p>There is also a powerful cautionary lesson to draw on. The Department of Homeland Security is the first prominent example we have of a major 21st-century reform, and it is mostly a negative example. It demonstrates that reform must consist of more than moving existing boxes around on an organizational chart and creating vast new structures to house largely unreformed old institutions. Institutional reform is n ot only about efficiency; it must also be directed to a reappraisal of ends and a careful honing of means.</p>
<p>These are, to be sure, mere chapter headings for a campaign agenda. But in many of these areas the McCain campaign has already offered proposals, which it now could tie together under a common narrative. That narrative ought to revolve around the challenges that call for reform, and the need for reforms that build on America's strengths, rather than exacerbating its troubles. Such an approach would suit McCain. He could show his grasp of the challenges we face and his confidence in America's future. He could drive home the point that what we need is not more government but a government better suited to the times and to the concerns of the American family.</p>
<p>Obviously such an immense reform agenda could not be accomplished by any single president, and particularly not in the exceedingly difficult political circumstances McCain would likely face if he won in November. But by advancing an ambitious agenda–one that if anything is too heavy on specifics–McCain could provide a sensible and coherent explanation for the generalized anxiety of the American public today and a road map toward addressing it head on.</p>
<p>McCain would also be providing conservatives with a new way of thinking about the challenges they confront as a governing party rather than a counterrevolutionary one and a new vocabulary for making the case for limited-but-effective government, for freedom and individual responsibility, and for American values. Precisely such reforms have been among the greatest gifts the conservative movement has given America. A renewed program of energetic conservative reform would bear similar benefits in years to come.</p>
<p>— Yuval Levin is the Hertog fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and senior editor at the New Atlantis magazine.</p> | false | 1 | recent weeks penultimate chapter democratic nomination race monopolized attention john mccain engaged series auditions general election themes campaign early april set service america tour highlighting key points biography two weeks later launched time action tour focused countrys economically depressed regions means confused call action tour followed focused mccains health care plans last week ohio mccain outlined key elements agenda speech organized around description america 2013after first term speaking future past tense sought describe ambitious doer allowed mccain raise important issues offer interesting ideas health care tour particular yielded speech delivered tampa florida april 29 date best articulation conservative vision health care republican politician emerged coherent campaign narrative theme unites mccains proposals persona assessment state nation today essence plans offer voter november indeed absence organizing principle painfully evident america 2013 speech model themeless pudding titles presentation assorted events suggest mccain campaign looking ground messages duty honor ability presenting candidate man always ready step act country needed roughly approach dole campaign 1996 rather different way kerry campaign 2004 cases failed capture imagination electorate campaigns need sell candidate sure successful campaigns usually articulating candidates vision present moment future willingness answer call mccain campaign currently organized around candidates character persona question governing philosophy mccains honor politics points course fairly late game engaged basic message development mccains peculiar path victory primaries force earlier without base without much strategy without organized campaign apparatus various rivals eliminated one another case giuliani thompson eliminated mccain man left standing end defining issue war iraq seems increasingly unlikely issue defines general election mccain team therefore unusual position primaries without clear unifying theme candidates message challenge invent campaign theme scratch discern articulate organizing principle candidates outlook politics mccain long ago offered core answer announcing first run presidency september 1999 mccain declared elected would work reform public institutions meet demands new day far made vocabulary reform key second run white house comprehensive reform agenda framed americas challenge terms revitalizing reimagining core public institutions would natural fit mccain challenges day would provide overarching theme assorted elements approach public policy successful mccain campaign would begin noting wrong democrats main theme change election year marked vague pervasive sense anxiety among voters something ironic democratic mantra change exactly americans experiencing last several decades changes american global economy changes social family structure changes advances technologies medicine communication transportation information processing changes every facet lives many welcome brought unease especially outpaced ability large public institutions adapt lurking beneath individual concerns anxieties voters express pollsters broad crisis confidence grounded apprehension escalating failures institutions intelligence community giant wall street banks entitlement programs immigration system beyond many public institutions arose meet demands 20th century growth complex financial markets brought federal reserve evolving regime financial regulation emergence powerful new technologies brought agencies like food drug administration federal aviation administration ensure safe use expenses longer healthier lives led entitlement programs like social security medicare complicated system employerbased health insurance demands two world wars long cold war brought integrated american military slew intelligence agencies challenges managing regulating led vast new institutions governance career federal bureaucracy absurdly complex tax code modern federal budget process institutions always critics recent years old debates begun seem outdated circumstances emerged changed dramatically institutions begun show signs serious decay grave institutional failures behind prominent problems bush years systemic sclerosis intelligence community led american leaders underestimate al qaedas ambitions overestimate iraqs weapons programs disorganized domestic response apparatus revealed september 11 wake hurricane katrina overly rigid military particularly army designed cold war found difficult adapt early setbacks iraq even resisted new winning strategy recently health care financing system built mid20thcentury american economy showing strain decadesjust everyone agrees needs serious redesign oldage entitlements designed different population threatening go bankrupt take federal government right legal immigration system enacted four decades ago far touch contemporary needs illegal immigration proceeds staggering pace regulatory institutions fared better past several months seen embarrassing breakdowns faa signs severe overextension fda failures basic oversight nations financial regulatory system new causes worry ab readiness federal reserve contend unexpected events similar signs trouble everywhere individually may dismissed modest problem sort always popping somewhere seen together arriving together signs point decay may governing problem moment left right largely failed notice emerging pattern left easy eight years blame every failure governance failure execution assume man charge executive branch key troubles extent propose institutional reformand surprisingly limited extentleading democrats mind giving government power responsibility health care financial markets housing sector less response emerging decay public institutions expression lefts generic approach great governing problems senators obama clinton moreover almost nothing say many prominent institutional crises face including immigration structure military intelligence community perhaps amazingly entitlements looming crisis welfare state institutions indeed offered health care plans would import private health care market logic medicare system facing 86 trillion unfunded liability republicans meanwhile never quite home original purposes ends institutions arent thinking constructively reforming though exceptions notably newt gingrich course debate structure military immigration republicans increasingly thinking creatively health care well conservative response bush administrations medicare prescription drug plan instancea plan first time introduced market incentives medicare quickly proved power incentives reduce costs improve qualityshows right still fighting last war failing recognize opportunity roll back egregious elements welfare state planting conservative principles deep enemy territory conservatives chance fundamentally alter assumptions behind large public agencies regulation governance welfare right well suited task reform overarching lesson failing institutions government failed reach far enough american society life 21st century complex less predictable 20thcentury institutions readily fathom answer expand government rescue people themselveswhich underlying premise behind every plank hillary clintons barack obamas platformsbut make institutions dynamic flexible enough advance causes economic growth cultural vitality national security disposition preserve ability improve edmund burkes definition statesman two centuries ago remains hallmark conservatism american conservatives sometimes liked think revolutionaries radical counterrevolutionaries significant accomplishments conservative movement actually targeted reforms turned existing institutions conservative ends reagan revolution gave us tax code better suited entrepreneurship growth gingrich revolution gave us welfare system incentives geared toward encouraging independence initiative conservative reform urban law enforcement early efforts reform local education school choice improved rather rejecting reform revolution conservative path supporting strong families free markets reform agenda would especially well suited john mccain seemed see 1999 mccains conservatism fundamentally ideological especially interested political issues abstract ideas individual rights role government rather moved large challenges great exertions imperative meeting americas commitments conservative believes right responsible attitude toward meeting commitments likely keep americans individuals nation strong enough great things makes awkward marriage mccain conservative movement coupling opportunities joint efforts two sides realize rather pretend mccain traditional movement conservative conservatism nonideological honor code two seize opportunity work together rather different ends mccain giving voice aims urgency reforms conservatives offering means seek reform governing institutions ways would turn cause americas working families source americas strengths understand cause terms upwardly mobile aspiration bitter angry desperation mccain paint picture public moment confronted one hand justified crisis confidence institutions proposals democrats driven set liberal ideological commitments would exacerbate problem carelessly expanding government cure ails us change simply samemore bureaucracy takeover private domestic spheres name offering relief steals away independence initiative cure rather plant architecture largest public institutions conservative commitments individual freedom initiative centrality parenthood family cause american strength world mccain reform agenda would begin effort help give american families say institutions rely directly americas health care system product 20thcentury labor policies struggling keep 21stcentury medicine puts many incentives wrong places creates needless uncertainties tensions care problem part advanced high quality medicine access happy problem access insurance coverage function tax policy grounded world war iiera employment laws many americans modern economy longer fit modelnot oppressed put upon pursuing prosperity different ways small business employees selfemployed freelancers change jobs frequently find constant risk losing health coverage answer program government subsidies slowly drives consumers public insurancewhich senators clinton obama proposeand would create even less responsive system one would replace slowly decaying 20thcentury model essentially bankrupt 20thcentury model answer rather treat individuals individuals create incentives cost containment private sector help uninsured find private coverage credit mccain already put forward plan along lines begins gently separate insurance employment introduce market incentives contain costsbut needs make concerted effort explain show preferable democrats approach failure american health coverage preeminent domestic concern election year conservative health care reform key mccains reform agenda tort reform another natural issue mccain companion cause health care reform existing medical liability regime pits trial lawyersan unpopular democratic interest groupagainst doctors nurses increases cost health care conservatives long advocated modest meaningful reforms medical liability mccain would wise draw ideas make issue prominent cause coming months democratic politicians chosen deny looming crisis social security blithely ignore even larger complicated disaster facing medicare mccain argued comprehensive social security reform past renewed vigor republicans answer ready plan personal accounts future recipients leaves age 55 untouched vital reform desperate need champion make case medicare unfortunately much bigger problem design prescription drug benefit passed 2003 offers model james capretta argued medicare gradually transformed openended entitlement definedcontribution program provides individuals preset amount based average insurance costs area toward purchase private public insurance individuals would choose specific plan purchase plans would compete business approach would begin reverse medicares disastrous fiscal course would also help contain costs larger health care sector since medicares openended reimbursement responsible significant portion health care cost inflation politician courage address medicares fiscal troubles mccain could part broader appeal reform insist ignore problem disgraceful dereliction responsibility future mccain also become forceful booster school choice failure many urban schools underperformance many rural suburban schools function deeply sclerotic counterproductive bureaucracy working tandem powerful union another democratic constituency resists hint reform directing attention urban schools underprivilege students seriously underprivileged begin mccain make case targeted choice programs worked fortunate cities past decade make clear middleclass parents childrens schools need change working children desperately need given chance escape failing schools tax reform also way supporting lower middleclass families encouraging economic growth mccain seek remove unneeded burdens businessesas already declared desire dobut also especially remove unfair burdens parents major expansion child tax credit applied payroll well income taxesas proposed ramesh ponnuru robert steinwould ideal centerpiece mccain tax reform mccain made gestures direction make prominent proposal would clearly signal agenda aimed middle lowerclass families mccains entire reform platform directed stresses concerns families housing credit crisis afflicting american economy also provides opportunity take fresh look key elements governments role regulating credit markets corporate governance mccain well suited take wall streets excesses without attacking core strengths key regulation smarter leaner regulation removes unnecessary burdens businesses protects americas large new investor classwhich exist many regulatory institutions born also time consider fundamental reforms federal reserve system addresses institutions touch lives american families mccain propose reform federal government might begin comprehensive budget reform promising work congress redesign annual federal budget process 11 separate fiefdoms inability produce orderly budget time endless opportunities mischief waste fraud mccain could also call thorough reappraisal federal regulatory agencies beginning food drug administration fda century old able keep dramatic changes technology world economy particularly globalization supply chains food medicine contamination pet food resulting improper practices chinese supplier last year loud clear warning similar far terrifying disaster human food supply easily imaginable todays regulatory regime fda needs new resources needs topdown redesign safety regulatory agencies like faa also shown serious strain last years require rethinking failure americas immigration system meanwhile problem mccain knows well rather raise prospect legal status illegal aliens however mccain might focus two urgent priorities control southern border reform legal immigration system americas immigration laws written mid1960s barely revised since system created heavy familybased immigration light sensible laborbased immigration also almost entirely lacking formal elements assimilation integration needs thoroughly redesigned combine secure borders open arms economic benefit common sense perhaps important mccain propose comprehensive national security reform agenda wellversed need restructure american diplomacy reform military intelligence community homeland security agencies already begun talk reforms americas foreign policy apparatus particularly public diplomacy even reforms global institutions seeking replace mid20thcentury united nations 21stcentury league democracies last years offered shortage lessons reforming organization armed forces revisiting joint command structure showing real strain intelligence community meanwhile showing strain signs systemic failure bush administration began efforts reform creation director national intelligence vigorous work sorely needed pursuing military intelligence reform moreover mccain particularly rich storehouse conservative reform ideas call upon also powerful cautionary lesson draw department homeland security first prominent example major 21stcentury reform mostly negative example demonstrates reform must consist moving existing boxes around organizational chart creating vast new structures house largely unreformed old institutions institutional reform n ot efficiency must also directed reappraisal ends careful honing means sure mere chapter headings campaign agenda many areas mccain campaign already offered proposals could tie together common narrative narrative ought revolve around challenges call reform need reforms build americas strengths rather exacerbating troubles approach would suit mccain could show grasp challenges face confidence americas future could drive home point need government government better suited times concerns american family obviously immense reform agenda could accomplished single president particularly exceedingly difficult political circumstances mccain would likely face november advancing ambitious agendaone anything heavy specificsmccain could provide sensible coherent explanation generalized anxiety american public today road map toward addressing head mccain would also providing conservatives new way thinking challenges confront governing party rather counterrevolutionary one new vocabulary making case limitedbuteffective government freedom individual responsibility american values precisely reforms among greatest gifts conservative movement given america renewed program energetic conservative reform would bear similar benefits years come yuval levin hertog fellow ethics public policy center senior editor new atlantis magazine | 2,217 |
<p>In southwest Ohio, people die from drug overdoses at more than double the national rate. In the future, whether someone survives could hinge on what county they’re in.</p>
<p>The sheriff in Butler County this summer declared that his officers wouldn’t carry medication to reverse overdoses. In Middletown, a city of 49,000 that overlaps&#160;the county, a council member frustrated by ballooning costs went even further,&#160;suggesting&#160;ambulance crews shouldn’t have to save the lives of some people who have been revived before.</p>
<p>In neighboring Hamilton County, which includes Cincinnati, officials are taking the opposite approach. They want to create the Narcan capital of America, putting more than 30,000 doses of&#160;the opioid-overdose reversal spray in the hands of Ohioans ready to use it. That’s about one for every 27 residents. In addition to police, firefighters, and medics&#160;who already carry the drug, Hamilton County plans to distribute Narcan to syringe exchanges,&#160;houses of worship—and maybe even employers. People discharged from hospitals or jails after opioid incidents should leave with “Narcan on the belt,” says Tim Ingram,&#160;Hamilton County’s health commissioner.</p>
<p>The contrast between these approaches mirrors the national debate over how to deal with a drug&#160;crisis that killed 33,000 Americans in 2015, a tally expected to increase. The epidemic began years ago as doctors started to liberally prescribe opioid painkillers such as oxycodone. As addiction and abuse rose, the medical industry began to tighten access, drivng up street prices.&#160;Drug cartels saw an opportunity and flooded U.S. cities with cheap heroin,&#160;a common substitute.&#160;</p>
<p>Nowadays,&#160;heroin&#160;is often laced with such potent synthetic drugs as&#160;fentanyl or the&#160;elephant tranquilizer carfentanil, which can be deadly in minuscule doses. As drug poisonings keep rising, communities have to decide how easy it should be for people who overdose to get life-saving medicines—and at what cost.</p>
<p>Forty-five states and the District of Columbia allow naloxone, the active chemical in Narcan spray, to be obtained without a prescription.&#160;Naloxone isn’t addictive and doesn’t induce a high, so it can’t be abused. President Donald Trump’s opioid commission urged in a July&#160;draft report&#160;that “Naloxone be in the hands of every law enforcement officer” and suggested doctors also prescribe it in tandem with risky painkillers. Between 1996 and 2014, naloxone dispensed by “laypersons”—including drug users, family members, and other bystanders—reversed at least 26,000 overdoses, the Centers for Diseases Control has reported.</p>
<p>“This is pretty egregious to think that you would just deny people care that would save their lives”&#160;</p>
<p>Raising awareness about naloxone&#160;has “been a struggle,” says&#160;Reilly Glasgow, project manager&#160;at the Lower East Side Harm Reduction Center in New York City. The nonprofit provides syringe exchange, counseling, and other services to people suffering from addiction. The group hands out free naloxone kits at 800 training sessions each year. “To me, it’s criminal to let this sit on the shelf,” Glasgow says.</p>
<p>Dan Picard, the Middletown, Ohio, council member who proposed limiting naloxone for repeat overdoses, stands on the opposite side of the divide. Picard&#160;says drug poisonings in Middletown have dropped since his suggestion made national headlines in June. “Every overdose run costs the city $1,104,” Picard says, adding that Middletown had been on track to spend 10 times the $10,000 it budgeted for Narcan.</p>
<p>“My comments scared people,” he contends. “At some point in life people need to have some personal responsibility.”</p>
<p>Butler County Sheriff Richard Jones says people can get Narcan at pharmacies or from paramedics, but his officers won’t carry it. “Everything’s being spent on the treatment of the addict,” he says, adding that more money should go to prevention and school programs to discourage drug use, citing the DARE program and the “Just Say No” campaign Nancy Reagan championed. “I’m here on the front lines, and people are fed up with this. I had a guy call me the other day saying, ‘I don’t get free insulin.’”</p>
<p>Last year Butler County recorded 211 fatal drug overdoses, and the death rate is among the highest in Ohio.&#160;</p>
<p>Jones says he’s not aware of anyone who died because his officers didn’t have naloxone, and he notes that medics usually arrive at the same time as police. Picard says Middletown does plenty&#160;to get people into treatment, including sending response teams the day after overdoses to follow up.</p>
<p>Withholding emergency treatment after an overdose would violate medical ethics, says Andrew Aronsohn, a doctor and faculty member at the&#160;MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics at the University of Chicago Medical Center.&#160;Addiction carries a particular stigma, but society rarely questions whether other medical conditions resulting from personal behavior deserve treatment, from a smokers’ lung cancer or a drunk drivers’ injuries after a crash, he says.&#160;“When someone’s dying in front of you, that’s not really our place to judge all of those things as medical providers,”&#160;Aronsohn says.&#160;“This is pretty egregious to think that you would just deny people care that would save their lives.”&#160;</p>
<p>Mike DeWine, Ohio’s Republican attorney general, is currently suing prescription opioid manufacturers, alleging that they downplayed addiction risks. He says that, while he understands why some officials are exasperated with reviving people who may overdose again, they should do it anyway. “You’ve got law enforcement officers who are doing things that five years ago none of them ever would have dreamed they’d be doing—but it’s the right thing to do,”&#160;says DeWine, a former U.S. senator who is also running for governor. The epidemic requires both public health and law enforcement solutions, he says, such as drug courts and programs in which police help connect people to treatment.</p>
<p>Researchers at the University of Cincinnati will track the Hamilton County experiment to see what effect it has on deadly overdoses. “If you really put an emphasis on nalaxone and put it out there everywhere, how many lives will you be able to save?” DeWine says. Hamilton County’s five hospitals as well as other providers and community groups pledged&#160;$550,000 in cash, including $25,000 from the county, to fund the program for the next two years.</p>
<p>“This could be a blueprint for what other communities need to do”</p>
<p>That funding doesn’t cover the cost of 25,000 doses of Narcan that manufacturer Adapt Pharma will donate. Hamilton County has already distributed 7,000 of doses of naloxone over the past two years, mostly through emergency responders. Narcan can be delivered without training and is already available at pharmacies in almost every state, usually&#160;on “standing order,” meaning people can get it without a prescription. Mike Kelly, who runs U.S. operations for Adapt, says public awareness is the biggest barrier to more widespread use. New York and Massachusetts are doing public ad campaigns to alert people that naloxone is available at pharmacies.</p>
<p>If the Hamilton County program reduces deaths, he says, “this could be a blueprint for what other communities need to do.” A successful demonstration&#160;could also broaden the market for Narcan, providing&#160;a commercial opportunity for closely held Adapt. Narcan prescriptions have increased to 530,000 doses so far in 2017, up from 229,000 doses in all of 2016, according to data from Symphony Health Solutions that was compiled by Bloomberg Intelligence.</p>
<p>Other Ohio counties support&#160;expanding Narcan availability. On the other side of the state, police in Lorraine County averted 350 fatal overdoses over the past four years using&#160;naloxone, says Detective Gregg Mehling of the county’s drug task force. Medics have saved many more. “If this guy’s going to live another day, it’s in your hands,” he says. Mehling supports having Narcan in schools and workplaces, alongside fire extinguishers and automated defibrillators. “You hope you never use them.”</p>
<p>Last year, Lorraine County had 146 drug overdose deaths—double the rate in recent years. Mehling says that, without Narcan, the numbers would be “two or three times worse.”</p>
<p>No one thinks&#160;Narcan alone is sufficient. While making it more widely available is a “no brainer,” the U.S. needs a greater focus on prevention and&#160;access to treatment, says Andrew Kolodny, executive director of Physicians for Responsible Opioid Prescribing and a researcher at Brandeis University. People with addiction should find it easier to “access treatment than heroin,” he says. “That person should be able to walk into a treatment facility regardless of the ability to pay.”</p>
<p>Ingram, the Hamilton County health commissioner, agrees that people need treatment, counseling, and social support to beat addiction. While treatment facility capacity is expanding, there still aren’t enough beds. Making Narcan more widely available, he says, will at least keep people out of the morgue.</p> | false | 1 | southwest ohio people die drug overdoses double national rate future whether someone survives could hinge county theyre sheriff butler county summer declared officers wouldnt carry medication reverse overdoses middletown city 49000 overlaps160the county council member frustrated ballooning costs went even further160suggesting160ambulance crews shouldnt save lives people revived neighboring hamilton county includes cincinnati officials taking opposite approach want create narcan capital america putting 30000 doses of160the opioidoverdose reversal spray hands ohioans ready use thats one every 27 residents addition police firefighters medics160who already carry drug hamilton county plans distribute narcan syringe exchanges160houses worshipand maybe even employers people discharged hospitals jails opioid incidents leave narcan belt says tim ingram160hamilton countys health commissioner contrast approaches mirrors national debate deal drug160crisis killed 33000 americans 2015 tally expected increase epidemic began years ago doctors started liberally prescribe opioid painkillers oxycodone addiction abuse rose medical industry began tighten access drivng street prices160drug cartels saw opportunity flooded us cities cheap heroin160a common substitute160 nowadays160heroin160is often laced potent synthetic drugs as160fentanyl the160elephant tranquilizer carfentanil deadly minuscule doses drug poisonings keep rising communities decide easy people overdose get lifesaving medicinesand cost fortyfive states district columbia allow naloxone active chemical narcan spray obtained without prescription160naloxone isnt addictive doesnt induce high cant abused president donald trumps opioid commission urged july160draft report160that naloxone hands every law enforcement officer suggested doctors also prescribe tandem risky painkillers 1996 2014 naloxone dispensed laypersonsincluding drug users family members bystandersreversed least 26000 overdoses centers diseases control reported pretty egregious think would deny people care would save lives160 raising awareness naloxone160has struggle says160reilly glasgow project manager160at lower east side harm reduction center new york city nonprofit provides syringe exchange counseling services people suffering addiction group hands free naloxone kits 800 training sessions year criminal let sit shelf glasgow says dan picard middletown ohio council member proposed limiting naloxone repeat overdoses stands opposite side divide picard160says drug poisonings middletown dropped since suggestion made national headlines june every overdose run costs city 1104 picard says adding middletown track spend 10 times 10000 budgeted narcan comments scared people contends point life people need personal responsibility butler county sheriff richard jones says people get narcan pharmacies paramedics officers wont carry everythings spent treatment addict says adding money go prevention school programs discourage drug use citing dare program say campaign nancy reagan championed im front lines people fed guy call day saying dont get free insulin last year butler county recorded 211 fatal drug overdoses death rate among highest ohio160 jones says hes aware anyone died officers didnt naloxone notes medics usually arrive time police picard says middletown plenty160to get people treatment including sending response teams day overdoses follow withholding emergency treatment overdose would violate medical ethics says andrew aronsohn doctor faculty member the160maclean center clinical medical ethics university chicago medical center160addiction carries particular stigma society rarely questions whether medical conditions resulting personal behavior deserve treatment smokers lung cancer drunk drivers injuries crash says160when someones dying front thats really place judge things medical providers160aronsohn says160this pretty egregious think would deny people care would save lives160 mike dewine ohios republican attorney general currently suing prescription opioid manufacturers alleging downplayed addiction risks says understands officials exasperated reviving people may overdose anyway youve got law enforcement officers things five years ago none ever would dreamed theyd doingbut right thing do160says dewine former us senator also running governor epidemic requires public health law enforcement solutions says drug courts programs police help connect people treatment researchers university cincinnati track hamilton county experiment see effect deadly overdoses really put emphasis nalaxone put everywhere many lives able save dewine says hamilton countys five hospitals well providers community groups pledged160550000 cash including 25000 county fund program next two years could blueprint communities need funding doesnt cover cost 25000 doses narcan manufacturer adapt pharma donate hamilton county already distributed 7000 doses naloxone past two years mostly emergency responders narcan delivered without training already available pharmacies almost every state usually160on standing order meaning people get without prescription mike kelly runs us operations adapt says public awareness biggest barrier widespread use new york massachusetts public ad campaigns alert people naloxone available pharmacies hamilton county program reduces deaths says could blueprint communities need successful demonstration160could also broaden market narcan providing160a commercial opportunity closely held adapt narcan prescriptions increased 530000 doses far 2017 229000 doses 2016 according data symphony health solutions compiled bloomberg intelligence ohio counties support160expanding narcan availability side state police lorraine county averted 350 fatal overdoses past four years using160naloxone says detective gregg mehling countys drug task force medics saved many guys going live another day hands says mehling supports narcan schools workplaces alongside fire extinguishers automated defibrillators hope never use last year lorraine county 146 drug overdose deathsdouble rate recent years mehling says without narcan numbers would two three times worse one thinks160narcan alone sufficient making widely available brainer us needs greater focus prevention and160access treatment says andrew kolodny executive director physicians responsible opioid prescribing researcher brandeis university people addiction find easier access treatment heroin says person able walk treatment facility regardless ability pay ingram hamilton county health commissioner agrees people need treatment counseling social support beat addiction treatment facility capacity expanding still arent enough beds making narcan widely available says least keep people morgue | 862 |
<p>Here are the good things about The Legend of Bagger Vance, written by Jeremy Leven from the novel by Steven Pressfield and directed by Robert Redford. It tells a story set in Savannah, Georgia, in about 1930 and never once mentions Jim Crow or Southern white racism. So familiar by now is the iconography of the civil rights movement that it is refreshing to see a movie with the boldness to leave out what would necessarily have been a gratuitous obeisance to it. These Savannahans may not be very attractive, most of them, but neither are they moral monsters. Another good thing is that the hero, Randolph Junuh (Matt Damon), is presented to us as being admirable as well as honorable in penalizing himself a stroke for inadvertently moving his ball—even though it seemingly deprives him of his chance to beat both the great Walter Hagen (Bruce McGill) and the great Bobby Jones (Joel Gretsch)—and even though neither of those gentlemen think the penalty stroke is necessary. There’s real old-fashioned sportsmanship for you.</p>
<p>Er, that’s it. Everything else is so relentlessly uplifting that you have to wear a weight-belt just to sit through it. It is a movie about golf, mind you, and intended for an audience sympathetic to the idea that the meaning of golf is more or less the same as the meaning of life—rather as Field of Dreams was intended for people with the same way of thinking about baseball. Unfortunately, the comparison of both sports to life itself will only stretch so far, and both movies stretch it way farther. The characters in Bagger Vance keep saying over and over that “it’s just a game”—as if this redundant reminder was a prophylactic against deserved criticism for treating it throughout as one of the higher spiritual exercises. It is just a game. So why are we encouraged to see Junuh’s attempt to “get his swing back” as if it were the quest for the Holy Grail?</p>
<p>I also have little patience with the romance of Junuh’s suffering from What He Saw In The War—that would be the First World War—which was the reason he lost his swing in the first place. Tremulous old Jack Lemmon, who narrates the film in the person of the (much) older version of the little boy, Hardy Greaves (J. Michael Moncrief), from whose point of view we witness the events of 1930, gives us the voiceover version of Junuh’s war experience: “Nothing could have prepared him—or anyone for the shock of what was to come.” The result of which shock was that, “confused, broken and unable to face a return to a hero’s welcome, Junuh just disappeared.” Well, for ten years. Then he came home as a bum and a heavy drinker who was ostensibly trying to forget.</p>
<p>The trouble with this kind of self-pitying and self-destructive behavior is of course that (not inadvertently), it makes everyone else remember. And Mr. Damon is by now well-practised in the art of posing for this kind of romantic snapshot. When he learns that his ex-fiancée, Adele Invergordon (Charlize Theron) will go bankrupt unless he takes part in an exhibition golf match with Hagen and Jones, he is coaxed out of his drunken stupor and strikes another romantic pose. Now there miraculously appears to caddy for him, and to help get his swing back, the mystical figure of Bagger Vance (Will Smith). Bagger is a folksy sort given to saying things like “a man’s grip on his club is like a man’s grip on the world” or “the rhythm of the game is just like the rhythm of life.” Above all, he teaches that “each one of us born with one true and authentic swing.” You can lose your swing when it gets “buried under all the wouldas and couldas and shouldas,” but if you play Bagger’s kind of Zen golf and “just keep swinging that club until you’re part of the whole thing,” you can get it back.</p>
<p>Not only get it back either. You can even become the equal of Bobby Jones and Walter Hagen. Golfers in the audience have got to wonder: is the swing they were born with also the equal of that of the world’s best golfers? Or is it just Junuh’s? Can anybody attain Bobby Jones’s state of enlightenment, in which he can feel “the one shot that’s in perfect harmony with the field” - Can you, too, put yourself in a position where the shot finds you and all you’ve got to do is get out of the way of it? And, if so, does that mean that you can quit your job and go on the pro tour? If Junuh’s epic links to the place “where everything that is becomes one” somehow involves this kind of improvement to his game, sign us up! Even if we don’t earn Tiger Woods’s millions in prize money and endorsements, we ought to be able to market the how-to book of Zen golf and make a tidy sum. Too bad Bagger didn’t think of it first.</p>
<p>These Savannahans may not be very attractive, most of them, but neither are they moral monsters. Another good thing is that the hero, Randolph Junuh (Matt Damon), is presented to us as being admirable as well as honorable in penalizing himself a stroke for inadvertently moving his ball—even though it seemingly deprives him of his chance to beat both the great Walter Hagen (Bruce McGill) and the great Bobby Jones (Joel Gretsch)—and even though neither of those gentlemen think the penalty stroke is necessary. There’s real old-fashioned sportsmanship for you.</p>
<p>Er, that’s it. Everything else is so relentlessly uplifting that you have to wear a weight-belt just to sit through it. It is a movie about golf, mind you, and intended for an audience sympathetic to the idea that the meaning of golf is more or less the same as the meaning of life—rather as Field of Dreams was intended for people with the same way of thinking about baseball. Unfortunately, the comparison of both sports to life itself will only stretch so far, and both movies stretch it way farther. The characters in Bagger Vance keep saying over and over that “it’s just a game”—as if this redundant reminder was a prophylactic against deserved criticism for treating it throughout as one of the higher spiritual exercises. It is just a game. So why are we encouraged to see Junuh’s attempt to “get his swing back” as if it were the quest for the Holy Grail?</p>
<p>I also have little patience with the romance of Junuh’s suffering from What He Saw In The War—that would be the First World War—which was the reason he lost his swing in the first place. Tremulous old Jack Lemmon, who narrates the film in the person of the (much) older version of the little boy, Hardy Greaves (J. Michael Moncrief), from whose point of view we witness the events of 1930, gives us the voiceover version of Junuh’s war experience: “Nothing could have prepared him—or anyone for the shock of what was to come.” The result of which shock was that, “confused, broken and unable to face a return to a hero’s welcome, Junuh just disappeared.” Well, for ten years. Then he came home as a bum and a heavy drinker who was ostensibly trying to forget.</p>
<p>The trouble with this kind of self-pitying and self-destructive behavior is of course that (not inadvertently), it makes everyone else remember. And Mr. Damon is by now well-practised in the art of posing for this kind of romantic snapshot. When he learns that his ex-fiancée, Adele Invergordon (Charlize Theron) will go bankrupt unless he takes part in an exhibition golf match with Hagen and Jones, he is coaxed out of his drunken stupor and strikes another romantic pose. Now there miraculously appears to caddy for him, and to help get his swing back, the mystical figure of Bagger Vance (Will Smith). Bagger is a folksy sort given to saying things like “a man’s grip on his club is like a man’s grip on the world” or “the rhythm of the game is just like the rhythm of life.” Above all, he teaches that “each one of us born with one true and authentic swing.” You can lose your swing when it gets “buried under all the wouldas and couldas and shouldas,” but if you play Bagger’s kind of Zen golf and “just keep swinging that club until you’re part of the whole thing,” you can get it back.</p>
<p>Not only get it back either. You can even become the equal of Bobby Jones and Walter Hagen. Golfers in the audience have got to wonder: is the swing they were born with also the equal of that of the world’s best golfers? Or is it just Junuh’s? Can anybody attain Bobby Jones’s state of enlightenment, in which he can feel “the one shot that’s in perfect harmony with the field” - Can you, too, put yourself in a position where the shot finds you and all you’ve got to do is get out of the way of it? And, if so, does that mean that you can quit your job and go on the pro tour? If Junuh’s epic links to the place “where everything that is becomes one” somehow involves this kind of improvement to his game, sign us up! Even if we don’t earn Tiger Woods’s millions in prize money and endorsements, we ought to be able to market the how-to book of Zen golf and make a tidy sum. Too bad Bagger didn’t think of it first.</p> | false | 1 | good things legend bagger vance written jeremy leven novel steven pressfield directed robert redford tells story set savannah georgia 1930 never mentions jim crow southern white racism familiar iconography civil rights movement refreshing see movie boldness leave would necessarily gratuitous obeisance savannahans may attractive neither moral monsters another good thing hero randolph junuh matt damon presented us admirable well honorable penalizing stroke inadvertently moving balleven though seemingly deprives chance beat great walter hagen bruce mcgill great bobby jones joel gretschand even though neither gentlemen think penalty stroke necessary theres real oldfashioned sportsmanship er thats everything else relentlessly uplifting wear weightbelt sit movie golf mind intended audience sympathetic idea meaning golf less meaning liferather field dreams intended people way thinking baseball unfortunately comparison sports life stretch far movies stretch way farther characters bagger vance keep saying gameas redundant reminder prophylactic deserved criticism treating throughout one higher spiritual exercises game encouraged see junuhs attempt get swing back quest holy grail also little patience romance junuhs suffering saw warthat would first world warwhich reason lost swing first place tremulous old jack lemmon narrates film person much older version little boy hardy greaves j michael moncrief whose point view witness events 1930 gives us voiceover version junuhs war experience nothing could prepared himor anyone shock come result shock confused broken unable face return heros welcome junuh disappeared well ten years came home bum heavy drinker ostensibly trying forget trouble kind selfpitying selfdestructive behavior course inadvertently makes everyone else remember mr damon wellpractised art posing kind romantic snapshot learns exfiancée adele invergordon charlize theron go bankrupt unless takes part exhibition golf match hagen jones coaxed drunken stupor strikes another romantic pose miraculously appears caddy help get swing back mystical figure bagger vance smith bagger folksy sort given saying things like mans grip club like mans grip world rhythm game like rhythm life teaches one us born one true authentic swing lose swing gets buried wouldas couldas shouldas play baggers kind zen golf keep swinging club youre part whole thing get back get back either even become equal bobby jones walter hagen golfers audience got wonder swing born also equal worlds best golfers junuhs anybody attain bobby joness state enlightenment feel one shot thats perfect harmony field put position shot finds youve got get way mean quit job go pro tour junuhs epic links place everything becomes one somehow involves kind improvement game sign us even dont earn tiger woodss millions prize money endorsements ought able market howto book zen golf make tidy sum bad bagger didnt think first savannahans may attractive neither moral monsters another good thing hero randolph junuh matt damon presented us admirable well honorable penalizing stroke inadvertently moving balleven though seemingly deprives chance beat great walter hagen bruce mcgill great bobby jones joel gretschand even though neither gentlemen think penalty stroke necessary theres real oldfashioned sportsmanship er thats everything else relentlessly uplifting wear weightbelt sit movie golf mind intended audience sympathetic idea meaning golf less meaning liferather field dreams intended people way thinking baseball unfortunately comparison sports life stretch far movies stretch way farther characters bagger vance keep saying gameas redundant reminder prophylactic deserved criticism treating throughout one higher spiritual exercises game encouraged see junuhs attempt get swing back quest holy grail also little patience romance junuhs suffering saw warthat would first world warwhich reason lost swing first place tremulous old jack lemmon narrates film person much older version little boy hardy greaves j michael moncrief whose point view witness events 1930 gives us voiceover version junuhs war experience nothing could prepared himor anyone shock come result shock confused broken unable face return heros welcome junuh disappeared well ten years came home bum heavy drinker ostensibly trying forget trouble kind selfpitying selfdestructive behavior course inadvertently makes everyone else remember mr damon wellpractised art posing kind romantic snapshot learns exfiancée adele invergordon charlize theron go bankrupt unless takes part exhibition golf match hagen jones coaxed drunken stupor strikes another romantic pose miraculously appears caddy help get swing back mystical figure bagger vance smith bagger folksy sort given saying things like mans grip club like mans grip world rhythm game like rhythm life teaches one us born one true authentic swing lose swing gets buried wouldas couldas shouldas play baggers kind zen golf keep swinging club youre part whole thing get back get back either even become equal bobby jones walter hagen golfers audience got wonder swing born also equal worlds best golfers junuhs anybody attain bobby joness state enlightenment feel one shot thats perfect harmony field put position shot finds youve got get way mean quit job go pro tour junuhs epic links place everything becomes one somehow involves kind improvement game sign us even dont earn tiger woodss millions prize money endorsements ought able market howto book zen golf make tidy sum bad bagger didnt think first | 805 |
<p>WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS, W.Va. — When the full <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Houston-Texans/" type="external">Houston Texans</a> roster reported for duty here at the Greenbrier Resort Tuesday (July 25), most attention will be on a Savage, a rookie quarterback and one of the best defensive lineman in NFL history who must prove he can play again.</p>
<p>Texans head coach <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Bill-OBrien/" type="external">Bill O’Brien</a> named <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Tom-Savage/" type="external">Tom Savage</a> as the starting quarterback over rookie <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Deshaun-Watson/" type="external">Deshaun Watson</a>, who must gain some seasoning before the Texans consider changing his status.</p>
<p>“It’s best for the team,” admitted Watson, the former Clemson standout who was a <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Heisman_Trophy/" type="external">Heisman Trophy</a> finalist, Davey O’Brien and Manning Award winner and claimed an ESPY this month for Best Male College Athlete.</p>
<p>“Coach OB knows a lot of football. He’s been with the best, if not one of the best in NFL history, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Tom_Brady/" type="external">Tom Brady</a>. He knows how everything is operated. He knows when the perfect timing will be. He knows when it’s right and when it’s wrong.”</p>
<p>Meanwhile, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/JJ-Watt/" type="external">J.J. Watt</a>, a three-time NFL Defensive Player of the Year, must show he can return to some semblance of his former greatness and stay healthy after undergoing a pair of back surgeries to repair a herniated disk. Watt was not in contact drills yet but was fully cleared and participated in all offseason practices. His health is paramount to the NFL’s top-ranked defense.</p>
<p>The opening of camp was not without some drama. Tackle Duane Brown, who wants a new contract despite having two years remaining on his current deal, is officially a holdout and was placed on the team’s reserve/did not report list. Brown was also absent from the team’s June mandatory minicamp.</p>
<p>His scheduled salaries are $9.4 million this year and $9.75 million in 2018.</p>
<p>Top Summer Battle</p>
<p>With most public and media attention focused on the all-important quarterback position and Watt’s return, one of the key battles to watch in camp this summer will be at strong safety.</p>
<p>This will a highly-contested battle for a starting job between Corey Moore, Lonnie Ballentine and, perhaps later, K.J. Dillon when he is healthy.</p>
<p>Moore returns with starting experience and held up solidly last season, but didn’t make many big plays. Ballentine has prototypical size and speed, but keeps getting hurt. Dillon is recovering from a torn ACL suffered as a rookie last year.</p>
<p>TRAINING CAMP: The Greenbrier; White Sulphur Springs, W.Va.</p>
<p>COACH: Bill O’Brien</p>
<p>4th season as Texans/NFL head coach</p>
<p>28-23 overall; 1-2 postseason</p>
<p>2016 finish: 1st AFC South (9-7)</p>
<p>STATISTICS</p>
<p>TOTAL OFFENSE: 314.7 (29th)</p>
<p>RUSHING: 116.2 (8th)</p>
<p>PASSING: 198.5 (29th)</p>
<p>TOTAL DEFENSE: 301.3 (1st)</p>
<p>RUSHING: 99.7 (12th)</p>
<p>PASSING: 201.6 (2nd)</p>
<p>All times Central</p>
<p>Aug. 9, at Carolina (Wed), 6:30</p>
<p>Aug. 19, NEW ENGLAND (Sat), 7:00</p>
<p>Aug. 26, at New Orleans (Sat), 7:00</p>
<p>Aug. 31, DALLAS (Thu), 7:00</p>
<p>QUARTERBACKS: Starter — Tom Savage. Backups — <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Brandon-Weeden/" type="external">Brandon Weeden</a>, Deshaun Watson.</p>
<p>Savage has a lot to prove as the Texans’ new starter. He has had durability issues and hasn’t thrown a touchdown pass in an actual game. Watson is a multi-dimensional option down the road, but Savage has been named the starter and it’s not an open competition. Weeden is a reliable option who’s won games for the Texans in the past.</p>
<p>RUNNING BACKS: Starters — <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Lamar-Miller/" type="external">Lamar Miller</a>, FB Jay Prosch. Backups — D’Onta Foreman, Akeem Hunt, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Alfred-Blue/" type="external">Alfred Blue</a>, Tyler Ervin, Dare Ogunbowale.</p>
<p>The Texans want to be more judicious with Miller’s workload after he wore down at the end of last season. When healthy, Miller is one of the better backs in the NFL. Prosch plays mostly on special teams but is a rugged lead blocker when called upon. Foreman was recently arrested on drug and gun charges and was overweight in the spring. He enters camp in coach Bill O’Brien’s doghouse. Hunt has speed to burn. Blue is a solid backup who lacks explosiveness. Ervin has been a nonfactor on offense, but is getting another shot.</p>
<p>TIGHT ENDS: Starter — <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/CJ-Fiedorowicz/" type="external">C.J. Fiedorowicz</a>. Backups — Ryan Griffin, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Stephen_Anderson/" type="external">Stephen Anderson</a>, Zach Conque, RaShaun Allen, Evan Baylis.</p>
<p>Fiedorowicz emerged last season as a productive pass-catcher. He’s always been a stout blocker. Griffin is a big downfield target who can run after the catch.</p>
<p>WIDE RECEIVERS: Starters — <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/DeAndre-Hopkins/" type="external">DeAndre Hopkins</a>, Will Fuller. Backups — Jaelen Strong, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Braxton-Miller/" type="external">Braxton Miller</a>, Wendall Williams, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Chris-Thompson/" type="external">Chris Thompson</a>, Riley McCarron, Justin Hardee, Deante’ Gray, Shaq Hill.</p>
<p>Hopkins is looking for a bounce-back season after his production dipped last year during the failed <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Brock_Osweiler/" type="external">Brock Osweiler</a> experiment. Fuller, the fastest player on the roster, is working to improve his hands after dropping too many passes as a rookie. Miller is a converted quarterback who’s starting to find his groove as a slot receiver. Strong has been a disappointing former third-round pick. He has good size and speed, but has yet to put it all together.</p>
<p>OFFENSIVE LINEMEN: Starters — LT Duane Brown, LG Xavier Su’a-Filo, C Nick Martin, RG <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jeff_Allen/" type="external">Jeff Allen</a>, RT <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Chris_Clark/" type="external">Chris Clark</a>. Backups — T Kendall Lamm, G Chad Slade, G David Quessenberry, C Greg Mancz, T Breno Giacomini, C Erik Austell, C Kyle Fuller, T Laurence Gibson, T Julie’n Davenport, G Josh Walker.</p>
<p>Brown is a three-time Pro Bowl blocker and the anchor of the line, but he opened training camp as a holdout after being absent for the entire offseason due to a contract dispute. Allen had a rough first season but has lost 20 pounds. Su’a-Filo had his best season last year, but his play hasn’t justified his second-round draft status. Martin takes over in the middle and draws high marks from coaches after missing his rookie season with an ankle injury. Clark struggled at right tackle last season and needs to improve. Lamm is a capable swing tackle. Giacomini has to prove he can stay healthy. Mancz gives the Texans quality depth after starting all of last season.</p>
<p>DEFENSIVE LINEMEN: Starters — DLE J.J. Watt, NT D.J. Reader, DRE Jadeveon Clowney. Backups — DT Eli Ankou, DE Christian Covington, DE Matt Godin, DE Joel Heath, DE Carlos Watkins, DE Daniel Ross, DE Ufomba Kamalu, NT Ricky Hatley, DE Brandon Dunn.</p>
<p>Clowney shed his injury-prone reputation last season and consistently disrupted offenses as he was named to the Pro Bowl. Watt is a three-time NFL Defensive Player of the Year who’s made a full recovery from back surgery. Reader is a massive interior presence who takes over as the new starting nose tackle for <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Vince_Wilfork/" type="external">Vince Wilfork</a>. Covington’s forte is stopping the run. The coaching staff likes Heath’s long arms and versatility. Watkins was ultra-productive at Clemson and should fit in well as a rotational defensive lineman.</p>
<p>LINEBACKERS: Starters — WLB Whitney Mercilus, ILB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Brian-Cushing/" type="external">Brian Cushing</a>, ILB Benardrick McKinney, SLB Brennan Scarlett. Backups — ILB Dylan Cole, ILB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Zach-Cunningham/" type="external">Zach Cunningham</a>, OLB Eric Lee, ILB Sio Moore, ILB Brian Peters, OLB Gimel President, OLB Dayon Pratt, ILB Shakeel Rashad, OLB Tony Washington, ILB Avery Williams.</p>
<p>Mercilus is regarded by some scouts as the Texans’ most complete defensive player. He has size, speed and skill. Cushing is regarded as the emotional leader of the defense, but he’s coming off shoulder surgery. McKinney was named second-team All-Pro last season as he led the Texans in tackles and notched five sacks. Cunningham was a tackling machine in college, but needs to upgrade his strength and ability to shed blocks. Scarlett is the new starting strong-side linebacker as the replacement for <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/John_Simon/" type="external">John Simon</a>. Peters operates as the special-teams ace.</p>
<p>DEFENSIVE BACKS: Starters — LCB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Johnathan-Joseph/" type="external">Johnathan Joseph</a>, RCB Kareem Jackson, FS Andre Hal, SS Corey Moore. Backups — CB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Kevin_Johnson/" type="external">Kevin Johnson</a>, CB Robert Nelson, CB Dee Virgin, CB Marcus Roberson, CB Denzel Rice, S Kurtis Drummond, S Lonnie Ballentine, S K.J. Dillon, S Eddie Pleasant, CB Bryce Jones, CB Treston Decoud.</p>
<p>Joseph returns for his 12th season and is a two-time Pro Bowl selection who’s healthier this year. Hal lost his starting job last season but regained it during a down year in pass coverage and tackling. Jackson is aggressive and got picked on some in single coverage. Johnson is fully recovered from a broken foot that required surgery. Moore is a fast, sound tackler, but doesn’t make many plays in pass coverage. Ballentine has had chronic injuries. Dillon is a hard hitter but is not expected to be fully ready for training camp. Decoud is a prototypical big corner who excels in press coverage. Nelson could step in as a nickel back after intercepting <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Andrew-Luck/" type="external">Andrew Luck</a> once last season. Rice has good size and speed, but needs to keep improving his understanding of coverages.</p>
<p>SPECIAL TEAMS: K <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Nick_Novak/" type="external">Nick Novak</a>, P Shane Lechler, LS Jon Weeks, KOR Tyler Ervin, PR Will Fuller, K Ka’imi Fairbairn, P Cory Carter.</p>
<p>Novak is a very accurate clutch kicker who keeps bailing out a horrendous red-zone offense. Lechler is one of the top punters in NFL history, seemingly ageless with strong hang time and distance. Fairbairn is expected to push Novak in camp, but Novak is the favorite to win the job. Weeks is a former Pro Bowl selection who remains one of the top long snappers in the NFL. Ervin had ball-security issues as a rookie. Fuller is explosive, but needs to stay healthy to have a full-time role on offense and returning punts.</p> | false | 1 | white sulphur springs wva full houston texans roster reported duty greenbrier resort tuesday july 25 attention savage rookie quarterback one best defensive lineman nfl history must prove play texans head coach bill obrien named tom savage starting quarterback rookie deshaun watson must gain seasoning texans consider changing status best team admitted watson former clemson standout heisman trophy finalist davey obrien manning award winner claimed espy month best male college athlete coach ob knows lot football hes best one best nfl history tom brady knows everything operated knows perfect timing knows right wrong meanwhile jj watt threetime nfl defensive player year must show return semblance former greatness stay healthy undergoing pair back surgeries repair herniated disk watt contact drills yet fully cleared participated offseason practices health paramount nfls topranked defense opening camp without drama tackle duane brown wants new contract despite two years remaining current deal officially holdout placed teams reservedid report list brown also absent teams june mandatory minicamp scheduled salaries 94 million year 975 million 2018 top summer battle public media attention focused allimportant quarterback position watts return one key battles watch camp summer strong safety highlycontested battle starting job corey moore lonnie ballentine perhaps later kj dillon healthy moore returns starting experience held solidly last season didnt make many big plays ballentine prototypical size speed keeps getting hurt dillon recovering torn acl suffered rookie last year training camp greenbrier white sulphur springs wva coach bill obrien 4th season texansnfl head coach 2823 overall 12 postseason 2016 finish 1st afc south 97 statistics total offense 3147 29th rushing 1162 8th passing 1985 29th total defense 3013 1st rushing 997 12th passing 2016 2nd times central aug 9 carolina wed 630 aug 19 new england sat 700 aug 26 new orleans sat 700 aug 31 dallas thu 700 quarterbacks starter tom savage backups brandon weeden deshaun watson savage lot prove texans new starter durability issues hasnt thrown touchdown pass actual game watson multidimensional option road savage named starter open competition weeden reliable option whos games texans past running backs starters lamar miller fb jay prosch backups donta foreman akeem hunt alfred blue tyler ervin dare ogunbowale texans want judicious millers workload wore end last season healthy miller one better backs nfl prosch plays mostly special teams rugged lead blocker called upon foreman recently arrested drug gun charges overweight spring enters camp coach bill obriens doghouse hunt speed burn blue solid backup lacks explosiveness ervin nonfactor offense getting another shot tight ends starter cj fiedorowicz backups ryan griffin stephen anderson zach conque rashaun allen evan baylis fiedorowicz emerged last season productive passcatcher hes always stout blocker griffin big downfield target run catch wide receivers starters deandre hopkins fuller backups jaelen strong braxton miller wendall williams chris thompson riley mccarron justin hardee deante gray shaq hill hopkins looking bounceback season production dipped last year failed brock osweiler experiment fuller fastest player roster working improve hands dropping many passes rookie miller converted quarterback whos starting find groove slot receiver strong disappointing former thirdround pick good size speed yet put together offensive linemen starters lt duane brown lg xavier suafilo c nick martin rg jeff allen rt chris clark backups kendall lamm g chad slade g david quessenberry c greg mancz breno giacomini c erik austell c kyle fuller laurence gibson julien davenport g josh walker brown threetime pro bowl blocker anchor line opened training camp holdout absent entire offseason due contract dispute allen rough first season lost 20 pounds suafilo best season last year play hasnt justified secondround draft status martin takes middle draws high marks coaches missing rookie season ankle injury clark struggled right tackle last season needs improve lamm capable swing tackle giacomini prove stay healthy mancz gives texans quality depth starting last season defensive linemen starters dle jj watt nt dj reader dre jadeveon clowney backups dt eli ankou de christian covington de matt godin de joel heath de carlos watkins de daniel ross de ufomba kamalu nt ricky hatley de brandon dunn clowney shed injuryprone reputation last season consistently disrupted offenses named pro bowl watt threetime nfl defensive player year whos made full recovery back surgery reader massive interior presence takes new starting nose tackle vince wilfork covingtons forte stopping run coaching staff likes heaths long arms versatility watkins ultraproductive clemson fit well rotational defensive lineman linebackers starters wlb whitney mercilus ilb brian cushing ilb benardrick mckinney slb brennan scarlett backups ilb dylan cole ilb zach cunningham olb eric lee ilb sio moore ilb brian peters olb gimel president olb dayon pratt ilb shakeel rashad olb tony washington ilb avery williams mercilus regarded scouts texans complete defensive player size speed skill cushing regarded emotional leader defense hes coming shoulder surgery mckinney named secondteam allpro last season led texans tackles notched five sacks cunningham tackling machine college needs upgrade strength ability shed blocks scarlett new starting strongside linebacker replacement john simon peters operates specialteams ace defensive backs starters lcb johnathan joseph rcb kareem jackson fs andre hal ss corey moore backups cb kevin johnson cb robert nelson cb dee virgin cb marcus roberson cb denzel rice kurtis drummond lonnie ballentine kj dillon eddie pleasant cb bryce jones cb treston decoud joseph returns 12th season twotime pro bowl selection whos healthier year hal lost starting job last season regained year pass coverage tackling jackson aggressive got picked single coverage johnson fully recovered broken foot required surgery moore fast sound tackler doesnt make many plays pass coverage ballentine chronic injuries dillon hard hitter expected fully ready training camp decoud prototypical big corner excels press coverage nelson could step nickel back intercepting andrew luck last season rice good size speed needs keep improving understanding coverages special teams k nick novak p shane lechler ls jon weeks kor tyler ervin pr fuller k kaimi fairbairn p cory carter novak accurate clutch kicker keeps bailing horrendous redzone offense lechler one top punters nfl history seemingly ageless strong hang time distance fairbairn expected push novak camp novak favorite win job weeks former pro bowl selection remains one top long snappers nfl ervin ballsecurity issues rookie fuller explosive needs stay healthy fulltime role offense returning punts | 1,019 |
<p>Voters will weigh many factors when assessing the Republican candidates for president in 2016, including their professional experience, leadership qualities, political dispositions, and other important attributes.</p>
<p>These are all important considerations, of course. But governing is mainly a question of deciding on a policy and then implementing it. And so voters will be eager to hear what the candidates would actually do if elected.</p>
<p>To date, most of the candidates have been focused on introducing themselves to voters and providing an overall sense of their governing philosophies. Many of the announced or likely candidates currently are in office, or have run for president previously, and thus have a record that provides a guide to the kinds of policies they would support if elected. But that’s not the same thing as articulating specific plans to address the big issues of the moment.</p>
<p>There have been some notable exceptions to the general absence of specific plans. Governor Chris Christie — not yet a candidate — has spelled out plans for <a href="http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/christie_factsheet.pdf" type="external">long-term entitlement reform</a> and for <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/my-plan-to-raise-growth-and-incomes-1431387102" type="external">reforming taxes and boosting economic growth</a>. Senator Marco Rubio, in a series of speeches and articles, has proposed specific <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/mike-lee-and-marco-rubio-pro-growth-pro-family-tax-reform-1425426777" type="external">reforms for the tax code</a>, Social Security, health care, and low-income programs. And Senator Rand Paul <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/blow-up-the-tax-code-and-start-over-1434582592" type="external">announced his own tax plan</a> recently in a Wall Street Journal editorial.</p>
<p>But, by and large, most of the candidates still haven’t said very much about what exactly they would do if elected. That is likely to change as the jockeying intensifies in the run-up to the first debate on August 6.</p>
<p>As the candidates reveal more in the coming weeks, GOP primary voters should keep what follows in mind when they hear the politicians make promises about taxes, Obamacare, and the federal budget.</p>
<p>Taxes. Most if not all of the serious GOP candidates will promise to cut and reform taxes to boost economic growth, and it is good that there is relative unanimity on this point. But there’s a big difference between a realistic, pro-growth tax policy and one that promises the moon but will never get enacted.</p>
<p>Take, for instance, Senator Rand Paul’s flat-tax proposal. He would displace today’s income, payroll, and other lesser taxes with a 14.5 percent tax that applies to all income above $50,000 per year. The plan sounds great to some voters because it would eliminate all of the complexity of current law. But it stands no chance of getting enacted for two reasons. First, it’s too big of a tax cut for the highest earners. No matter how many deductions and credits are eliminated, if you lower the top rate from over 40 percent today (including the tax hikes in Obamacare) to 14.5 percent, the result will be big tax reductions for the well-to-do. Second, the revenue loss would be massive. Senator Paul says his plan would cut taxes by $2 trillion over a decade, and that’s assuming it will boost growth by more than 1 percent annually. Independent assessments will show the revenue loss to be far higher than $2 trillion. But even at $2 trillion, it cannot be accommodated within a realistic fiscal plan. An aggressive program of spending restraint, aimed mainly at entitlements, could cut hundreds of billions out of the budget over the coming decade, but much of that is needed to prevent deficits and debt from spiraling out of control.</p>
<p>The country needs a pro-growth tax-reform plan that is appealing to the broad middle class and cuts taxes by hundreds of billions, not trillions, of dollars over a decade.</p>
<p>Obamacare. It is near certain that all of the GOP candidates will run hard against Obamacare and promise to roll it back. But if a candidate cannot articulate a coherent plan to replace Obamacare, then his pledges to repeal it are largely empty. Most Americans disapprove of Obamacare, but they don’t want to go back to the pre-Obamacare status quo either. They want reform, just not the government-dominated version that passed in 2010.</p>
<p>To be credible, a replacement plan will need to have a reasonable approach to providing secure and affordable insurance to people with expensive pre-existing conditions, and a way to broaden insurance enrollment to the uninsured without the mandates and bureaucracy of Obamacare. And, to avoid the mistake of Senator John McCain in 2008, the plan should not upend employer-based health insurance for the tens of millions of Americans enrolled in those plans.</p>
<p>Fortunately, there are already two Obamacare replacement plans in Congress that meet these tests: <a href="http://energycommerce.house.gov/sites/republicans.energycommerce.house.gov/files/114/20150205-PCARE-Act-Plan.pdf" type="external">the plan introduced by senators Richard Burr and Orrin Hatch along with Representative&#160;Fred Upton</a>, and <a href="http://tomprice.house.gov/sites/tomprice.house.gov/files/Section%20by%20Section%20of%20HR%202300%20Empowering%20Patients%20First%20Act%202015.pdf" type="external">the plan introduced by Representative Tom Price</a>. The GOP candidate that embraces one of these plans, and modifies it to make it his own, will have gone a long way to winning the policy debate on health care.</p>
<p>The Federal Budget. Most of the GOP candidates will be promising tax cuts and defense increases as well as low deficits and maybe even a balanced budget. How will they make it all work? If their answer is cuts in foreign aid, congressional pay, and the federal bureaucracy, they shouldn’t be taken seriously.</p>
<p>The federal budget is driven by entitlement spending. It is not possible to cut taxes, or even just hold the line on them, without proposing ways to slow the growth of the major health entitlements and Social Security over the medium and long term. There’s no particular reason a Republican candidate needs to promise to balance the budget within ten years. The near-term priority should be stronger economic growth and putting a stop to the debt hemorrhage of the past eight years. But it is necessary to begin restraining entitlements now to prevent a fiscal and economic catastrophe in ten or 15 years’ time.</p>
<p>***</p>
<p>The 2016 election will present an opportunity for a presidential candidate to offer the country an ambitious vision of government reform. Among other things, that will mean tax reform to promote growth, a replacement plan for Obamacare that delivers lower costs and better health care, and a budget plan that steers the country away from fiscal ruin.</p>
<p>All of that is doable, but it has to be pursued as part of a realistic plan, not a pipedream. It is the job of GOP primary voters to find the candidate who is best able to articulate this kind of plan and has the leadership skills to make it happen.</p>
<p>—&#160;James C. Capretta is a <a href="" type="internal">senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center</a> and a <a href="http://www.aei.org/scholar/james-c-capretta/" type="external">visiting fellow at the American Enterprise Institute</a>.</p> | false | 1 | voters weigh many factors assessing republican candidates president 2016 including professional experience leadership qualities political dispositions important attributes important considerations course governing mainly question deciding policy implementing voters eager hear candidates would actually elected date candidates focused introducing voters providing overall sense governing philosophies many announced likely candidates currently office run president previously thus record provides guide kinds policies would support elected thats thing articulating specific plans address big issues moment notable exceptions general absence specific plans governor chris christie yet candidate spelled plans longterm entitlement reform reforming taxes boosting economic growth senator marco rubio series speeches articles proposed specific reforms tax code social security health care lowincome programs senator rand paul announced tax plan recently wall street journal editorial large candidates still havent said much exactly would elected likely change jockeying intensifies runup first debate august 6 candidates reveal coming weeks gop primary voters keep follows mind hear politicians make promises taxes obamacare federal budget taxes serious gop candidates promise cut reform taxes boost economic growth good relative unanimity point theres big difference realistic progrowth tax policy one promises moon never get enacted take instance senator rand pauls flattax proposal would displace todays income payroll lesser taxes 145 percent tax applies income 50000 per year plan sounds great voters would eliminate complexity current law stands chance getting enacted two reasons first big tax cut highest earners matter many deductions credits eliminated lower top rate 40 percent today including tax hikes obamacare 145 percent result big tax reductions welltodo second revenue loss would massive senator paul says plan would cut taxes 2 trillion decade thats assuming boost growth 1 percent annually independent assessments show revenue loss far higher 2 trillion even 2 trillion accommodated within realistic fiscal plan aggressive program spending restraint aimed mainly entitlements could cut hundreds billions budget coming decade much needed prevent deficits debt spiraling control country needs progrowth taxreform plan appealing broad middle class cuts taxes hundreds billions trillions dollars decade obamacare near certain gop candidates run hard obamacare promise roll back candidate articulate coherent plan replace obamacare pledges repeal largely empty americans disapprove obamacare dont want go back preobamacare status quo either want reform governmentdominated version passed 2010 credible replacement plan need reasonable approach providing secure affordable insurance people expensive preexisting conditions way broaden insurance enrollment uninsured without mandates bureaucracy obamacare avoid mistake senator john mccain 2008 plan upend employerbased health insurance tens millions americans enrolled plans fortunately already two obamacare replacement plans congress meet tests plan introduced senators richard burr orrin hatch along representative160fred upton plan introduced representative tom price gop candidate embraces one plans modifies make gone long way winning policy debate health care federal budget gop candidates promising tax cuts defense increases well low deficits maybe even balanced budget make work answer cuts foreign aid congressional pay federal bureaucracy shouldnt taken seriously federal budget driven entitlement spending possible cut taxes even hold line without proposing ways slow growth major health entitlements social security medium long term theres particular reason republican candidate needs promise balance budget within ten years nearterm priority stronger economic growth putting stop debt hemorrhage past eight years necessary begin restraining entitlements prevent fiscal economic catastrophe ten 15 years time 2016 election present opportunity presidential candidate offer country ambitious vision government reform among things mean tax reform promote growth replacement plan obamacare delivers lower costs better health care budget plan steers country away fiscal ruin doable pursued part realistic plan pipedream job gop primary voters find candidate best able articulate kind plan leadership skills make happen 160james c capretta senior fellow ethics public policy center visiting fellow american enterprise institute | 600 |
<p>Richard Wagner (1813-83) remains, and likely will long remain, one of the three greatest operatic composers who have ever lived, and he enjoys a particular following among intellectuals of the highest brow, who have been known to condescend to his only real rivals, Mozart and Verdi, the former as an elegant confectioner oblivious to the call of modernity, the latter as an inspired organ-grinder cranking out agreeable tunes to accompany the consumption of huge vats of pasta.</p>
<p>That Wagner declared himself “the most German of Germans,” that he regularly cleared his throat for a juicy anti-Semitic spit, that many of those musically reverent highest brows have been capped by spiked helmets real or imaginary, and that Hitler adulated Wagner as no other leading political man has ever adulated another artist–such considerations have complicated or qualified the admiration for his operas, or turned it to flaming hatred. The public performance of Wagner’s works was unofficially but strictly prohibited in Israel until 1995, and elsewhere Wagnerism has been assailed as an affront to liberal democratic decency.</p>
<p>Jonathan Carr, an accomplished British journalist and biographer of Gustav Mahler and Helmut Schmidt, has joined his musical and political interests in&#160;The Wagner Clan,&#160;an excellent family biography that honors the artistic genius and reviles the political venom of Richard Wagner’s legacy. An ironclad family rule enjoined that the Master’s descendants had to be faithful disciples if they were not to be deemed apostates, and living up to one’s heritage was as much an ordeal for some as living it down was to others.</p>
<p>To be a Wagner was (and perhaps still is) to belong by birth to the highest reaches of the artistic aristocracy, preserving and transmitting the founder’s renown down the generations, through the institution of the Bayreuth Festival, administered by the family and dedicated to his finest works. It was a proud fate and also a sad one, for one could never hope to be more than an epigone, in the service and in the shadow of the patriarch. Indeed, even to speak of the Wagner family as a heritable artistic nobility is a misnomer, because the true nobility belongs to the singular creator alone, and certainly ought not extend to the mere curators or interpreters of his masterpieces, even if they happen to be connected by blood and adept at their subordinate roles.</p>
<p>One cannot justly write of Richard Wagner’s art without mentioning nobility, though that is what Carr does; for however repugnant his stated opinions and personal behavior often were–the index of Carr’s book points the reader to Wagner’s coarseness, ill-temper, lying, pettiness, philandering, ruthless egocentricity, self-hatred, spitefulness, sycophancy, thanklessness, and vindictiveness–his operas have to do with the noblest men and women undergoing the hardest trials of body and spirit.</p>
<p>There is a magnificent strain in the art of democratic times, redefining nobility for an age that has done away with the conventional nobility of birth. Mozart’s Count Almaviva in&#160;Le nozze di Figaro&#160;overcoming his lust and boredom and recovering his exalted love for his wife; Beethoven’s Leonore in&#160;Fidelio&#160;saving her husband from a tyrant’s dungeon; Goethe’s Wilhelm Meister being guided by a secret brotherhood of the wise and virtuous toward happiness in love and work; Schiller’s (and Verdi’s) Marquis de Posa in&#160;Don Carlos&#160;giving his life for the cause of freedom and inspiring his friend the Spanish prince to similar daring–these superb men and women embody this newfound nobility and the hope that moral grandeur like theirs will flourish under the egalitarian dispensation.</p>
<p>Where Mozart, Beethoven, Goethe, and Schiller were writing in the exhilarating days of democracy’s youth, Wagner is at work in the less appealing prime of democratic laissez-faire capitalism. George Bernard Shaw wrote in&#160;The Perfect Wagnerite(1898), still one of the best readings of the monumental tetralogy&#160;Der Ring des Nibelungen, that Wagner’s “picture of Niblunghome under the reign of Alberic [sic] is a poetic version of unregulated industrial capitalism as it was made known in Germany in the middle of the nineteenth century by Engels’s&#160;The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844.”</p>
<p>For the sometime socialist revolutionary Wagner, who numbered the anarchist Mikhail Bakunin among his firebrand comrades during the insurrection in Dresden in 1848, and who was compelled to go into exile for 11 years afterward, dire capitalist darkness required, by way of heroic contrast, love and courage resplendent as a thousand suns.</p>
<p>So Wagner elevates his heroes and heroines still higher than his noble artistic predecessors did, to the plane of the superhuman. Lohengrin in the 1850 opera of that name is an ideal knight who appears from nowhere in a boat pulled by a swan to save a damsel in distress, and his chivalric prowess proves to be the work of the Holy Grail’s sacred magic–music of what Thomas Mann called a silver-blue hue evokes shining manly virtue and fateful love.</p>
<p>In&#160;Tristan und Isolde&#160;(1865)&#160;the nonpareil knight and the Irish princess drink a love potion that launches them into transports exceeding by far not only the hottest operatic passions of other composers but, indeed, the known bounds of human longing. Death alone can rightfully consummate such desire, and Isolde’s climactic&#160;Liebestod, as she joins her slain lover in night’s kingdom, is music of incomparable, harrowing rapture.</p>
<p>In the&#160;Ring&#160;(1869-1876),&#160;Siegfried, the human grandson of the supreme god Wotan, literally does not know what fear is, slays the dragon Fafner guarding the hoard of gold that represents the moral tribulation of gods and men and dwarfish Nibelungs, wins the love of Wotan’s disowned daughter Brünnhilde by plunging through the wall of magic fire with which her father surrounded her, and is murdered by a treacherous spear thrust in the back, earning a funeral march as majestic in its keening as that in Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony.</p>
<p>The eponymous hero of&#160;Parsifal&#160;(1882),&#160;“a pure fool, knowing through compassion,” resists the seduction of the immemorial temptress Kundry, who has woefully roamed the earth in various incarnations since mocking Christ on the&#160;via dolorosa, and foils the evil wizardry of Klingsor, a renegade knight of the Grail, catching in mid-air the spear that Klingsor hurls at him and that had once pierced Christ’s side, and making the sign of the cross with it. Parsifal’s rule revives the moribund Order of the Grail, and the opera–which Wagner declared was not an opera at all but a “stage-consecrating festival play”–ends with the elevation of the Grail, the chalice that was used at the Last Supper and into which Christ’s blood flowed when He was on the cross, to music that answers the human cry for the numinous with a heart-wringing imperious warmth.</p>
<p>That so illustrious an artist as Wagner should be a moral imbecile is not a unique turn of events, but it is a profoundly disheartening one. Wagner was a very public Jew-hater, and his anti-Semitism was so intense and pervasive that it appears to have leached into his best operas. His most defensive defenders squirm every which way to deny it, but it is pretty well undeniable that villains such as Kundry, Alberich, and Mime in the&#160;Ring,&#160;and Beckmesser in&#160;Die Meistersinger, are Jewish caricatures.</p>
<p>The origins of Wagner’s hatred bubble in the usual darkness. Poverty early in his career did not prevent him from indulging expensive tastes, and the need to borrow money led him to “Jewis h scum” when “our people” failed to extend him credit. His resentment of the moneylenders and pawnbrokers was outdone, however, by his hatred for Giacomo Meyerbeer, the titanically successful operatic composer whom he imitated in the 1847&#160;Rienzi, whose support he importuned and received, and whom he repudiated in a letter to Robert Schumann as “a source whose very smell I find repulsive.”</p>
<p>In his 1850 pamphlet&#160;Jewishness in Music, written to settle Meyerbeer’s hash, Wagner derided the “gurgle, yodel, and cackle” of Hebrew sacred song, compared the effect of “Judaic works of music” to that of a Goethe poem rendered in Yiddish, and adjudged Jewish attempts to make art as issuing in “coldness and indifference, even to the point of triviality and absurdity.” His own success did not mellow him; the swamp fever only got worse with age. The so-called “regeneration” essays he wrote late in life, Carr declares,</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>railed against Jewish influence in the press, scorned state moves to bring about full Jewish emancipation, and even called Jews “the plastic demon of the decline of mankind.” It is hard to be sure just what he meant by “plastic demon,” but it sounds pretty dreadful and that, no doubt, was the main thing.</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>In private he was even more malignant: His wife Cosima (1837-1930) records in her notorious diary that, in 1881 at a performance of Lessing’s rather preachy play advocating tolerance toward the Jews,&#160;Nathan the Wise, Wagner said jocularly that such a performance would be just the occasion to round the Jews up and burn them all.</p>
<p>Cosima, Wagner’s longtime mistress and second wife, the daughter of Franz Liszt and the alluringly literary French Countess d’Agoult, was even more toxic than her husband, as her diaries and letters prove in abundance. As Carr writes:</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>When there was anything to deplore, from supplies of rotten food for the army to a badly tuned instrument, as like as not Cosima found “Israel” or “Jewish revenge” behind it. She loathed Jewish faces and Jewish beards of which, to her particular irritation, she saw many among the public at performances of Wagner’s works.</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>From 1876, though only intermittently at first, the cynosure of Wagnerian performance was the Bayreuth Festspielhaus, which Wagner had built specifically to stage his own operas, and where to this day only his own operas are staged. The premiere of the&#160;Ring&#160;in its entirety took place before an audience that included Bruckner, Grieg, Saint-Saëns, and Tchaikovsky. The philosophical nobility, for its part, was represented by Nietzsche, who had been Wagner’s friend and devotee but who divined a sinister nationalism to the festival that was a fatal insult to his cosmopolitan sympathies: “What had happened?&#160;Wagner had been translated into German! The Wagnerian had become master of Wagner!–German&#160;art! The&#160;German&#160;Master!&#160;Germanbeer!”</p>
<p>Wagner had, of course, made himself the German Master, but the way the Wagnerians, prominently including members of the clan, mastered even&#160;him&#160;is one of Carr’s rich themes. The foreigners who married into the family were bent on yielding to no one in their fealty to Wagner–and indeed, on proving themselves more German than the Germans. Cosima, who outlived her husband by almost 50 years, directed the festival with a domineering punctilio, seeing to it that music and staging adhered to Wagner’s own specifications, and that as few Jews as possible worked in the sanctum. She protected Wagner’s hallowed reputation from any efforts to stain its purity, discrediting biographers who told of his sexual prowling and general unsavoriness.</p>
<p>Her principal ally in the propagation of holy writ was Houston Stewart Chamberlain (1855-1927), an English polymath who married the Wagners’ daughter Eva. Chamberlain wrote a hagiography of Wagner in 1895, but his 1,100-page best-selling masterwork was&#160;The Foundations of the Nineteenth Century&#160;(1899), which divides humanity into splendid Aryans and pernicious Semites, and argues that since Christ was the essence of goodness, and Jews are the nadir of vileness, He could only have been an Aryan Himself. Kaiser Wilhelm II, who knew choice passages by heart, wrote Chamberlain a gushing fan letter and initiated a correspondence spanning two decades.</p>
<p>In 1923 Chamberlain wrote a fan letter of his own to a political newcomer: “You are not at all as you have been described to me, a fanatic. The fanatic inflames the mind, you warm the heart. .  .  . You have immense achievements ahead of you, but for all your strength of will I do not regard you as a violent man.” The recipient, Adolf Hitler, exulted at this benediction from an intellectual hero and precursor. (Some weeks later he proved Chamberlain wrong on the essentials with his failed beer hall putsch in Munich, which landed him in prison.)</p>
<p>The Wagners’ son Siegfried (1869-1930) and his English-born wife Winifred (1897-1980) happened to be in Munich at the time–Siegfried was conducting one of his own compositions–and witnessed the firefight, in which a dozen Nazis died. In the aftermath Winifred, who had met Hitler not long before, spoke to the now-outlawed Nazi party in Bayreuth, composed an open letter on behalf of all the Wagners in Hitler’s defense, raised money for the families of Nazi jailbirds, got up a local petition with 10,000 signatures demanding Hitler’s freedom, and sent reams of paper to Hitler in prison, where he would write&#160;Mein Kampf.</p>
<p>Winifred conceived a passion for Hitler and his ways that lasted all her very long life; some suspected romance between them, though she denied ever having slept with him. Uncle Wolf, as the family called him, was a frequent caller at the Wagner homestead, Wahnfried. Hitler, who in his youth had first imagined his leading Germany to world mastery upon seeing&#160;Rienzi, was the most ardent enthusiast Wagner ever had. Most of the Wagners reciprocated the enthusiasm: Siegfried and Winifred’s eldest son, Wieland (1917-1966), remarked as a boy that he wished Hitler were his father and Siegfried merely his uncle. Even the snappish family dog took an instant shine to Uncle Wolf.</p>
<p>Siegfried, however, emphatically did&#160;not&#160;cotton to Hitler or to Nazism. Demonstrating an un-Wagnerian cosmopolitan embrace, he replied in 1921 to a newspaper editor who insisted that Jews be barred from the festival:</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>If the Jews are willing to help us that is doubly meritorious, because my father in his writings attacked and offended them. .  .  . On our Bayreuth hill we want to do positive work, not negative. Whether a man is a Chinese, a Negro, an American, an Indian, or a Jew, that is a matter of complete indifference to us.</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>While Hitler and the demented nationalists of the Richard Wagner associations fulminated at the “racial desecration” of a Jew like Friedrich Schorr singing Wotan, Siegfried placed artistic values first, and Schorr is now widely considered the greatest Wotan ever. The gentle, bisexual Siegfried, who wrote 14 operas that have sunk without a trace and conducted 62 performances at Bayreuth, had a remarkable career by any standard but that of genius. He died of a heart attack suffered during a tempestuous Bayreuth rehearsal in 1930. He was one of the best of the Wagners.</p>
<p>Siegfried’s daughter Friedelind (1918-1991) shared his decency, and possessed besides the fearlessness of her father’s heroic namesake. For her courage she was regularly trashed in family circles and beyond as a bad seed. Although as a teenager she partook of the general admiration for Hitler, when war broke out she bolted in disgust for Switzerland, and withstood appalling verbal shelling from her mother, who w as incensed that her defiant daughter should be used for Allied propaganda. Friedelind would move on to England, where she was imprisoned for nine months as an enemy alien, then to Argentina, and finally to the United States, where she worked as a waitress, dishwasher, and secretary, and eventually became an American citizen. She did not return to Bayreuth until 1953, hoping to take over management of the festival.</p>
<p>However, her brothers Wieland and Wolfgang (born in 1919) had been running the festival since its revival in 1951, and they shouldered their sister out of the action. Wolfgang had been wounded in Poland in 1939 and invalided out of the fighting while Wieland had enjoyed the Führer’s special exemption from combat as a person indispensable to the Reich. After the war Wieland flummoxed Winifred with his ingratitude to Uncle Wolf by declaring that he should have joined Friedelind in exile, but he certainly proved indispensable to Bayreuth: From “a notable dabbler,” Carr writes, Wieland turned into “one of the finest producers [stage directors, in American parlance] in the history of theatre.” His characteristic style of stark abstraction tended to ignore his grandfather’s explicit instructions, but made the dramas seem deeper than ever before.</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>Decades later many of the scenes he conceived were still the standard against which newer efforts tended to be measured and found wanting; the menacing outline of the wizard Klingsor in&#160;Parsifal, spotlighted in space like a white spider in a gigantic web; the phallic monolith towering above the doomed lovers in&#160;Tristan; the passionate “outsider” Tannhäuser, dwarfed by the intimidating décor in the hall of Castle Wartburg and looking as vulnerable on the chequered floor as a lonely pawn on a chessboard.</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>When Wieland died at the age of 49, Wolfgang could not hope to match his bold and lustrous ingenuity. Wolfgang’s own ideas tended to fizzle, and as he contracted work out to other directors, many of them fashionable nincompoops, Bayreuth began to languish artistically. Financially, too, there were insuperable difficulties, and in 1973 the family ceded its empire, for 12.5 million Deutsche marks, to the Richard Wagner Foundation Bayreuth. But Wolfgang continues to head the operation, and apparently intends to hand control over to his 30-year-old daughter Katharina. Last year–too late for mention in Carr’s book–with her direction of&#160;Die Meistersinger&#160;at Bayreuth, just the sixth production she had ever directed of anything, Katharina joined the ranks of the fashionable nincompoops with a version that was, by all reasonable accounts, an incoherent fiasco.</p>
<p>Bayreuth remains the hottest ticket there is–would-be patrons wait 10 years for admission–but the light of Richard Wagner’s genius is threatening to go out in the theater he built. The excellence of his art is the only part of his legacy worth preserving, and now his descendants are ruining that, too.</p>
<p>Algis Valiunas is a writer in Florida.</p> | false | 1 | richard wagner 181383 remains likely long remain one three greatest operatic composers ever lived enjoys particular following among intellectuals highest brow known condescend real rivals mozart verdi former elegant confectioner oblivious call modernity latter inspired organgrinder cranking agreeable tunes accompany consumption huge vats pasta wagner declared german germans regularly cleared throat juicy antisemitic spit many musically reverent highest brows capped spiked helmets real imaginary hitler adulated wagner leading political man ever adulated another artistsuch considerations complicated qualified admiration operas turned flaming hatred public performance wagners works unofficially strictly prohibited israel 1995 elsewhere wagnerism assailed affront liberal democratic decency jonathan carr accomplished british journalist biographer gustav mahler helmut schmidt joined musical political interests in160the wagner clan160an excellent family biography honors artistic genius reviles political venom richard wagners legacy ironclad family rule enjoined masters descendants faithful disciples deemed apostates living ones heritage much ordeal living others wagner perhaps still belong birth highest reaches artistic aristocracy preserving transmitting founders renown generations institution bayreuth festival administered family dedicated finest works proud fate also sad one one could never hope epigone service shadow patriarch indeed even speak wagner family heritable artistic nobility misnomer true nobility belongs singular creator alone certainly ought extend mere curators interpreters masterpieces even happen connected blood adept subordinate roles one justly write richard wagners art without mentioning nobility though carr however repugnant stated opinions personal behavior often werethe index carrs book points reader wagners coarseness illtemper lying pettiness philandering ruthless egocentricity selfhatred spitefulness sycophancy thanklessness vindictivenesshis operas noblest men women undergoing hardest trials body spirit magnificent strain art democratic times redefining nobility age done away conventional nobility birth mozarts count almaviva in160le nozze di figaro160overcoming lust boredom recovering exalted love wife beethovens leonore in160fidelio160saving husband tyrants dungeon goethes wilhelm meister guided secret brotherhood wise virtuous toward happiness love work schillers verdis marquis de posa in160don carlos160giving life cause freedom inspiring friend spanish prince similar daringthese superb men women embody newfound nobility hope moral grandeur like flourish egalitarian dispensation mozart beethoven goethe schiller writing exhilarating days democracys youth wagner work less appealing prime democratic laissezfaire capitalism george bernard shaw wrote in160the perfect wagnerite1898 still one best readings monumental tetralogy160der ring des nibelungen wagners picture niblunghome reign alberic sic poetic version unregulated industrial capitalism made known germany middle nineteenth century engelss160the condition working class england 1844 sometime socialist revolutionary wagner numbered anarchist mikhail bakunin among firebrand comrades insurrection dresden 1848 compelled go exile 11 years afterward dire capitalist darkness required way heroic contrast love courage resplendent thousand suns wagner elevates heroes heroines still higher noble artistic predecessors plane superhuman lohengrin 1850 opera name ideal knight appears nowhere boat pulled swan save damsel distress chivalric prowess proves work holy grails sacred magicmusic thomas mann called silverblue hue evokes shining manly virtue fateful love in160tristan und isolde1601865160the nonpareil knight irish princess drink love potion launches transports exceeding far hottest operatic passions composers indeed known bounds human longing death alone rightfully consummate desire isoldes climactic160liebestod joins slain lover nights kingdom music incomparable harrowing rapture the160ring16018691876160siegfried human grandson supreme god wotan literally know fear slays dragon fafner guarding hoard gold represents moral tribulation gods men dwarfish nibelungs wins love wotans disowned daughter brünnhilde plunging wall magic fire father surrounded murdered treacherous spear thrust back earning funeral march majestic keening beethovens eroica symphony eponymous hero of160parsifal1601882160a pure fool knowing compassion resists seduction immemorial temptress kundry woefully roamed earth various incarnations since mocking christ the160via dolorosa foils evil wizardry klingsor renegade knight grail catching midair spear klingsor hurls pierced christs side making sign cross parsifals rule revives moribund order grail operawhich wagner declared opera stageconsecrating festival playends elevation grail chalice used last supper christs blood flowed cross music answers human cry numinous heartwringing imperious warmth illustrious artist wagner moral imbecile unique turn events profoundly disheartening one wagner public jewhater antisemitism intense pervasive appears leached best operas defensive defenders squirm every way deny pretty well undeniable villains kundry alberich mime the160ring160and beckmesser in160die meistersinger jewish caricatures origins wagners hatred bubble usual darkness poverty early career prevent indulging expensive tastes need borrow money led jewis h scum people failed extend credit resentment moneylenders pawnbrokers outdone however hatred giacomo meyerbeer titanically successful operatic composer imitated 1847160rienzi whose support importuned received repudiated letter robert schumann source whose smell find repulsive 1850 pamphlet160jewishness music written settle meyerbeers hash wagner derided gurgle yodel cackle hebrew sacred song compared effect judaic works music goethe poem rendered yiddish adjudged jewish attempts make art issuing coldness indifference even point triviality absurdity success mellow swamp fever got worse age socalled regeneration essays wrote late life carr declares 160 railed jewish influence press scorned state moves bring full jewish emancipation even called jews plastic demon decline mankind hard sure meant plastic demon sounds pretty dreadful doubt main thing 160 private even malignant wife cosima 18371930 records notorious diary 1881 performance lessings rather preachy play advocating tolerance toward jews160nathan wise wagner said jocularly performance would occasion round jews burn cosima wagners longtime mistress second wife daughter franz liszt alluringly literary french countess dagoult even toxic husband diaries letters prove abundance carr writes 160 anything deplore supplies rotten food army badly tuned instrument like cosima found israel jewish revenge behind loathed jewish faces jewish beards particular irritation saw many among public performances wagners works 160 1876 though intermittently first cynosure wagnerian performance bayreuth festspielhaus wagner built specifically stage operas day operas staged premiere the160ring160in entirety took place audience included bruckner grieg saintsaëns tchaikovsky philosophical nobility part represented nietzsche wagners friend devotee divined sinister nationalism festival fatal insult cosmopolitan sympathies happened160wagner translated german wagnerian become master wagnergerman160art the160german160master160germanbeer wagner course made german master way wagnerians prominently including members clan mastered even160him160is one carrs rich themes foreigners married family bent yielding one fealty wagnerand indeed proving german germans cosima outlived husband almost 50 years directed festival domineering punctilio seeing music staging adhered wagners specifications jews possible worked sanctum protected wagners hallowed reputation efforts stain purity discrediting biographers told sexual prowling general unsavoriness principal ally propagation holy writ houston stewart chamberlain 18551927 english polymath married wagners daughter eva chamberlain wrote hagiography wagner 1895 1100page bestselling masterwork was160the foundations nineteenth century1601899 divides humanity splendid aryans pernicious semites argues since christ essence goodness jews nadir vileness could aryan kaiser wilhelm ii knew choice passages heart wrote chamberlain gushing fan letter initiated correspondence spanning two decades 1923 chamberlain wrote fan letter political newcomer described fanatic fanatic inflames mind warm heart immense achievements ahead strength regard violent man recipient adolf hitler exulted benediction intellectual hero precursor weeks later proved chamberlain wrong essentials failed beer hall putsch munich landed prison wagners son siegfried 18691930 englishborn wife winifred 18971980 happened munich timesiegfried conducting one compositionsand witnessed firefight dozen nazis died aftermath winifred met hitler long spoke nowoutlawed nazi party bayreuth composed open letter behalf wagners hitlers defense raised money families nazi jailbirds got local petition 10000 signatures demanding hitlers freedom sent reams paper hitler prison would write160mein kampf winifred conceived passion hitler ways lasted long life suspected romance though denied ever slept uncle wolf family called frequent caller wagner homestead wahnfried hitler youth first imagined leading germany world mastery upon seeing160rienzi ardent enthusiast wagner ever wagners reciprocated enthusiasm siegfried winifreds eldest son wieland 19171966 remarked boy wished hitler father siegfried merely uncle even snappish family dog took instant shine uncle wolf siegfried however emphatically did160not160cotton hitler nazism demonstrating unwagnerian cosmopolitan embrace replied 1921 newspaper editor insisted jews barred festival 160 jews willing help us doubly meritorious father writings attacked offended bayreuth hill want positive work negative whether man chinese negro american indian jew matter complete indifference us 160 hitler demented nationalists richard wagner associations fulminated racial desecration jew like friedrich schorr singing wotan siegfried placed artistic values first schorr widely considered greatest wotan ever gentle bisexual siegfried wrote 14 operas sunk without trace conducted 62 performances bayreuth remarkable career standard genius died heart attack suffered tempestuous bayreuth rehearsal 1930 one best wagners siegfrieds daughter friedelind 19181991 shared decency possessed besides fearlessness fathers heroic namesake courage regularly trashed family circles beyond bad seed although teenager partook general admiration hitler war broke bolted disgust switzerland withstood appalling verbal shelling mother w incensed defiant daughter used allied propaganda friedelind would move england imprisoned nine months enemy alien argentina finally united states worked waitress dishwasher secretary eventually became american citizen return bayreuth 1953 hoping take management festival however brothers wieland wolfgang born 1919 running festival since revival 1951 shouldered sister action wolfgang wounded poland 1939 invalided fighting wieland enjoyed führers special exemption combat person indispensable reich war wieland flummoxed winifred ingratitude uncle wolf declaring joined friedelind exile certainly proved indispensable bayreuth notable dabbler carr writes wieland turned one finest producers stage directors american parlance history theatre characteristic style stark abstraction tended ignore grandfathers explicit instructions made dramas seem deeper ever 160 decades later many scenes conceived still standard newer efforts tended measured found wanting menacing outline wizard klingsor in160parsifal spotlighted space like white spider gigantic web phallic monolith towering doomed lovers in160tristan passionate outsider tannhäuser dwarfed intimidating décor hall castle wartburg looking vulnerable chequered floor lonely pawn chessboard 160 wieland died age 49 wolfgang could hope match bold lustrous ingenuity wolfgangs ideas tended fizzle contracted work directors many fashionable nincompoops bayreuth began languish artistically financially insuperable difficulties 1973 family ceded empire 125 million deutsche marks richard wagner foundation bayreuth wolfgang continues head operation apparently intends hand control 30yearold daughter katharina last yeartoo late mention carrs bookwith direction of160die meistersinger160at bayreuth sixth production ever directed anything katharina joined ranks fashionable nincompoops version reasonable accounts incoherent fiasco bayreuth remains hottest ticket iswouldbe patrons wait 10 years admissionbut light richard wagners genius threatening go theater built excellence art part legacy worth preserving descendants ruining algis valiunas writer florida | 1,610 |
<p />
<p>When the first Arab Human Development Report (AHDR) was published in 2002, a star glistened in a vast, gloomy sky. The fact that a UN-sponsored report authored by independent Arab scholars would receive so much attention in Arab media was in itself a promising start. The fact that such terminology as human security, personal security, economic security, etc - as highlighted in the report - would even compete with the largely ceremonial news bulletins' headlines in many Arab countries was in itself an achievement. But then, the star quickly faded, the terms became clich's, and the report, published seven times since then, became a haunting reminder of how bad things really are in the Arab World.</p>
<p>Those who wish to discredit Arab countries, individually or as a collective, now find in these reports plenty of reasons to fuel their constant diatribes; those who genuinely care and wish for things to improve are either silent or muted.</p>
<p>The last report, sponsored, like the rest, by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) was published in July 2009. It was the grimmest. Its statistics are intriguing, although depressing. 2.9 million square kilometers of land in the Arab World are threatened by desertification. Natural resources are depleting at an alarming level. Birth rates are the highest in the world. Unemployment is skyrocketing. 50 million new jobs must be created by 2020. Arab oil-based economies leave some Arab countries entirely vulnerable to market price fluctuations or the depletion of oil altogether. While many economies, especially in Asia are shifting or have already achieved great strides into becoming knowledge-based economies, Arab economies are still hostage to the same cycle of oil and cheap labor. In fact, 70 percent of the Arab region's total exports, according to the report, is oil.</p>
<p>The problem is not just economic, or environmental, it's societal as well. Inequality is entrenched in many Arab societies. Women's rights are not the only individual rights violated. Men's right are violated too, that is if they are not members of the dominant group, which are either divided by blind political allegiance, tribal or sectarian membership, or economic leverage.</p>
<p>Admittedly, Arab societies are, of course, not the only societies that suffer from these ills, but sadly, the problems of Arab countries are most convoluted, accentuated by the fact that there is little action to rectify the problem, neither at individual country's level or using joint platforms, for instance, the Arab League. Why didn't the Arab League hold an emergency summit following the release of the first or even the last AHDR report? One would think that problems of such magnitude, ones that affect the lives of 330 million people, are pressing enough for such gatherings.</p>
<p>Arab media has been highlighting the issue and the shortcomings, some media outlets more than others. But the discussion is largely political, at times a mere attempt at discrediting this government or that leader, and are still conducted in general terms. The latest report for example was supplemented by opinion polls conducted in four Arab countries - Kuwait, Lebanon, Morocco and occupied Palestine. One need not emphasize the different human development challenges in these countries, situated in diverse geopolitical settings. One cannot possibly devise the same solution to a country occupied by a foreign army, to an independent country with untold oil wealth, to a third with immense human potential but dire poverty.</p>
<p>&lt;img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-2374" style="margin: 5px;" title="arab-girl-student" src="https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/arab-girl-student.jpg" alt="arab-girl-student" width="300" height="169" srcset="https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/arab-girl-student.jpg 300w, https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/arab-girl-student-150x85.jpg 150w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" /&gt; Generalized problems can only obtain generalized, thus superficial solutions. Therefore, it has been summarily decided that the problem lies in lack of education, not the inequitable and unrepresentative political systems. Education became the buzz word, as if education is a detached value; therefore, education cities are erected in Arab countries that can easily afford importing the best teachers and curricula money can buy. More, research institutions are also making appearances in various Arab capitals. Those existing in rich Arab countries are operated largely by foreigners, whose sense of priority lies, naturally, elsewhere. One fails to grasp the wisdom.</p>
<p>But of course, education is a mindset, a culture even. What is the point of pursuing a PhD in a society where nepotism determines who does what? It's most rational, from a self-seeker's point of view, to spend time knowing and passing one's business cards to the "right people" than spending years of one's life pursuing a university degree.</p>
<p>UNDP had recently launched "The Arab Knowledge Report 2009", jointly with the United Arab Emirates-based Mohammad bin Rashid al-Maktoum Foundation. Another depressing read, nonetheless. Governments were criticized for paying lip service to "reform", yet "widening the gap between word and deed." It concluded that Arab countries are far from being knowledge based societies. Numbers and more numbers told the story: Finland spends $1000 per person on scientific research, while less than $10 are spent annually in the Arab world. More, the number of published books averages one for every 491 British citizens, while in the Arab world it's one for every 19,150. But that should not be much of a surprise considering that one-third of older Arab citizens are illiterate, two-thirds of whom are women. Meanwhile, more than seven million children who should be in school are not. Illiteracy stands at 30 percent in the Arab world.</p>
<p>Dr. Ghassan Khateeb, of Birzeit University in the occupied West Bank believes that there "is a direct relation between the lack of investment and the problematic situation we find ourselves in relation to knowledge." "This is all related to politics; the lack of democracy and the lack of knowledge enforce each other," he was quoted as saying.</p>
<p>Paul Salem, writing in the British Guardian, while recognizing the failure of Arab governments, found that others are also, if not equally, responsible. "The cost of a single month of Western military spending in Iraq or Afghanistan would be enough to triple total aid for education in the Middle East. The cost of two cruise missiles would build a school, the cost of a Eurofighter a small university."</p>
<p>Alas, some Arab governments spend twice, if not three times more, on their military budget than invest in education. And keeping in mind that nearly one out of every five Arab citizens lives below the poverty threshold of two-dollars a day, the tragedy is suddenly augmented.</p>
<p>Arab governments must rethink and reconsider their current priorities and course of action. They must think and act individually, but collectively as well, before the crisis turns into a catastrophe, as will surely be the case if nothing is done.</p> | false | 1 | first arab human development report ahdr published 2002 star glistened vast gloomy sky fact unsponsored report authored independent arab scholars would receive much attention arab media promising start fact terminology human security personal security economic security etc highlighted report would even compete largely ceremonial news bulletins headlines many arab countries achievement star quickly faded terms became clichs report published seven times since became haunting reminder bad things really arab world wish discredit arab countries individually collective find reports plenty reasons fuel constant diatribes genuinely care wish things improve either silent muted last report sponsored like rest united nations development program undp published july 2009 grimmest statistics intriguing although depressing 29 million square kilometers land arab world threatened desertification natural resources depleting alarming level birth rates highest world unemployment skyrocketing 50 million new jobs must created 2020 arab oilbased economies leave arab countries entirely vulnerable market price fluctuations depletion oil altogether many economies especially asia shifting already achieved great strides becoming knowledgebased economies arab economies still hostage cycle oil cheap labor fact 70 percent arab regions total exports according report oil problem economic environmental societal well inequality entrenched many arab societies womens rights individual rights violated mens right violated members dominant group either divided blind political allegiance tribal sectarian membership economic leverage admittedly arab societies course societies suffer ills sadly problems arab countries convoluted accentuated fact little action rectify problem neither individual countrys level using joint platforms instance arab league didnt arab league hold emergency summit following release first even last ahdr report one would think problems magnitude ones affect lives 330 million people pressing enough gatherings arab media highlighting issue shortcomings media outlets others discussion largely political times mere attempt discrediting government leader still conducted general terms latest report example supplemented opinion polls conducted four arab countries kuwait lebanon morocco occupied palestine one need emphasize different human development challenges countries situated diverse geopolitical settings one possibly devise solution country occupied foreign army independent country untold oil wealth third immense human potential dire poverty ltimg classalignleft sizefull wpimage2374 stylemargin 5px titlearabgirlstudent srchttpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads200911arabgirlstudentjpg altarabgirlstudent width300 height169 srcsethttpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads200911arabgirlstudentjpg 300w httpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads200911arabgirlstudent150x85jpg 150w sizesmaxwidth 300px 100vw 300px gt generalized problems obtain generalized thus superficial solutions therefore summarily decided problem lies lack education inequitable unrepresentative political systems education became buzz word education detached value therefore education cities erected arab countries easily afford importing best teachers curricula money buy research institutions also making appearances various arab capitals existing rich arab countries operated largely foreigners whose sense priority lies naturally elsewhere one fails grasp wisdom course education mindset culture even point pursuing phd society nepotism determines rational selfseekers point view spend time knowing passing ones business cards right people spending years ones life pursuing university degree undp recently launched arab knowledge report 2009 jointly united arab emiratesbased mohammad bin rashid almaktoum foundation another depressing read nonetheless governments criticized paying lip service reform yet widening gap word deed concluded arab countries far knowledge based societies numbers numbers told story finland spends 1000 per person scientific research less 10 spent annually arab world number published books averages one every 491 british citizens arab world one every 19150 much surprise considering onethird older arab citizens illiterate twothirds women meanwhile seven million children school illiteracy stands 30 percent arab world dr ghassan khateeb birzeit university occupied west bank believes direct relation lack investment problematic situation find relation knowledge related politics lack democracy lack knowledge enforce quoted saying paul salem writing british guardian recognizing failure arab governments found others also equally responsible cost single month western military spending iraq afghanistan would enough triple total aid education middle east cost two cruise missiles would build school cost eurofighter small university alas arab governments spend twice three times military budget invest education keeping mind nearly one every five arab citizens lives poverty threshold twodollars day tragedy suddenly augmented arab governments must rethink reconsider current priorities course action must think act individually collectively well crisis turns catastrophe surely case nothing done | 655 |
<p />
<p>Everyone says that they hate war, and most people really do, yet war has always been a part of human life. Nearly all societies throughout history have engaged in some form of warfare. And for as long as there has been war there have been good people trying to end it. Unfortunately, despite minor successes lasting peace has been a dream that has been impossible to realize. That dream has not died, however, and people continue the fight to end all war. A recent example is the new campaign called&#160; <a href="http://www.worldbeyondwar.org/" type="external">World Beyond War</a>&#160;(WBW).</p>
<p>At the WBW website, the organizers call for new ideas and ask for feedback on the strategies outlined there. The group’s approach to ending war calls for “defeating the propaganda of war promoters and countering the economic interests of war promoters with alternative economic possibilities.” Furthermore, WBW stresses the need for “a combination of disarmament and investment alternatives.” This means that nations must disarm, stop selling arms, and negotiate disarmament agreements.</p>
<p>How to accomplish such things is the problem. The disarmament ideas would require governments to dramatically change course, but the governments are often led by the war promoters. Changing the governments in any substantial way would necessitate a dramatic change in the mindset of most citizens. Similarly, although there are theoretical ways to counter the economic interests of war promoters, such as coordinating the purchasing and tax-paying decisions of citizens en masse, organizing for it would require unprecedented changes in public opinion. The arguments of the past won’t make that happen.</p>
<p>Like many others, I believe that unprecedented changes in public opinion can be achieved by taking a more courageous and committed approach to one of WBW’s key objectives. That objective is to “communicate the facts about war and discard the myths.” It takes courage to really examine the facts and myths about how wars begin and how they are maintained because most of us—even people who see themselves as peace activists—play a part in that process.</p>
<p>How do wars start, for what reasons, and by what mechanisms? To answer these important questions it might help to begin by dispelling several powerful myths about the origins of war.</p>
<p>Wars are often mistakenly seen as disputes based primarily on the differences between religions. But a closer examination of individual conflicts shows that this is not true. Sometimes differences in religion are emphasized by war promoters as a means of dividing the people and pitting them against each other. But war is not ever fundamentally about religion. The Arab-Israeli conflict, for example, began as a political and nationalist land grab following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. Only later did various arguments about who might be God’s “chosen people” play a part. Similarly, the 350-year long conflict in Ireland never had much to do with the differences between Catholicism and Protestantism. Although Oliver Cromwell was a Puritan, he was sent purely for the purpose of seizing the land.</p>
<p>War is also not about vengeance. It’s true that some people have been known to spend years seeking vengeance in small-scale acts of violence. The Apache chief Geronimo is an example as described in his memoirs. He spent decades killing Mexicans in guerrilla raids because of the murder of his wife and children in a place now called Arizona. But Geronimo and his small band of fighters ultimately fought, as did most Native Americans, simply to keep their land.</p>
<p>To be clear, war is not about religion or vengeance—it’s about the land and its resources.</p>
<p>The beginnings of every war can be traced back to efforts by a powerful few to control land and its strategic benefits. This fact is most easily seen in the wars that have been fought by the United States, the country that WBW hopes to focus on first. Whether it was for trade routes, or bases to establish military presence, or some other corporate access, all of the wars in which the U.S. has engaged have been about securing strategic property.</p>
<p>The ability to start and perpetuate large-scale war depends on the ability of the few to manipulate the emotional state of the masses. An old saying is that “truth is the first casualty of war” but that is misleading. War is born of deception and is manufactured for the benefit of the wealthy few. It is supported by people who gain through the military-industrial complex, and it is sold to everyone else through more deception.</p>
<p>The lies used to start and maintain wars are based on manipulating the natural mechanisms by which individuals protect their self-image. The most common form of this trickery was described by the founder of the Nazi Gestapo, Hermann Göring, who said “Why, of course, the people don’t want war. Why would some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best that he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece? [But] the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country.”</p>
<p>Göring and his cohorts used that very mechanism of deception to bring the Nazis to power in 1933 via the Reichstag Fire. The result was World War II and 60 million people dead. Since that time, the wars in which the U.S. has engaged have been initiated through the same kinds of lies. The U.S. military was committed to the Vietnam War as a result of a false claim about an attack in the Gulf of Tonkin. And the 1991 Gulf War was started by way of false testimony from a Kuwaiti girl who claimed that Iraqi troops were killing babies. Dick Cheney then falsely claimed that satellite photos showed Iraqi troops massing at the Saudi border. The cooperation of the American public and the Saudis followed quickly thereafter.</p>
<p>How are wars started? By telling the people that they are being attacked and by inventing outrageous claims that demonize the intended enemy. You know, the terrorists are out to get us. They want to steal our freedoms. They are a dark people with inhuman culture and violent religion. We’ll never know where they will strike next.</p>
<p>Once started, wars are perpetuated through propaganda that manipulates the public’s sense of patriotism. Whoever doesn’t support the war is accused of not supporting the troops. Whoever reveals anything truthful about the situation is accused of putting the country at risk, or of being a conspiracy theorist.</p>
<p>By recognizing what is happening we can understand how to eliminate war. The first and most important step is the same as for solving any other challenge. It is to realize the problem. As Sun Tzu said in&#160;The Art of War, “All warfare is based on deception.” Therefore war can only be ended by realizing and managing the mechanisms by which we are deceived. How do we realize when mass-deception has occurred? We can understand it academically or by rationalizing but it is only a gut wrenching here-and-now realization that can move us to do anything about it. Emotions are what drive people to do something.</p>
<p>This leads directly to the war-ending idea that has been ignored by many peace activists for the last 13 years. It’s an idea that has been shared by many others, including over one third of the American public&#160; <a href="http://www.911truth.org/article_for_printing.php?story=20060802215417462" type="external">according to a 2006 Scripps Howard poll</a>. We don’t know what happened on September 11, 2001 and many people understand that fact. But it is overwhelmingly clear to anyone who examines the evidence that the accused 19 young men could not have accomplished most of what happened. And it’s clear that the 9/11 events and government responses followed the pattern of a war-initiating deception.</p>
<p>Those facts lead people to a catastrophic and catalyzing realization. The crimes of 9/11 represent the greatest war-generating scam of our lifetime. What a great opportunity to begin solving the problem of war! &#160;If we have the courage to re-evaluate our understanding of that seminal event, we might still have the chance to leverage the resulting emotional power to drive the changes needed.</p>
<p>We can defeat the propaganda of war promoters and counter their economic interests with peace-promoting initiatives like mass purchasing decisions and tax resistance. We can disarm, stop selling arms, and negotiate disarmament agreements. We can do all these things if we are all willing to recognize and overcome the ego-based deceptions behind war. To do so we need to face the problem fundamentally and get out of our comfort zones. The good news is that 9/11 provides a real opportunity to do that and we still have time.</p> | false | 1 | everyone says hate war people really yet war always part human life nearly societies throughout history engaged form warfare long war good people trying end unfortunately despite minor successes lasting peace dream impossible realize dream died however people continue fight end war recent example new campaign called160 world beyond war160wbw wbw website organizers call new ideas ask feedback strategies outlined groups approach ending war calls defeating propaganda war promoters countering economic interests war promoters alternative economic possibilities furthermore wbw stresses need combination disarmament investment alternatives means nations must disarm stop selling arms negotiate disarmament agreements accomplish things problem disarmament ideas would require governments dramatically change course governments often led war promoters changing governments substantial way would necessitate dramatic change mindset citizens similarly although theoretical ways counter economic interests war promoters coordinating purchasing taxpaying decisions citizens en masse organizing would require unprecedented changes public opinion arguments past wont make happen like many others believe unprecedented changes public opinion achieved taking courageous committed approach one wbws key objectives objective communicate facts war discard myths takes courage really examine facts myths wars begin maintained useven people see peace activistsplay part process wars start reasons mechanisms answer important questions might help begin dispelling several powerful myths origins war wars often mistakenly seen disputes based primarily differences religions closer examination individual conflicts shows true sometimes differences religion emphasized war promoters means dividing people pitting war ever fundamentally religion arabisraeli conflict example began political nationalist land grab following collapse ottoman empire later various arguments might gods chosen people play part similarly 350year long conflict ireland never much differences catholicism protestantism although oliver cromwell puritan sent purely purpose seizing land war also vengeance true people known spend years seeking vengeance smallscale acts violence apache chief geronimo example described memoirs spent decades killing mexicans guerrilla raids murder wife children place called arizona geronimo small band fighters ultimately fought native americans simply keep land clear war religion vengeanceits land resources beginnings every war traced back efforts powerful control land strategic benefits fact easily seen wars fought united states country wbw hopes focus first whether trade routes bases establish military presence corporate access wars us engaged securing strategic property ability start perpetuate largescale war depends ability manipulate emotional state masses old saying truth first casualty war misleading war born deception manufactured benefit wealthy supported people gain militaryindustrial complex sold everyone else deception lies used start maintain wars based manipulating natural mechanisms individuals protect selfimage common form trickery described founder nazi gestapo hermann göring said course people dont want war would poor slob farm want risk life war best get come back farm one piece people always brought bidding leaders easy tell attacked denounce pacifists lack patriotism exposing country danger works way country göring cohorts used mechanism deception bring nazis power 1933 via reichstag fire result world war ii 60 million people dead since time wars us engaged initiated kinds lies us military committed vietnam war result false claim attack gulf tonkin 1991 gulf war started way false testimony kuwaiti girl claimed iraqi troops killing babies dick cheney falsely claimed satellite photos showed iraqi troops massing saudi border cooperation american public saudis followed quickly thereafter wars started telling people attacked inventing outrageous claims demonize intended enemy know terrorists get us want steal freedoms dark people inhuman culture violent religion well never know strike next started wars perpetuated propaganda manipulates publics sense patriotism whoever doesnt support war accused supporting troops whoever reveals anything truthful situation accused putting country risk conspiracy theorist recognizing happening understand eliminate war first important step solving challenge realize problem sun tzu said in160the art war warfare based deception therefore war ended realizing managing mechanisms deceived realize massdeception occurred understand academically rationalizing gut wrenching hereandnow realization move us anything emotions drive people something leads directly warending idea ignored many peace activists last 13 years idea shared many others including one third american public160 according 2006 scripps howard poll dont know happened september 11 2001 many people understand fact overwhelmingly clear anyone examines evidence accused 19 young men could accomplished happened clear 911 events government responses followed pattern warinitiating deception facts lead people catastrophic catalyzing realization crimes 911 represent greatest wargenerating scam lifetime great opportunity begin solving problem war 160if courage reevaluate understanding seminal event might still chance leverage resulting emotional power drive changes needed defeat propaganda war promoters counter economic interests peacepromoting initiatives like mass purchasing decisions tax resistance disarm stop selling arms negotiate disarmament agreements things willing recognize overcome egobased deceptions behind war need face problem fundamentally get comfort zones good news 911 provides real opportunity still time | 760 |
<p>Rome–My friend Alejandro Bermudez, capo of the Catholic News Agency and a shrewd observer of ecclesiastical affairs, told me something during the 2005 conclave that I’ve tried to remember–and to impress upon others. Every conclave, Alejandro said, is a unique microculture, and you can’t predict what will happen within it simply by reading the pre-conclave tea leaves. Things happen inside conclaves, away from the world and the buzz, that can shape papal elections–and pontificates–in surprising ways.</p>
<p>History bears that out.</p>
<p>In 1903, for example, Pope Leo XIII’s secretary of state, Mariano Rampolla del Tindaro, was a clear frontrunner going into the conclave: He had been Leo’s right hand during the last decade and a half of a reforming pontificate and was widely thought to be the natural successor to his patron. Yet the conclave was stunned when Jan Cardinal Puzyna, bishop of Cracow (then a city in the Austro-Hungarian Empire), pronounced a veto against Rampolla by Emperor Franz Joseph–a modern exercise of the ancient ius exclusivae (right of exclusion) that Catholic monarchs traditionally wielded in papal elections.</p>
<p>The conclave was thrown into turmoil; some insisted that, in a 20th-century conclave, there was no place for state vetoes. Rampolla, understandably, protested; but when the dust settled his candidacy was finished, and in the somewhat bitter proceedings that followed, the cardinals turned in the opposite direction, away from a diplomat-prelate, to Giuseppe Sarto of Venice, a man of deep piety and extensive pastoral experience, who became Pope Pius X–and later, the first pope canonized since Pius V. (According to one tale from 1903, one of the electors who talked a very reluctant Sarto into accepting the papacy was James Cardinal Gibbons of Baltimore. Among the first acts of Pius X’s pontificate was the abolition of the ius exclusivae.)</p>
<p>The following conclave, in 1914, was another donnybrook, between anti-Modernist forces and those who sought to reinstate the reformist approach of Leo XIII. At the end, the leader of the losing party, Rafael Cardinal Merry del Val, challenged the validity of the election of his arch-enemy, Giacomo Cardinal della Chiesa (Rampolla’s former assistant), on the grounds that della Chiesa had voted for himself in an election decided by one vote. So della Chiesa sat in the Sistine Chapel, in a state that can only be imagined, while all the ballots were reopened and it was determined that he had not, in fact, cast the vote that had given him a two-thirds supermajority–and thus was duly elected pope. When the cardinals came up to kiss the new pope’s foot, knee, and hand (a ritual that has been abolished), Benedict XV looked into the face of Merry del Val, the man who had just publicly humiliated him, and said (without, one expects, much warmth), “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.” Not without a certain aplomb, Merry del Val looked into the new pope’s face and responded with the next verse of Psalm 118, “This is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.” Benedict XV was not mollified, and Merry del Val was swiftly ejected from the Vatican.</p>
<p>John XXIII’s election in 1958 demonstrated another conclave dynamic that might have some relevance to the conclave of 2013. It was a wide-open election, with some cardinals wanting to extend, so to speak, both the policy and the style of Pius XII, and others wanting to sweep out the rooms of the Apostolic Palace, let in some fresh air, and take a different approach to the Church’s engagement with the 20th century. A small but disciplined bloc of French cardinals, committed to forwarding the candidacy of the former nuncio to Paris, Angelo Cardinal Roncalli, hung in for ballot after ballot until they had assembled a winning coalition.</p>
<p>The second conclave of 1978 was even more dramatic, and provided yet another example of how each conclave microculture is unique. The first conclave of 1978, brilliantly organized behind the scenes by Giovanni Cardinal Benelli of Florence, Paul VI’s former chief of staff, had swiftly elected the hitherto obscure Albino Cardinal Luciani of Venice in one day. Then John Paul I died after a 33-day pontificate and the College of Cardinals was spiritually and psychologically traumatized. As one elector in the 1978 conclaves put it to me years later, the sudden death of John Paul I was “a message from the Lord, quite out of the ordinary. . . . This was an intervention from the Lord to teach us something.” And the lesson learned was that the Italian hegemony of the papacy could be broken after 455 years, given the availability of a charismatic Pole named Karol Wojtyła, who was elected as John Paul II.</p>
<p>But if unexpected dynamics develop within the conclave microculture, both through human interaction and, Catholics believe, by the work of the Holy Spirit (which two electors told me they felt, palpably, in the second conclave of 1978), there can still be pre-conclave indicators of where the principal fault lines in a papal electorate will lie.</p>
<p>In 1903, before the shock of the emperor’s veto, the chief fault line lay between pro-Leo XIII reformers and pro-Pius IX intransigents (specially on the question of the Holy See’s relationship to the unified Kingdom of Italy). That division replicated itself in 1914. The basic question that sorted out the electors in 1963 was whether John XXIII’s summoning of the Second Vatican Council had been a good idea or not; the pro-conciliar party won by electing Giovanni Battista Montini as Paul VI (but only after a close friend of John XXIII, Gustavo Cardinal Testa, had gotten up in the Sistine Chapel and read the riot act to the anti-conciliar faction).</p>
<p>The conclave of 2013 has its own unique framework, within which those unexpected intra-conclave dynamics will emerge and play themselves out. It’s not the old post-Vatican II progressive vs. conservative division; one of the most striking things about this conclave is that there is no progressive candidate, as there was in 2005. No, the framework-setting issue for this conclave is different: It’s the division between Old Church and New Church, between institutional-maintenance Catholicism and Evangelical Catholicism. And along that fault line there are two different approaches to what is indisputably a major issue as the conclave is enclosed: the reform of the Roman Curia.</p>
<p>The party of institutional maintenance would likely favor some tinkering with the Vatican bureaucracy, chiefly in terms of increased competence at the highest levels of curial leadership. The evangelical-Catholic forces want a root-and-branch reform that would dramatically change the Curia’s institutional culture (as well as ramping up the competence of its senior leadership), so that the Church’s central administrative machinery makes its own important contribution to the New Evangelization. And within that difference of approach lies another burning question: What is to be done about various unmistakable issues of corruption that were surfaced, if in a sleazy way, in the Vatileaks affair? Again, the party of reform–the evangelical-Catholic party–would favor a swift housecleaning, by analogy to FDR’s 100 Days, while the institutional-maintenance party would, most likely, deal with the most egregious offenses (and offenders) without addressing what seem to some to be systematic patterns of decay.</p>
<p>The fundamental direction of 21st-century Catholicism seems set: Whether the venue is Africa, Asia, Latin America, or the North Atlantic world, the Catholicism with a future is a robustly evangelical, dynamically orthodox Catholicism that invites the world into friendship with the Lord Jesus Christ, that defends the dignity of every human life and the “first freedom” of religious liberty for all, and that models a more humane way of life amidst the chill winds of postmodern nihilism and skepticism. The question that will begin to be answered when the white smoke goes up is whether that process of deep Catholic reform, in the service of profound conversion and renewed evangelical energy, will be accelerated by the new pope.</p>
<p>George Weigel is Distinguished Senior Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C. and holds EPPC’s William E. Simon Chair in Catholic Studies.</p> | false | 1 | romemy friend alejandro bermudez capo catholic news agency shrewd observer ecclesiastical affairs told something 2005 conclave ive tried rememberand impress upon others every conclave alejandro said unique microculture cant predict happen within simply reading preconclave tea leaves things happen inside conclaves away world buzz shape papal electionsand pontificatesin surprising ways history bears 1903 example pope leo xiiis secretary state mariano rampolla del tindaro clear frontrunner going conclave leos right hand last decade half reforming pontificate widely thought natural successor patron yet conclave stunned jan cardinal puzyna bishop cracow city austrohungarian empire pronounced veto rampolla emperor franz josepha modern exercise ancient ius exclusivae right exclusion catholic monarchs traditionally wielded papal elections conclave thrown turmoil insisted 20thcentury conclave place state vetoes rampolla understandably protested dust settled candidacy finished somewhat bitter proceedings followed cardinals turned opposite direction away diplomatprelate giuseppe sarto venice man deep piety extensive pastoral experience became pope pius xand later first pope canonized since pius v according one tale 1903 one electors talked reluctant sarto accepting papacy james cardinal gibbons baltimore among first acts pius xs pontificate abolition ius exclusivae following conclave 1914 another donnybrook antimodernist forces sought reinstate reformist approach leo xiii end leader losing party rafael cardinal merry del val challenged validity election archenemy giacomo cardinal della chiesa rampollas former assistant grounds della chiesa voted election decided one vote della chiesa sat sistine chapel state imagined ballots reopened determined fact cast vote given twothirds supermajorityand thus duly elected pope cardinals came kiss new popes foot knee hand ritual abolished benedict xv looked face merry del val man publicly humiliated said without one expects much warmth stone builders rejected become cornerstone without certain aplomb merry del val looked new popes face responded next verse psalm 118 lords marvelous eyes benedict xv mollified merry del val swiftly ejected vatican john xxiiis election 1958 demonstrated another conclave dynamic might relevance conclave 2013 wideopen election cardinals wanting extend speak policy style pius xii others wanting sweep rooms apostolic palace let fresh air take different approach churchs engagement 20th century small disciplined bloc french cardinals committed forwarding candidacy former nuncio paris angelo cardinal roncalli hung ballot ballot assembled winning coalition second conclave 1978 even dramatic provided yet another example conclave microculture unique first conclave 1978 brilliantly organized behind scenes giovanni cardinal benelli florence paul vis former chief staff swiftly elected hitherto obscure albino cardinal luciani venice one day john paul died 33day pontificate college cardinals spiritually psychologically traumatized one elector 1978 conclaves put years later sudden death john paul message lord quite ordinary intervention lord teach us something lesson learned italian hegemony papacy could broken 455 years given availability charismatic pole named karol wojtyła elected john paul ii unexpected dynamics develop within conclave microculture human interaction catholics believe work holy spirit two electors told felt palpably second conclave 1978 still preconclave indicators principal fault lines papal electorate lie 1903 shock emperors veto chief fault line lay proleo xiii reformers propius ix intransigents specially question holy sees relationship unified kingdom italy division replicated 1914 basic question sorted electors 1963 whether john xxiiis summoning second vatican council good idea proconciliar party electing giovanni battista montini paul vi close friend john xxiii gustavo cardinal testa gotten sistine chapel read riot act anticonciliar faction conclave 2013 unique framework within unexpected intraconclave dynamics emerge play old postvatican ii progressive vs conservative division one striking things conclave progressive candidate 2005 frameworksetting issue conclave different division old church new church institutionalmaintenance catholicism evangelical catholicism along fault line two different approaches indisputably major issue conclave enclosed reform roman curia party institutional maintenance would likely favor tinkering vatican bureaucracy chiefly terms increased competence highest levels curial leadership evangelicalcatholic forces want rootandbranch reform would dramatically change curias institutional culture well ramping competence senior leadership churchs central administrative machinery makes important contribution new evangelization within difference approach lies another burning question done various unmistakable issues corruption surfaced sleazy way vatileaks affair party reformthe evangelicalcatholic partywould favor swift housecleaning analogy fdrs 100 days institutionalmaintenance party would likely deal egregious offenses offenders without addressing seem systematic patterns decay fundamental direction 21stcentury catholicism seems set whether venue africa asia latin america north atlantic world catholicism future robustly evangelical dynamically orthodox catholicism invites world friendship lord jesus christ defends dignity every human life first freedom religious liberty models humane way life amidst chill winds postmodern nihilism skepticism question begin answered white smoke goes whether process deep catholic reform service profound conversion renewed evangelical energy accelerated new pope george weigel distinguished senior fellow ethics public policy center washington dc holds eppcs william e simon chair catholic studies | 758 |
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<p>As the international community watches conflict and violence continue in the Central African Republic and South Sudan, it is still worth monitoring Nigeria’s continuing terrorist problem. For the United States, Nigeria represents a strategic partner on the African continent as it deploys valuable peacekeeping forces in Africa, supplies oil to the U.S., and can help combat radical Islam in North Africa.[1] Nigeria has its own domestic terrorist group that has posed a threat to the Nigerian government and population for years. The terrorist group, known as Boko Haram, has killed thousands of Nigerians using a variety of deadly methods including drive-by attacks, small arms assaults, improvised explosive devices (IEDs), and vehicle borne improvised explosive devices (VBIEDs).[2] Boko Haram targets security personnel, Christians, Muslims, and even international organizations when it attacked the UN building in Abuja (2011). Boko Haram has ties to Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and Al-Shabaab in Somalia – prompting the concern of the U.S. government. Several northern states are still in a state of emergency enacted last year by the Nigerian government.</p>
<p>Most recently, the U.S. and Nigerian governments implemented several changes, resulting in revitalized efforts to eradicate the terrorist movement. The U.S. Department of State designated Boko Haram a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) in November 2013 – allowing the U.S. to investigate and prosecute Boko Haram members, in addition to prohibiting any and all support to members of the group by individuals or organizations.[3] In doing so, the FTO designation and other assistance represents the full U.S. support for the Nigerian government’s war on terror.</p>
<p>Last week, President Goodluck Jonathan dismissed and replaced the head generals of the Nigerian military. According to official statements, the generals had been illegally appointed and thus were removed; it did not indicate that it was based on their unsatisfactory performance in the campaign against Boko Haram.[4] However, a presidency source stated, “regional balancing, apart from competence, informed the choice of the new service chiefs,” according to the Saturday Tribune.[5] The media outlet also reports that President Jonathan desires new leadership with better methods for combatting Boko Haram.[6]</p>
<p>This week, Chief of Defence Staff, Air Marshal Alex Badeh, announced a primary goal to completely stamp out the Boko Haram “insurgency” by April 2014 – so as to prevent an extension of the state of emergency status that will be up for renewal at that point.[7] A particular asset that may help achieve this goal is the recently established Nigerian Army Special Operation Command (NASOC), created with the aid of AFRICOM.[8] NASOC is designed as a low-level, strategic force tasked with combatting terrorism and insurgency through direct action.[9] Several U.S. groups are providing training equipment, assistance, and counter-insurgency lessons for NASOC, including AFRICOM, the Office of Security Operations from the United States Embassy, and Special Operations Command Africa.[10] By combining their new Special Operations Command group with U.S. training assistance and counter-insurgency lessons, the Nigerian government has high expectations for the continuing campaign against terror.</p>
<p>However, despite the recent developments in Nigeria’s military and U.S. assistance, Boko Haram has continued to launch deadly attacks, killing 15 people in Gashigar village and 18 in Gafate village just last week.[11] If the new military leadership’s methodologies do not produce satisfactory results, Nigeria will continue to be plagued by terrorist attacks on its civilians. The next three months are critical for both Boko Haram and the Nigerian government. If Boko Haram resists and survives the government’s new counter-terrorism goal – forcing the military Chiefs of Staff to appeal for another state of emergency – the people will increasingly lose confidence in President Jonathan and the military while Boko Haram increases its resolve and attacks.</p>
<p>Due to the continued rate of terrorist attacks despite the current state of emergency and U.S. FTO designation, it is probable that the goal of completely stopping Boko Haram by April 2014 will fail. By utilizing improved tactics, NASOC, and continued U.S. assistance, the Nigerian military may possibly make progress in the coming months, but will not fully eliminate the threat of Boko Haram by April 2014. While it is an admirable goal, it is questionable and likely unattainable. Hopefully Nigeria’s new military leadership proves this writer wrong.</p>
<p>References</p>
<p>[1] Mitchell, Jon B. “Boko Haram: A Nigerian Terror Movement.” Unofficial Report for Congressional Committee on Homeland Security staffers, April 22, 2013.</p>
<p>[2] Mitchell, Jon B. “Boko Haram: A Nigerian Terror Movement.” Unofficial Report for Congressional Committee on Homeland Security staffers, April 22, 2013.</p>
<p>[3] “Terrorist Designations of Boko Haram and Ansaru.” Media Note, Office of the Spokesperson, U.S. Department of State. November 13, 2013. Accessed January 21, 2014.&#160; <a href="http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2013/11/217509.htm" type="external">http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2013/11/217509.htm</a>.</p>
<p>[4] Agence France-Presse. “Nigeria: Top Generals Dismissed.” New York Times, January 16, 2014. Accessed January 21, 2014. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/17/world/africa/nigeria-top-generals-dismissed.html" type="external">http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/17/world/africa/nigeria-top-generals-dismissed.html</a>.</p>
<p>[5] Agbambu, Chris. “Mass retirement looms in military&#160;• Six generations of officers may go&#160;• ‘New appointments meet regional balancing.'” Nigerian Tribune, January 18, 2014. Accessed January 21, 2014.&#160; <a href="http://tribune.com.ng/news2013/index.php/en/news/lead-stories/item/31220-mass-retirement-looms-in-military-%E2%80%A2six-generations-of-officers-may-go-%E2%80%A2%E2%80%98new-appointments-meet-regional-balancing%E2%80%99.html" type="external">http://tribune.com.ng/news2013/index.php/en/news/lead-stories/item/31220-mass-retirement-looms-in-military-%E2%80%A2six-generations-of-officers-may-go-%E2%80%A2%E2%80%98new-appointments-meet-regional-balancing%E2%80%99.html</a>.</p>
<p>[6] Agbambu, Chris. “Mass retirement looms in military&#160;• Six generations of officers may go&#160;• ‘New appointments meet regional balancing.'” Nigerian Tribune, January 18, 2014. Accessed January 21, 2014.&#160; <a href="http://tribune.com.ng/news2013/index.php/en/news/lead-stories/item/31220-mass-retirement-looms-in-military-%E2%80%A2six-generations-of-officers-may-go-%E2%80%A2%E2%80%98new-appointments-meet-regional-balancing%E2%80%99.html" type="external">http://tribune.com.ng/news2013/index.php/en/news/lead-stories/item/31220-mass-retirement-looms-in-military-%E2%80%A2six-generations-of-officers-may-go-%E2%80%A2%E2%80%98new-appointments-meet-regional-balancing%E2%80%99.html</a>.</p>
<p>[7] “Boko Haram Insurgency Must End By April 2014, says new CDS.” PM News Nigeria, January 20, 2014. Accessed January 21, 2014. <a href="http://pmnewsnigeria.com/2014/01/20/boko-haram-insurgency-must-end-by-april-2014-says-new-cds/" type="external">http://pmnewsnigeria.com/2014/01/20/boko-haram-insurgency-must-end-by-april-2014-says-new-cds/</a>.</p>
<p>[8] “Nigerian Army Partners With AFRICOM To Establish Special Operation Command.” Stratrisks, January 13, 2014. Accessed January 21, 2014. <a href="http://stratrisks.com/geostrat/17506" type="external">http://stratrisks.com/geostrat/17506</a>.</p>
<p>[9] “Army establishes special operations command to fight terror – Nigeria.” Afrique en Ligne, January 13, 2014. Accessed January 21, 2014. <a href="http://www.afriquejet.com/news/286-army-establishes-special-operations-command-to-fight-terror-nigeria.html" type="external">http://www.afriquejet.com/news/286-army-establishes-special-operations-command-to-fight-terror-nigeria.html</a>. “Nigerian Army Partners With AFRICOM To Establish Special Operation Command.” Stratrisks, January 13, 2014. Accessed January 21, 2014. <a href="http://stratrisks.com/geostrat/17506" type="external">http://stratrisks.com/geostrat/17506</a>.</p>
<p>[10] “Army establishes special operations command to fight terror – Nigeria.” Afrique en Ligne, January 13, 2014. Accessed January 21, 2014. <a href="http://www.afriquejet.com/news/286-army-establishes-special-operations-command-to-fight-terror-nigeria.html" type="external">http://www.afriquejet.com/news/286-army-establishes-special-operations-command-to-fight-terror-nigeria.html</a>.</p>
<p>[11] Maina, Maina. “Boko Haram: Again, 18 killed in Borno.” Daily Post, January 20, 2014. Accessed January 21, 2014. <a href="http://dailypost.com.ng/2014/01/20/boko-haram-18-killed-borno/" type="external">http://dailypost.com.ng/2014/01/20/boko-haram-18-killed-borno/</a>.</p> | false | 1 | international community watches conflict violence continue central african republic south sudan still worth monitoring nigerias continuing terrorist problem united states nigeria represents strategic partner african continent deploys valuable peacekeeping forces africa supplies oil us help combat radical islam north africa1 nigeria domestic terrorist group posed threat nigerian government population years terrorist group known boko haram killed thousands nigerians using variety deadly methods including driveby attacks small arms assaults improvised explosive devices ieds vehicle borne improvised explosive devices vbieds2 boko haram targets security personnel christians muslims even international organizations attacked un building abuja 2011 boko haram ties alqaeda islamic maghreb aqim alshabaab somalia prompting concern us government several northern states still state emergency enacted last year nigerian government recently us nigerian governments implemented several changes resulting revitalized efforts eradicate terrorist movement us department state designated boko haram foreign terrorist organization fto november 2013 allowing us investigate prosecute boko haram members addition prohibiting support members group individuals organizations3 fto designation assistance represents full us support nigerian governments war terror last week president goodluck jonathan dismissed replaced head generals nigerian military according official statements generals illegally appointed thus removed indicate based unsatisfactory performance campaign boko haram4 however presidency source stated regional balancing apart competence informed choice new service chiefs according saturday tribune5 media outlet also reports president jonathan desires new leadership better methods combatting boko haram6 week chief defence staff air marshal alex badeh announced primary goal completely stamp boko haram insurgency april 2014 prevent extension state emergency status renewal point7 particular asset may help achieve goal recently established nigerian army special operation command nasoc created aid africom8 nasoc designed lowlevel strategic force tasked combatting terrorism insurgency direct action9 several us groups providing training equipment assistance counterinsurgency lessons nasoc including africom office security operations united states embassy special operations command africa10 combining new special operations command group us training assistance counterinsurgency lessons nigerian government high expectations continuing campaign terror however despite recent developments nigerias military us assistance boko haram continued launch deadly attacks killing 15 people gashigar village 18 gafate village last week11 new military leaderships methodologies produce satisfactory results nigeria continue plagued terrorist attacks civilians next three months critical boko haram nigerian government boko haram resists survives governments new counterterrorism goal forcing military chiefs staff appeal another state emergency people increasingly lose confidence president jonathan military boko haram increases resolve attacks due continued rate terrorist attacks despite current state emergency us fto designation probable goal completely stopping boko haram april 2014 fail utilizing improved tactics nasoc continued us assistance nigerian military may possibly make progress coming months fully eliminate threat boko haram april 2014 admirable goal questionable likely unattainable hopefully nigerias new military leadership proves writer wrong references 1 mitchell jon b boko haram nigerian terror movement unofficial report congressional committee homeland security staffers april 22 2013 2 mitchell jon b boko haram nigerian terror movement unofficial report congressional committee homeland security staffers april 22 2013 3 terrorist designations boko haram ansaru media note office spokesperson us department state november 13 2013 accessed january 21 2014160 httpwwwstategovrpaprsps201311217509htm 4 agence francepresse nigeria top generals dismissed new york times january 16 2014 accessed january 21 2014 httpwwwnytimescom20140117worldafricanigeriatopgeneralsdismissedhtml 5 agbambu chris mass retirement looms military160 six generations officers may go160 new appointments meet regional balancing nigerian tribune january 18 2014 accessed january 21 2014160 httptribunecomngnews2013indexphpennewsleadstoriesitem31220massretirementloomsinmilitarye280a2sixgenerationsofofficersmaygoe280a2e28098newappointmentsmeetregionalbalancinge28099html 6 agbambu chris mass retirement looms military160 six generations officers may go160 new appointments meet regional balancing nigerian tribune january 18 2014 accessed january 21 2014160 httptribunecomngnews2013indexphpennewsleadstoriesitem31220massretirementloomsinmilitarye280a2sixgenerationsofofficersmaygoe280a2e28098newappointmentsmeetregionalbalancinge28099html 7 boko haram insurgency must end april 2014 says new cds pm news nigeria january 20 2014 accessed january 21 2014 httppmnewsnigeriacom20140120bokoharaminsurgencymustendbyapril2014saysnewcds 8 nigerian army partners africom establish special operation command stratrisks january 13 2014 accessed january 21 2014 httpstratriskscomgeostrat17506 9 army establishes special operations command fight terror nigeria afrique en ligne january 13 2014 accessed january 21 2014 httpwwwafriquejetcomnews286armyestablishesspecialoperationscommandtofightterrornigeriahtml nigerian army partners africom establish special operation command stratrisks january 13 2014 accessed january 21 2014 httpstratriskscomgeostrat17506 10 army establishes special operations command fight terror nigeria afrique en ligne january 13 2014 accessed january 21 2014 httpwwwafriquejetcomnews286armyestablishesspecialoperationscommandtofightterrornigeriahtml 11 maina maina boko haram 18 killed borno daily post january 20 2014 accessed january 21 2014 httpdailypostcomng20140120bokoharam18killedborno | 692 |
<p>All Hollywood agrees that anytime someone makes a movie about TV or the media culture it is ipso facto a serious picture. And a picture — like, for instance, Natural Born Killers — which hasn’t a serious bone in its body can be instantly transformed into a serious picture by the addition of a “satirical” meditation on the violence- voyeurism of TV news. Thus everyone knew in advance that The Truman Show, directed by Peter Weir to a screenplay by Andrew Niccol, was going to be the high-brow movie of the summer (as the high-brow goes in Hollywood, you understand), the one that we critics were supposed to be solemn about and that the Motion Picture Academy will be expected to give awards to. In fact it is a very clever movie with no heart, like the worst of the Coen brothers, and it has no reason for existing apart from imparting a sense of their own depth to people who join in its scorn of televisual shallowness.</p>
<p>The idea is that Truman Burbank (Jim Carrey) is the star of something called “The Truman Show” without knowing it. The cameras have followed him all his life, from the moment of his birth, and everything that has ever happened to him has been staged by a mysterious genius called Christof (Ed Harris) — a man who runs a little empire of actors and stage hands, funded by colossal sums spent on “product placement” (in lieu of commercial breaks) on the show. When a klieg light accidentally falls through the “sky” of the perfect little town where he lives, he begins to suspect that something is not right about the artificiality of his world and the rest of the film is taken up with his attempts to verify his suspicions and to make his way to the one woman, Sylvia (Natascha McElhone) who, as an actress in the show, once tried to warn him of the truth.</p>
<p>Well, you’d think, looking at Peter Biziou’s garish photography which emphasizes the artificiality of everything around him, that poor Truman might have begun to get the idea by 30, the age at which he has now arrived. But he must remain unconscious of his role until now, since his awakening is meant to evoke three main themes. First, there is a deliberate dialogue with Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life, parodied in the TV man’s own favorite TV show. That was a film in which, like this one, the hero also spent the whole film trying to burst out of his small-town cocoon into the wider world only to find out that he was far more successful as a human being just by staying home. This film mocks and rejects that conclusion. The small town, called Seahaven and based on (and filmed at) Seaside, Florida, is here a horrible TV-ville, where everything is artificial and artificially protected from reality. Or “reality.” It is a place from which escape is essential.</p>
<p>There is also, I think, a dialogue with religious legend. Truman’s best friend, Marlon (Noah Emmerich), makes a little joke as he and Truman watch a magnificent sunset over the sea (which is really a sound stage in Hollywood): “That’s the Big Guy; quite a paintbrush he’s got!” Of course, the Big Guy in this case is Christof, the “creator” figure, whose name significantly alludes to that of the Savior. More importantly, he is shown as a kind of tyrant-God who manipulates all reality, supposedly in the name of love (all the crew of the show wear T-shirts emblazoned with the motto: “Love him; protect him”) but actually for the sake of control. He is a bully and a control-freak who believes that “Truman prefers his cell” because it is a controlled environment — something deliberately created to be “normal” as opposed to the “sick” world outside the director’s creative control.</p>
<p>There is some truth in the insight that his power over Truman is based on the fact that “we accept the reality of the world with which we are presented,” and he is prepared to sacrifice his creature rather than to grant him his freedom. Yet for most of us, there are very good reasons for accepting the reality of the world with which we are presented. Usually it is fatal not to accept it. That way madness lies. But sometimes a kind of mild social madness such as we have in the United States — a madness that expresses itself in TV addiction, drug or movie-induced hallucination, weird religions or wacko conspiracy theories — is simply an amusing way for us to spend some of our huge economic surplus. We can afford to be a bit crazy.</p>
<p>Weir’s poison appears to be the wacko conspiracy theory, since the third thematic strand lies in the film’s appeal to Hollywood paranoia. Everybody can remember the solipsistic childhood fantasy that somehow one’s self was the only certain reality, and that everyone around one, even mom and dad, even one’s best friends, might only be fakes, or in on some horrible secret that they don’t tell us. In a way this is the proto-paranoia, the model for all the sorts of paranoia that we go on to develop in adulthood. The clever thing about its use here is partly that it comes in the form of a sort-of satire (but satire in the Hollywood sense, which means that its object is flattered more than savaged) of the entertainment industry and partly that it is identified with the general Hollywood regression to childhood. When Truman tells his actress wife, Meryl (Laura Linney) that he wants to travel the world, she reminds him of their mortgage and car payments. “You’re talking like a teenager,” she says.</p>
<p>“Maybe I feel like a teenager!” says Truman defiantly. Adulthood itself is the ultimate plot, the ultimate trick played on us to keep us chained to the particular artificial reality where we happen to find ourselves.</p>
<p>All this is not to say that the film is not very clever in bringing before us the fake made to look genuine made to look fake (actually, since Seaside is a real time, it is the genuine made to look fake made to look genuine made to look fake). In a particularly memorable passage, Truman confides in Marlon, his supposed best friend since childhood, that he has this horrible suspicion that “the world revolves around me.” Marlon allays his fears with traditional anti-paranoia reassurances, and there follows one of those movie moments as Marlon assures him of his undying devotion. “If everyone were in on it,” he says, “I would have to be in on it.” And the one thing he can always be sure of is that “I would never lie to you.” All the while we see him repeating these lines from the promptings in his earpiece by Christof, who seems to write the script as the show goes along.</p>
<p>It’s an amusing idea, but where do you go with it? Unfortunately, where Mr Weir goes with it is to an account of Truman’s escape, ineffectually hindered by God/Christof, which ends (in a sailboat called the Santa Maria) at the literal edge of the world he has known all his life. There he finds some stairs which lead him up into the sky (again the religious iconography is to the fore), where he finds a door marked “Exit.” Opening it, he hears the voice of God, as it were, and asks: “Who are you?”</p>
<p>“I am the Creator” [slight pause] “of a television show that gives hope and joy and inspiration to millions.” He tells Truman that “There’s no more truth out there than in the world I created for you.” With his God-bluster, Christof insists that “You can’t leave, Truman!” But of course Truman can leave, and his leaving inspires the TV audience, estimated at upwards of a billion throughout the world, to cheer in unison, and in successive reaction shots by Mr Weir (i.e. not Christof): “He made it!” It is one of those cinematic moments just like that between the two friends in Christof’s production a short time before. In other words, Weir ends his film against fakery by celebrating his own fakery, post-modern style. But, also post-modern style, this makes it just another exercise in heartless cynicism. Truman was a real man abused by fakers—but wait! Not really. He‘s really a fake too. Ha ha. Fooled you.</p>
<p>The joke is wearing thin.</p> | false | 1 | hollywood agrees anytime someone makes movie tv media culture ipso facto serious picture picture like instance natural born killers hasnt serious bone body instantly transformed serious picture addition satirical meditation violence voyeurism tv news thus everyone knew advance truman show directed peter weir screenplay andrew niccol going highbrow movie summer highbrow goes hollywood understand one critics supposed solemn motion picture academy expected give awards fact clever movie heart like worst coen brothers reason existing apart imparting sense depth people join scorn televisual shallowness idea truman burbank jim carrey star something called truman show without knowing cameras followed life moment birth everything ever happened staged mysterious genius called christof ed harris man runs little empire actors stage hands funded colossal sums spent product placement lieu commercial breaks show klieg light accidentally falls sky perfect little town lives begins suspect something right artificiality world rest film taken attempts verify suspicions make way one woman sylvia natascha mcelhone actress show tried warn truth well youd think looking peter bizious garish photography emphasizes artificiality everything around poor truman might begun get idea 30 age arrived must remain unconscious role since awakening meant evoke three main themes first deliberate dialogue frank capras wonderful life parodied tv mans favorite tv show film like one hero also spent whole film trying burst smalltown cocoon wider world find far successful human staying home film mocks rejects conclusion small town called seahaven based filmed seaside florida horrible tvville everything artificial artificially protected reality reality place escape essential also think dialogue religious legend trumans best friend marlon noah emmerich makes little joke truman watch magnificent sunset sea really sound stage hollywood thats big guy quite paintbrush hes got course big guy case christof creator figure whose name significantly alludes savior importantly shown kind tyrantgod manipulates reality supposedly name love crew show wear tshirts emblazoned motto love protect actually sake control bully controlfreak believes truman prefers cell controlled environment something deliberately created normal opposed sick world outside directors creative control truth insight power truman based fact accept reality world presented prepared sacrifice creature rather grant freedom yet us good reasons accepting reality world presented usually fatal accept way madness lies sometimes kind mild social madness united states madness expresses tv addiction drug movieinduced hallucination weird religions wacko conspiracy theories simply amusing way us spend huge economic surplus afford bit crazy weirs poison appears wacko conspiracy theory since third thematic strand lies films appeal hollywood paranoia everybody remember solipsistic childhood fantasy somehow ones self certain reality everyone around one even mom dad even ones best friends might fakes horrible secret dont tell us way protoparanoia model sorts paranoia go develop adulthood clever thing use partly comes form sortof satire satire hollywood sense means object flattered savaged entertainment industry partly identified general hollywood regression childhood truman tells actress wife meryl laura linney wants travel world reminds mortgage car payments youre talking like teenager says maybe feel like teenager says truman defiantly adulthood ultimate plot ultimate trick played us keep us chained particular artificial reality happen find say film clever bringing us fake made look genuine made look fake actually since seaside real time genuine made look fake made look genuine made look fake particularly memorable passage truman confides marlon supposed best friend since childhood horrible suspicion world revolves around marlon allays fears traditional antiparanoia reassurances follows one movie moments marlon assures undying devotion everyone says would one thing always sure would never lie see repeating lines promptings earpiece christof seems write script show goes along amusing idea go unfortunately mr weir goes account trumans escape ineffectually hindered godchristof ends sailboat called santa maria literal edge world known life finds stairs lead sky religious iconography fore finds door marked exit opening hears voice god asks creator slight pause television show gives hope joy inspiration millions tells truman theres truth world created godbluster christof insists cant leave truman course truman leave leaving inspires tv audience estimated upwards billion throughout world cheer unison successive reaction shots mr weir ie christof made one cinematic moments like two friends christofs production short time words weir ends film fakery celebrating fakery postmodern style also postmodern style makes another exercise heartless cynicism truman real man abused fakersbut wait really hes really fake ha ha fooled joke wearing thin | 708 |
<p>Barack Obama has been President for just over three weeks. But even this early into the Age of Obama, we can, I think, make a valuable assessment on where things stand.</p>
<p>On the plus side for Obama, by later this month he will have achieved, in almost record time, a huge legislative victory: passage of a trillion dollar (more or less) economic package. His approval rating remains high. And he showed at his press conference on Monday that he is an extremely skilled communicator, one of the best we have ever seen. He is unquestionably the best spokesman Democrats have, and he comes across as reasonable, intelligent, and likeable (if long-winded and sometimes lecturing). But none of that is new; those talents, after all, were on full display during the campaign.</p>
<p>What is surprising is how many mishaps have taken place and how many damaging developments have accrued. One of the key pillars of Obama's campaign and his popularity was his commitment to bipartisanship. But that promise, like Jeremiah Wright, Tom Daschle, and others, has been tossed under the Obama bus. President Obama essentially admitted as much at his press conference earlier this week, when he said that bipartisanship would have to take a back-seat to passage of the economic legislation he wanted.</p>
<p>It's not simply that Obama gained no Republican votes in the House for his plan, and got only three in the Senate. It is that Obama himself never made a serious play at bipartisan cooperation. What he did was allow Nancy Pelosi and liberal House Democrats to write the legislation. Republicans were shut out. And once the legislation emerged, Republicans were asked to come on board. They politely but emphatically declined. It turns out spending a few hours with the GOP caucus and hosting a Super Bowl party does not constitute authentic bipartisanship.</p>
<p>The next pillar to crumble was the promise of “new politics.” We saw it with the announcement of new ethics rules barring lobbyists from working in the Obama Administration on issues that fell under their lobbying bailiwick – followed by waivers for lobbyists working on issues that fell under their lobbying bailiwick. In defense, press secretary Robert Gibbs defended the standard, as if violating the standard was of secondary importance. President Obama has also taken to lacerating Republicans for their opposition to his so-called stimulus plan, arguing that their opposition isn't based on different convictions but on narrow partisanship. A friend of mine who voted for Obama told me he was taken aback by the “gratuitous” nature of Obama's attacks. This was hardly the “turn-the-page-on-the-politics-of-the-past” that we had been told to expect.</p>
<p>More importantly, we have seen a surprising sloppiness from Team Obama. It has manifest itself through a sub-standard vetting process (which led to Bill Richardson withdrawing his nomination for Secretary of Commerce); to tone-deafness in believing the tax problems of Tim Geithner and Tom Daschle, both of which are significant and troubling, would be glossed over; to the announcement that they would close Guantanamo Bay without having any idea what they would do with the detainees (a future commission will decide this, we are told); to Secretary Geithner's disastrous unveiling of a plan to fix the nation's ailing financial markets. Even Democrats were unnerved by the scant details of Geithner's plan. “What they did is over-promise and under-deliver,” Thomas Barrack, chief executive of Colony Capital, a private investment firm in Los Angeles, <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/10/AR2009021001228.html?hpid=topnews" type="external">told</a> the Washington Post. “They said there was going to be a plan, so everybody expected a plan. And there was nothing.”</p>
<p>Minutes after the Geithner “plan” was announced, the Dow Jones industrial average plunged. It finished the day down 381.99 points, or 4.6 percent. The Standard and Poor's 500-stock index fell 4.9 percent. And Obama's response is that Wall Street was expecting an easy solution. No, actually what Wall Street was expecting was a competent plan. It got neither.</p>
<p>What is also surprising is the degree to which Obama has ceded authority to Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. One gets the sense that they are more in control than he is. And why Obama would grant the authority to write his economic recovery plan to Pelosi and House Democrats, who after all comprise the most liberal Congress in memory, is hard to fathom. The obvious explanation is Obama and his Administration were not ready to do it. In any event, he got exactly what you would expect: a massive spending bill, laden with wasteful and unnecessary programs which have almost nothing to do with stimulating the economy. In hitching his wagon to Pelosi and Reid, Obama has succeeded in reenergizing the GOP beyond what anyone could have anticipated.</p>
<p>Right now President Obama and his team look at times amateurish and somewhat overmatched by events.</p>
<p>To be fair, it is still extremely early. President Obama, a man of formidable skills, can regain his footing easily enough. And what will matter in the end is how events unfold, rather than the process. That is almost always the case. If the economy is surging by 2010, Obama and his party will reap the benefits. At the same time, a lot that is significant has already happened. The most attractive qualities about Obama have been shown to be, at this point at least, a mirage. Most importantly, Obama's fate is now tied to an economic package that was shaped more by political considerations (a 40-year Democratic wish list) than economic needs. This legislation is, in the eyes of many, a monstrosity. And very soon now Barack Obama will have ownership of it, and all the fiscal and economic consequences that flow from it.</p>
<p>One can't help think that less than a month into their administration, Obamacons would have hopes for something more, and something better.</p>
<p>It turns out governing is indeed harder than campaigning, and making promises is easier than fulfilling them.</p>
<p>—Peter Wehner is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center in&#160; Washington, D.C. He served in the Bush White House as director of the office of strategic initiatives.</p> | false | 1 | barack obama president three weeks even early age obama think make valuable assessment things stand plus side obama later month achieved almost record time huge legislative victory passage trillion dollar less economic package approval rating remains high showed press conference monday extremely skilled communicator one best ever seen unquestionably best spokesman democrats comes across reasonable intelligent likeable longwinded sometimes lecturing none new talents full display campaign surprising many mishaps taken place many damaging developments accrued one key pillars obamas campaign popularity commitment bipartisanship promise like jeremiah wright tom daschle others tossed obama bus president obama essentially admitted much press conference earlier week said bipartisanship would take backseat passage economic legislation wanted simply obama gained republican votes house plan got three senate obama never made serious play bipartisan cooperation allow nancy pelosi liberal house democrats write legislation republicans shut legislation emerged republicans asked come board politely emphatically declined turns spending hours gop caucus hosting super bowl party constitute authentic bipartisanship next pillar crumble promise new politics saw announcement new ethics rules barring lobbyists working obama administration issues fell lobbying bailiwick followed waivers lobbyists working issues fell lobbying bailiwick defense press secretary robert gibbs defended standard violating standard secondary importance president obama also taken lacerating republicans opposition socalled stimulus plan arguing opposition isnt based different convictions narrow partisanship friend mine voted obama told taken aback gratuitous nature obamas attacks hardly turnthepageonthepoliticsofthepast told expect importantly seen surprising sloppiness team obama manifest substandard vetting process led bill richardson withdrawing nomination secretary commerce tonedeafness believing tax problems tim geithner tom daschle significant troubling would glossed announcement would close guantanamo bay without idea would detainees future commission decide told secretary geithners disastrous unveiling plan fix nations ailing financial markets even democrats unnerved scant details geithners plan overpromise underdeliver thomas barrack chief executive colony capital private investment firm los angeles told washington post said going plan everybody expected plan nothing minutes geithner plan announced dow jones industrial average plunged finished day 38199 points 46 percent standard poors 500stock index fell 49 percent obamas response wall street expecting easy solution actually wall street expecting competent plan got neither also surprising degree obama ceded authority nancy pelosi harry reid one gets sense control obama would grant authority write economic recovery plan pelosi house democrats comprise liberal congress memory hard fathom obvious explanation obama administration ready event got exactly would expect massive spending bill laden wasteful unnecessary programs almost nothing stimulating economy hitching wagon pelosi reid obama succeeded reenergizing gop beyond anyone could anticipated right president obama team look times amateurish somewhat overmatched events fair still extremely early president obama man formidable skills regain footing easily enough matter end events unfold rather process almost always case economy surging 2010 obama party reap benefits time lot significant already happened attractive qualities obama shown point least mirage importantly obamas fate tied economic package shaped political considerations 40year democratic wish list economic needs legislation eyes many monstrosity soon barack obama ownership fiscal economic consequences flow one cant help think less month administration obamacons would hopes something something better turns governing indeed harder campaigning making promises easier fulfilling peter wehner senior fellow ethics public policy center in160 washington dc served bush white house director office strategic initiatives | 533 |
<p>Economic guru Ron Insana warns that if you’re invested in the lofty world of bitcoin, you’d be wise to get out now before it all crashes to the ground.</p>
<p>“Bitcoin is in a bubble, make no mistake,” <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2017/09/13/bitcoin-is-in-a-bubble-and-heres-how-its-going-to-crash-ron-insana.html" type="external">he wrote for CNBC.</a> “The episode, for some, will end badly while others reap the rewards of getting in on the action early and, more importantly, getting out before the bust,” he wrote.</p>
<p>“The price of a single bitcoin has gone up parabolically and at a faster pace than any other speculative vehicle in market history, as investor enthusiasm for the new medium has reached a fever pitch,”&#160;the CNBC and MSNBC contributor wrote.</p>
<p>However, its adoption as a global currency is suspect, partly for regulatory reasons and partly because creating a world currency from scratch, especially given the mandatory limitations on bitcoin creation, is no mean feat, he said.</p>
<p>There have been only three reserve currencies in the history of the Western World: the British pound, the French franc (however briefly) and the U.S. dollar.</p>
<p>Today, the dollar accounts for roughly two-thirds of all financial and economic transactions globally. The daily value of foreign exchange trading tops $5 trillion, alone, while bitcoin does a mere fraction of that.</p>
<p>As yet, bitcoin also fails as a currency in several ways. Money is defined by three characteristics:</p>
<p>“It’s hard to determine if bitcoin is a storehouse of value. Daily volatility tops 5 percent to 10 percent while its “value” has skyrocketed. If it crashes, it will fail to meet criteria No. 1,”&#160;the author of four books on Wall Street explained.</p>
<p>“It is a unit of account, but for whom?” he asked.</p>
<p>“It may be a medium of exchange, but for now that is only for a very few users,” he said.</p>
<p>“Complicating all that is the use of cryptocurrencies in the “dark web” for a wide variety of illicit activities, from money laundering to drug dealing to prostitution, among others.”</p>
<p>Insana isn’t alone in his criticism of bitcoin.</p>
<p>JPMorgan Chase &amp; Co. Chief Executive Officer Jamie said although he thinks bitcoin is a “fraud,” the cryptocurrency could still soar to $100,000 before it collapses.</p>
<p>The cryptocurrency “won’t end well,” he told an investor conference in New York on Tuesday, predicting it will eventually blow up. “It’s a fraud.”</p>
<p>Bitcoin has soared in recent months, spurred by greater acceptance of the blockchain technology that underpins the exchange method and optimism that faster transaction times will encourage broader use of the cryptocurrency. Prices have climbed more than four-fold this year — a run that has drawn debate over whether that’s a bubble, <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-12/jpmorgan-s-ceo-says-he-d-fire-traders-who-bet-on-fraud-bitcoin" type="external">Bloomberg</a> reported.</p>
<p>“If you’re in Venezuela or Ecuador, or North Korea, you’re better off probably using Bitcoin than using their currency,” he said. “That can’t possibly be true in the United States unless you’re speculating, and that isn’t a reason to say something has value,” he said.</p>
<p>“I’m not saying go short… Bitcoin can go $100,000 a bitcoin before it goes down, so this is not advice on what to do,” he said, <a href="http://fortune.com/2017/09/12/jamie-dimon-bitcoin-cryptocurrency-fraud-buy/" type="external">Fortune</a> reported.</p>
<p>Last week, bitcoin slumped after reports that China plans to ban trading of virtual currencies on domestic exchanges, dealing another blow to the $150 billion cryptocurrency market.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, Chinese bitcoin exchange BTCChina said on Thursday that it would stop all trading from Sept. 30, setting off a further slide in the value of the cryptocurrency that left it over 30 percent away from the record highs it hit earlier in the month.</p>
<p>China has boomed as a cryptocurrency trading location in recent years, as investors and speculators flocked to domestic exchanges that formerly allowed users to conduct trades for free, boosting demand, <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-bitcoin-btcc/bitcoin-exchange-btcchina-says-to-stop-trading-sparking-further-slide-idUSKCN1BP1J8" type="external">Reuters</a> explained.</p>
<p>But that has prompted regulators in the country to crack down on the cryptocurrency sector, in a bid to stamp out potential financial risks as consumers pile into a highly risky and speculative market that has seen unprecedented growth this year.</p>
<p>Just hours after BTCChina announced its closure, Chinese news outlet Yicai reported that the country plans to shut down all bitcoin exchanges by the end of September, citing financial sources in Shanghai.</p>
<p>BTCChina said its decision was based on a Sept. 4 directive from Chinese authorities that expressed concern over investment risks involved in cryptocurrencies and ordered a ban on so-called initial coin offerings, or ICOs – the practice of creating and selling digital currencies or tokens to investors to finance start-up projects.</p>
<p>That ban, as well as warnings by regulators in other countries, has driven fears of a wider crackdown and prompted a sell-off that has helped wipe almost $60 billion off the total value of cryptocurrencies since they hit record highs at the start of the month, according to industry website Coinmarketcap.</p>
<p>The price of bitcoin tumbled particularly sharply on BTCChina after the news. By 1233 GMT, it was down 18 percent on the exchange, at 20,510 yuan.</p>
<p>On U.S. exchange Bitstamp, it slid as much as 10 percent to a five-week low of $3,426.92, having hit a record high of nearly $5,000 on Sept. 2.</p>
<p>Panic also spread to other cryptocurrencies, with bitcoin’s main rival ether – sometimes called ethereum – also down around 10 percent, according to Coinmarketcap.</p>
<p>Reuters and other media had reported this week, citing sources, that China planned to further ban exchanges that allowed virtual currency trading but the regulator has yet to make an announcement.</p>
<p>(Newsmax wires services contributed to this report).</p> | false | 1 | economic guru ron insana warns youre invested lofty world bitcoin youd wise get crashes ground bitcoin bubble make mistake wrote cnbc episode end badly others reap rewards getting action early importantly getting bust wrote price single bitcoin gone parabolically faster pace speculative vehicle market history investor enthusiasm new medium reached fever pitch160the cnbc msnbc contributor wrote however adoption global currency suspect partly regulatory reasons partly creating world currency scratch especially given mandatory limitations bitcoin creation mean feat said three reserve currencies history western world british pound french franc however briefly us dollar today dollar accounts roughly twothirds financial economic transactions globally daily value foreign exchange trading tops 5 trillion alone bitcoin mere fraction yet bitcoin also fails currency several ways money defined three characteristics hard determine bitcoin storehouse value daily volatility tops 5 percent 10 percent value skyrocketed crashes fail meet criteria 1160the author four books wall street explained unit account asked may medium exchange users said complicating use cryptocurrencies dark web wide variety illicit activities money laundering drug dealing prostitution among others insana isnt alone criticism bitcoin jpmorgan chase amp co chief executive officer jamie said although thinks bitcoin fraud cryptocurrency could still soar 100000 collapses cryptocurrency wont end well told investor conference new york tuesday predicting eventually blow fraud bitcoin soared recent months spurred greater acceptance blockchain technology underpins exchange method optimism faster transaction times encourage broader use cryptocurrency prices climbed fourfold year run drawn debate whether thats bubble bloomberg reported youre venezuela ecuador north korea youre better probably using bitcoin using currency said cant possibly true united states unless youre speculating isnt reason say something value said im saying go short bitcoin go 100000 bitcoin goes advice said fortune reported last week bitcoin slumped reports china plans ban trading virtual currencies domestic exchanges dealing another blow 150 billion cryptocurrency market meanwhile chinese bitcoin exchange btcchina said thursday would stop trading sept 30 setting slide value cryptocurrency left 30 percent away record highs hit earlier month china boomed cryptocurrency trading location recent years investors speculators flocked domestic exchanges formerly allowed users conduct trades free boosting demand reuters explained prompted regulators country crack cryptocurrency sector bid stamp potential financial risks consumers pile highly risky speculative market seen unprecedented growth year hours btcchina announced closure chinese news outlet yicai reported country plans shut bitcoin exchanges end september citing financial sources shanghai btcchina said decision based sept 4 directive chinese authorities expressed concern investment risks involved cryptocurrencies ordered ban socalled initial coin offerings icos practice creating selling digital currencies tokens investors finance startup projects ban well warnings regulators countries driven fears wider crackdown prompted selloff helped wipe almost 60 billion total value cryptocurrencies since hit record highs start month according industry website coinmarketcap price bitcoin tumbled particularly sharply btcchina news 1233 gmt 18 percent exchange 20510 yuan us exchange bitstamp slid much 10 percent fiveweek low 342692 hit record high nearly 5000 sept 2 panic also spread cryptocurrencies bitcoins main rival ether sometimes called ethereum also around 10 percent according coinmarketcap reuters media reported week citing sources china planned ban exchanges allowed virtual currency trading regulator yet make announcement newsmax wires services contributed report | 523 |
<p>Las Vegas Municipal Court Judge Heidi Almase is facing a stiff challenge from longtime Clark County Deputy District Attorney Cara Campbell.</p>
<p>Almase, seeking a second six-year term on the bench, earned 42 percent of the vote in the April primary. Campbell, a first-time candidate for elected office, garnered 36 percent of votes cast, forcing a June 13 runoff.</p>
<p>Campbell outspent Almase by a 4-1 margin leading into the primary. Campbell’s 2017 total far outpaces Almase’s: $135,527 and $59,843, respectively. The gap between the two was significantly smaller in the most recent reporting cycle, where Campbell raised $43,789 between March 31 and May 19, to Almase’s $38,693.</p>
<p>Almase and Campbell both count the mental health court, started under Almase’s watch, a priority if they’re elected. The fledgling specialty court became fully operational with Las Vegas City Council funding in 2016.</p>
<p>Early voting runs through June 9.</p>
<p>Q&amp;A with Judge Heidi Almase</p>
<p>Q: If elected, what is your top priority?</p>
<p>Expanding the mental health court. We would like the Administrative Office of the Courts to fund the court. We’ve been following how we spend money — tracking and auditing the program — so we can show we’re a good program and we ask for those dollars.</p>
<p>Q: Should the city build a new courthouse for the Las Vegas Municipal Court, and why?</p>
<p>A: The District and Justice courts are overcrowded. When this first started, the idea was the budget stays flat, there’s a minimal financial impact. I support it insofar as it doesn’t cost the taxpayers, it’s not this monster build with a huge price tag.</p>
<p>Q: What is your vision for the mental health court over the next two or three years?</p>
<p>A: In our first year, we had 0 percent recidivism. I would love to be able to maintain that. There’s a wide spectrum of ability we encounter, and when we expand, we need to be really flexible and organic with an eye to accountability and stability. So we expand conservatively.</p>
<p>Q: What kinds of policies and practices can the Municipal Court put in place to help alleviate jail overcrowding?</p>
<p>A: The risk assessment release is a good start at getting people who shouldn’t be in jail out of jail. The Nevada Bail Agents Association is a little frustrated in that process. I think we absolutely need to address their concern. This is a good start, but we need to tweak it a little bit.</p>
<p>Q: What is the biggest challenge facing the Las Vegas Municipal Court, and how do you propose overcoming it?</p>
<p>A: People who come in are frustrated with how many times they have to come to court. If they want to challenge a traffic ticket, they want to know why they have to come to court three times, why it’s such a hassle. We’re trying to modernize our services. I think that’s the biggest gripe I’ve heard from attorneys. That’s why my team and I always try to have that customer service environment in the courtroom. We should continue to work on streamlining the process.</p>
<p>Q&amp;A with Cara Campbell</p>
<p>Q: If elected, what is your top priority?</p>
<p>A: My first priority would be to get up to speed with the mental health court. It’s a court I would be taking over, so I would want to do an accounting review or audit to see what could be done to improve it. If it’s cost-effective, and effective in general, I would want to work to improve on that, and work closely with the District Court judge who oversees the mental health court.</p>
<p>Q: Should the city of Las Vegas build a new courthouse for the Las Vegas Municipal Court, and why?</p>
<p>A: I’m a strong believer in if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, especially when taxpayer money is involved. I know there’s overcrowding at the Regional Justice Center. I don’t know if we could lease space that already exists, but I think there are ways to prevent using taxpayer money to build a new building.</p>
<p>Q: What is your vision for the mental health court over the next two or three years?</p>
<p>A: The most important thing is working together with the District Court mental health program to to better utilize those resources. It would be better to add more people to the program.</p>
<p>Q: What kinds of policies and practices can the Municipal Court put in place to help alleviate jail overcrowding?</p>
<p>A: I certainly wouldn’t be putting people in jail for nonpayment of fines on traffic matters. I think you could give them community service hours. Then, if they still don’t comply, you could put them in jail. Coming from this level, when I see people sitting in jail for a parking ticket or a trespass ticket, that’s not a person who needs to be sitting behind bars, costing taxpayers money and possibly losing their job.</p>
<p>Q: What is the biggest challenge facing the Las Vegas Municipal Court, and how do you propose overcoming it?</p>
<p>A: The outdated computer system. And again, I think the jail overcrowding is a huge issue. I think jail should be reserved for violent offenders, drunk drivers and repeat offenders.</p>
<p>Contact Jamie Munks at [email protected] or 702-383-0340. Follow <a href="http://www.twitter.com/JamieMunksRJ" type="external">@JamieMunksRJ</a> on Twitter.</p>
<p>Heidi Almase (incumbent)</p>
<p>— Age: 49</p>
<p>— Education: Degree in psychology from UNLV, master’s in clinical psychology, graduated from William S. Boyd School of Law at UNLV.</p>
<p>— Occupation: Former prosecutor for the Las Vegas City Attorney’s Office and the Nevada attorney general.</p>
<p>— Relevant experience: Elected to the Las Vegas Municipal Court in 2011, launched the mental health court in 2015.</p>
<p>— Priorities if elected: Continue to focus on and potentially expand the mental health court, improve customer service in the municipal court system.</p>
<p>Cara Campbell</p>
<p>— Age: 46</p>
<p>— Education: Degree in political science from UNLV, The McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento.</p>
<p>— Occupation: Chief deputy district attorney in Clark County.</p>
<p>— Relevant experience: Nearly 20 years in the Clark County District Attorney’s Office, including two stints on the domestic violence team and time spent as the chief of training and recruitment.</p>
<p>— Priorities if elected: Act as a deterrent when people are committing petty crimes from ending up back in the system for more serious offenses, increase respect and professionalism in the courtroom, focus on mental health issues.</p>
<p /> | false | 1 | las vegas municipal court judge heidi almase facing stiff challenge longtime clark county deputy district attorney cara campbell almase seeking second sixyear term bench earned 42 percent vote april primary campbell firsttime candidate elected office garnered 36 percent votes cast forcing june 13 runoff campbell outspent almase 41 margin leading primary campbells 2017 total far outpaces almases 135527 59843 respectively gap two significantly smaller recent reporting cycle campbell raised 43789 march 31 may 19 almases 38693 almase campbell count mental health court started almases watch priority theyre elected fledgling specialty court became fully operational las vegas city council funding 2016 early voting runs june 9 qampa judge heidi almase q elected top priority expanding mental health court would like administrative office courts fund court weve following spend money tracking auditing program show good program ask dollars q city build new courthouse las vegas municipal court district justice courts overcrowded first started idea budget stays flat theres minimal financial impact support insofar doesnt cost taxpayers monster build huge price tag q vision mental health court next two three years first year 0 percent recidivism would love able maintain theres wide spectrum ability encounter expand need really flexible organic eye accountability stability expand conservatively q kinds policies practices municipal court put place help alleviate jail overcrowding risk assessment release good start getting people shouldnt jail jail nevada bail agents association little frustrated process think absolutely need address concern good start need tweak little bit q biggest challenge facing las vegas municipal court propose overcoming people come frustrated many times come court want challenge traffic ticket want know come court three times hassle trying modernize services think thats biggest gripe ive heard attorneys thats team always try customer service environment courtroom continue work streamlining process qampa cara campbell q elected top priority first priority would get speed mental health court court would taking would want accounting review audit see could done improve costeffective effective general would want work improve work closely district court judge oversees mental health court q city las vegas build new courthouse las vegas municipal court im strong believer aint broke dont fix especially taxpayer money involved know theres overcrowding regional justice center dont know could lease space already exists think ways prevent using taxpayer money build new building q vision mental health court next two three years important thing working together district court mental health program better utilize resources would better add people program q kinds policies practices municipal court put place help alleviate jail overcrowding certainly wouldnt putting people jail nonpayment fines traffic matters think could give community service hours still dont comply could put jail coming level see people sitting jail parking ticket trespass ticket thats person needs sitting behind bars costing taxpayers money possibly losing job q biggest challenge facing las vegas municipal court propose overcoming outdated computer system think jail overcrowding huge issue think jail reserved violent offenders drunk drivers repeat offenders contact jamie munks jmunksreviewjournalcom 7023830340 follow jamiemunksrj twitter heidi almase incumbent age 49 education degree psychology unlv masters clinical psychology graduated william boyd school law unlv occupation former prosecutor las vegas city attorneys office nevada attorney general relevant experience elected las vegas municipal court 2011 launched mental health court 2015 priorities elected continue focus potentially expand mental health court improve customer service municipal court system cara campbell age 46 education degree political science unlv mcgeorge school law sacramento occupation chief deputy district attorney clark county relevant experience nearly 20 years clark county district attorneys office including two stints domestic violence team time spent chief training recruitment priorities elected act deterrent people committing petty crimes ending back system serious offenses increase respect professionalism courtroom focus mental health issues | 614 |
<p>WASHINGTON — Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., the former Democratic National Committee chairwoman known in political circles as DWS, is knee-deep in a scandal that involves a laptop, money and possible foreign entanglements.</p>
<p>Unlike the Trump Russian scandal, however, The Washington Post and The New York Times have barely reported on the story, which has conservatives observing — with President Donald Trump’s Twitter account concurring — that the mainstream media have a double standard.</p>
<p>In February, the House sergeant-at-arms yanked House computer network access for five information technology staffers who worked as shared employees for some 30 House Democrats. Capitol Police told members that the five were under criminal investigation for possibly violating security policies — and asked members to update their security settings. By March, most Democrats had fired the five, if only because they could no longer do their jobs.</p>
<p>To the puzzlement of many Democrats and Republicans, Wasserman Schultz kept one of the five, Imran Awan, on the payroll, even though he could not do standard House IT work.</p>
<p>On July 24, federal authorities arrested Awan at Dulles International Airport as the naturalized citizen was about to board a plane to his native Pakistan. According to an FBI affidavit, Awan had just wired $283,000 to Pakistan, $165,000 of it from an ill-gotten home-equity loan. The feds charged Awan with bank fraud, then released him under supervision. Only then did Wasserman Schultz fire Awan.</p>
<p>Awan’s wife, Hina Alvi, who was one of the fired IT workers, had left the country for Pakistan in March. While she had bought a round-trip ticket with a return date in September, FBI Special Agent Brandon C. Merriman wrote he “does not believe that Alvi has any intention to return to the United States.”</p>
<p>Wasserman Schultz is no obscure member of Congress. Last year, she had to resign as DNC chair after Wikileaks revealed that she had tilted the Democratic primary in favor of Hillary Clinton, even though the national committee was duty-bound to remain neutral.</p>
<p>Awan’s job duties changed</p>
<p>Earlier this month, Wasserman Schultz told the South Florida Sun Sentinel that she kept Awan on the payroll because she had “grave concerns about his due process rights being violated,” and stated her belief that the Capitol Police actions could be the result of anti-Muslim, anti-Pakistani profiling. She kept Awan on the payroll by switching his role to an advisory position.</p>
<p>Awan’s attorney Christopher Gowan released a statement that blamed the firings on “a frenzy of anti-Muslim bigotry,” charged that “extremist right-wing bloggers” forced Awan’s family to leave the country and voiced confidence that Awan “will soon be able to clear his name and get on with his life.”</p>
<p>It is important to note that federal authorities have not charged any of the IT five — Awan, Alvi, Awan’s two brothers or a friend — with any crime directly related to their House IT work.</p>
<p>But Matthew Whitaker, executive director of the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust, sees Awan’s continued presence on the payroll as a violation of House ethics rules. “After Awan was barred from accessing the House computer system, Wasserman Schultz continued to pay Awan with taxpayer funds for IT consulting — a position he could not possibly perform,” Whitaker wrote to the House Ethics Committee.</p>
<p>Awan’s salary also is an issue. Politico reported that Awan made nearly $2 million since he started working for House Democrats in 2004. Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley wrote that over 13 years, Awan, his brothers and wife “collected more than $4 million,” which he said is “three times higher than the norm for a government contractor.”</p>
<p>There is enough smoke to this story to merit intense news coverage. Yet, The Washington Post, the federal government’s hometown paper, had published only two stories on the Awan saga as of Tuesday, when the Post ran an explainer that looked at the story through two lenses — one conservative, one liberal.</p>
<p>Two competing viewpoints</p>
<p>The “conservative media” angle: “A powerful Democratic congresswoman refused to fire an information technology aide after he’s accused of stealing House computer equipment and potentially breaching security protocols.”</p>
<p>The liberal angle: “Powerful Democratic congresswoman protects Muslim IT staffer from what she suspects is religious discrimination. She fires him after he is charged with a seemingly unrelated crime.”</p>
<p>For this story, the Post simply could not take a side. Its coverage of the Trump Russia probe shows no such hesitation.</p>
<p>Likewise, The New York Times began a July 28 story with a warning of sorts — that “conservative news outlets have built a case against Imran Awan, his wife, two brothers and a friend, piece by piece.” Hmmm. Could it be that conservative outlets built the case because most liberal organs didn’t see much of a story?</p>
<p>When Trump has railed against leaks from the intelligence community, cable pundits routinely have slammed the president for not appreciating members of the intelligence community who put their lives on the line every day. When Wasserman Schultz has accused the Capitol Police of racial or religious profiling, newspapers have simply repeated her accusation.</p>
<p>The twin papers focused on how the fringe has framed the story — one “YouTube conspiracy theorist” accused Awan and friends of being “Pakistani spies” — as if fringe opinion absolves them from having to follow the story where it leads.</p>
<p>It is impossible not to see a double standard. The Democrats’ IT guys enjoy the presumption of innocence. And that would be OK, if big beltway media showed the president the same courtesy.</p>
<p>Contact Debra J. Saunders at [email protected] or 202-662-7391. Follow <a href="http://www.twitter.com/DebraJSaunders" type="external">@DebraJSaunders</a> on Twitter.</p> | false | 1 | washington rep debbie wasserman schultz dfla former democratic national committee chairwoman known political circles dws kneedeep scandal involves laptop money possible foreign entanglements unlike trump russian scandal however washington post new york times barely reported story conservatives observing president donald trumps twitter account concurring mainstream media double standard february house sergeantatarms yanked house computer network access five information technology staffers worked shared employees 30 house democrats capitol police told members five criminal investigation possibly violating security policies asked members update security settings march democrats fired five could longer jobs puzzlement many democrats republicans wasserman schultz kept one five imran awan payroll even though could standard house work july 24 federal authorities arrested awan dulles international airport naturalized citizen board plane native pakistan according fbi affidavit awan wired 283000 pakistan 165000 illgotten homeequity loan feds charged awan bank fraud released supervision wasserman schultz fire awan awans wife hina alvi one fired workers left country pakistan march bought roundtrip ticket return date september fbi special agent brandon c merriman wrote believe alvi intention return united states wasserman schultz obscure member congress last year resign dnc chair wikileaks revealed tilted democratic primary favor hillary clinton even though national committee dutybound remain neutral awans job duties changed earlier month wasserman schultz told south florida sun sentinel kept awan payroll grave concerns due process rights violated stated belief capitol police actions could result antimuslim antipakistani profiling kept awan payroll switching role advisory position awans attorney christopher gowan released statement blamed firings frenzy antimuslim bigotry charged extremist rightwing bloggers forced awans family leave country voiced confidence awan soon able clear name get life important note federal authorities charged five awan alvi awans two brothers friend crime directly related house work matthew whitaker executive director foundation accountability civic trust sees awans continued presence payroll violation house ethics rules awan barred accessing house computer system wasserman schultz continued pay awan taxpayer funds consulting position could possibly perform whitaker wrote house ethics committee awans salary also issue politico reported awan made nearly 2 million since started working house democrats 2004 senate judiciary chairman chuck grassley wrote 13 years awan brothers wife collected 4 million said three times higher norm government contractor enough smoke story merit intense news coverage yet washington post federal governments hometown paper published two stories awan saga tuesday post ran explainer looked story two lenses one conservative one liberal two competing viewpoints conservative media angle powerful democratic congresswoman refused fire information technology aide hes accused stealing house computer equipment potentially breaching security protocols liberal angle powerful democratic congresswoman protects muslim staffer suspects religious discrimination fires charged seemingly unrelated crime story post simply could take side coverage trump russia probe shows hesitation likewise new york times began july 28 story warning sorts conservative news outlets built case imran awan wife two brothers friend piece piece hmmm could conservative outlets built case liberal organs didnt see much story trump railed leaks intelligence community cable pundits routinely slammed president appreciating members intelligence community put lives line every day wasserman schultz accused capitol police racial religious profiling newspapers simply repeated accusation twin papers focused fringe framed story one youtube conspiracy theorist accused awan friends pakistani spies fringe opinion absolves follow story leads impossible see double standard democrats guys enjoy presumption innocence would ok big beltway media showed president courtesy contact debra j saunders dsaundersreviewjournalcom 2026627391 follow debrajsaunders twitter | 558 |
<p>MINNESOTA VIKINGS (8-2) AT DETROIT LIONS (6-4)</p>
<p>KICKOFF: Thursday, 12:30 p.m. ET, Ford Field. TV: FOX, Joe Buck, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Troy_Aikman/" type="external">Troy Aikman</a>, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Erin_Andrews/" type="external">Erin Andrews</a> (field reporter).</p>
<p>SERIES HISTORY: 113th regular-season meeting. Vikings lead series, 71-39-2. Vikings are 32-23-1 at Detroit, but lost 16-13 at Ford Field on Thanksgiving last season. The Vikings are 2-5 against the Lions during the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Mike_Zimmer/" type="external">Mike Zimmer</a> era. They have lost three straight, including a 14-7 setback at U.S. Bank Stadium on Oct. 1. This is the Lions’ 78th Thanksgiving game, dating to 1934. They are 37-38-2. The Vikings are 5-2 on Thanksgiving.</p>
<p>KEYS TO THE GAME: It’s pretty simple how the Vikings lost the first meeting. They lost three fumbles and the turnover battle, 3-0. The Lions turned two of those fumbles into 10 points. The last fumble, by <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Adam-Thielen/" type="external">Adam Thielen</a> with 1:51 left, clinched the 14-7 victory. The offense needs to secure the football.</p>
<p>The defense needs to establish its second-ranked run defense (77.7) and go after <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Matthew_Stafford/" type="external">Matthew Stafford</a>, whom they sacked six times in the first meeting.</p>
<p>It also will help if Kai Forbath gets his kicking straightened out. He missed a 39-yarder in the fourth quarter of the first meeting. And he’s coming off a game in which he missed back-to-back field-goal attempts.</p>
<p>The Lions won the first meeting by controlling the clock with 31 rushing attempts. That was done partly out of necessity in an effort to keep the Vikings’ menacing pass rush off Stafford.</p>
<p>The Lions still want a balanced offense, but their line has improved in the last two months thanks to the return of Taylor Decker, and they won’t have the disadvantage of playing on the road.</p>
<p>The Vikings do play a lot of single-high safety on early downs, so perhaps Stafford can take more shots downfield.</p>
<p>On defense, the objective is to stop the run first and foremost and put the game in <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Case_Keenum/" type="external">Case Keenum</a>‘s hands. The Vikings don’t take many sacks, but the Lions won’t hesitate to come after Keenum in long down-and-distance situations.</p>
<p>MATCHUPS TO WATCH:</p>
<p>–Lions LT Taylor Decker vs. Vikings DEs Everson Griffen and Danielle Hunter. What a difference seven weeks make. When the Vikings last faced the Lions, former first-round draft bust <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Greg_Robinson/" type="external">Greg Robinson</a> was a desperate fill-in for the injured Decker. Griffen was so unimpressed with Robinson’s work that he called him “lazy” in the days leading up to the game. The Vikings had six sacks. Not all of them came against Robinson. But the opening snap of the game was indicative of the problems the Lions would have. With the Lions giving extra attention to the blind side to help Robinson, Hunter took advantage of single blocking on the other side and beat Rick Wagner for a sack. Hunter had two sacks in the game. Griffen had one. Decker is a much better player than Robinson. Plus, Griffen admits he’s not 100 percent since injuring his foot Oct. 29 vs. Cleveland. He missed a game and then had his streak of eight games with a sack snapped last week against the Rams.</p>
<p>–Vikings WR Adam Thielen vs. Lions CBs <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Darius-Slay/" type="external">Darius Slay</a> and Nevin Lawson. Thielen is the only receiver in the league with at least five catches in every game this season. He had a relatively quiet game — five catches for 59 yards — in the first meeting. He also had the team’s third fumble of the game, which allowed the Lions to run out the final 1:51 of a 14-7 win. Slay has a team-high four interceptions. Teams haven’t shadowed Thielen yet this season because <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Stefon-Diggs/" type="external">Stefon Diggs</a> can be equally dangerous on the other side when healthy. He caught five balls for 98 yards in the first meeting. The rest of the Lions’ secondary can’t sleep on Thielen’s speed. Active safety Glover Quin will need to take the proper angle or risk a similar fate as the Rams did Sunday when Thielen turned a short catch into a 65-yard touchdown.</p>
<p>PLAYER SPOTLIGHT: Vikings RB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Latavius-Murray/" type="external">Latavius Murray</a>. Coming off his best performance in 10 games as a Viking, Murray needs to not play the way he did the last time these two teams met. In that game on Oct. 1, star rookie <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Dalvin-Cook/" type="external">Dalvin Cook</a> suffered a torn ACL while running untouched through an open hole. Murray stepped in and finished with 21 yards on seven carries, looking slow and punchless. Last week, Murray displayed the power that was advertised when the 6-foot-3, 230-pounder was signed. He ran through arm tackles and bulled his way into the end zone on two touchdown runs.</p>
<p>FAST FACTS: Vikings QB Case Keenum has thrown for 584 yards and five TDs, with two interceptions, in the past two games. … RB Latavius Murray rushed for 95 yards &amp; 2 TDs last week. Has 4 rush TDs in past 4. In 3 career Thursday games, has 332 scrimmage yards (110.7 per game) &amp; 4 rush TDs. … WR Adam Thielen ranks second in the NFL with 916 receiving yards. He is the second player in franchise history with 60 catches (62) and 900 yards (916) in the first 10 games ( <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Randy_Moss/" type="external">Randy Moss</a>, 2003). In his past six road games, he has 39 receptions for 645 yards and four TDs. … WR Stefon Diggs has 24 receptions for 286 yards and a score in three career games vs. Detroit. He has two TDs in his past three division road games. … DE Everson Griffen is tied for fourth in the NFL with 10 sacks. He has a sack in eight games this season. He has 9.5 sacks in his past 11 vs. Detroit. … DE Danielle Hunter aims for a third straight game with a sack. He had two sacks in the last meeting and has four sacks in the past five division games. … In his past six home games, Detroit QB Matthew Stafford has averaged 300.7 passing yards per game, with 12 TD passes and three interceptions. In his past six Thursday games, he has averaged 325 yards, with 15 TDs and two interceptions. His 2,219 yards and 15 TD passes are second-most on Thanksgiving in NFL history. … WR Golden Tate has 30 receptions for 424 yards (84.8 per game) &amp; 2 TDs in past 5. Has 13 catches for 183 yards (91.5 per game) &amp; TD in past 2 at home. … WR <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Marvin-Jones/" type="external">Marvin Jones</a> led Detroit with 85 yards and a TD last week. He has four TDs in his past five games. … DE <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Ezekiel-Ansah/" type="external">Ezekiel Ansah</a> has 6.5 sacks in four Thanksgiving games. … CB Darius Slay leads the NFC with four INTs and ranks first in NFL with 15 passes defensed. He has two INTs in his past three home games vs. Minnesota. … LB Tahir Whitehead led Detroit with nine tackles in Week 11. He has 29 tackles in the past three meetings.</p>
<p>PREDICTION: The Vikings haven’t lost since the last time these teams met, with six straight wins. The Lions have lost to all three good teams they have played since then.</p>
<p>OUR PICK: Vikings, 27-24.</p>
<p>— <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Chris-Cluff/" type="external">Chris Cluff</a></p> | false | 1 | minnesota vikings 82 detroit lions 64 kickoff thursday 1230 pm et ford field tv fox joe buck troy aikman erin andrews field reporter series history 113th regularseason meeting vikings lead series 71392 vikings 32231 detroit lost 1613 ford field thanksgiving last season vikings 25 lions mike zimmer era lost three straight including 147 setback us bank stadium oct 1 lions 78th thanksgiving game dating 1934 37382 vikings 52 thanksgiving keys game pretty simple vikings lost first meeting lost three fumbles turnover battle 30 lions turned two fumbles 10 points last fumble adam thielen 151 left clinched 147 victory offense needs secure football defense needs establish secondranked run defense 777 go matthew stafford sacked six times first meeting also help kai forbath gets kicking straightened missed 39yarder fourth quarter first meeting hes coming game missed backtoback fieldgoal attempts lions first meeting controlling clock 31 rushing attempts done partly necessity effort keep vikings menacing pass rush stafford lions still want balanced offense line improved last two months thanks return taylor decker wont disadvantage playing road vikings play lot singlehigh safety early downs perhaps stafford take shots downfield defense objective stop run first foremost put game case keenums hands vikings dont take many sacks lions wont hesitate come keenum long downanddistance situations matchups watch lions lt taylor decker vs vikings des everson griffen danielle hunter difference seven weeks make vikings last faced lions former firstround draft bust greg robinson desperate fillin injured decker griffen unimpressed robinsons work called lazy days leading game vikings six sacks came robinson opening snap game indicative problems lions would lions giving extra attention blind side help robinson hunter took advantage single blocking side beat rick wagner sack hunter two sacks game griffen one decker much better player robinson plus griffen admits hes 100 percent since injuring foot oct 29 vs cleveland missed game streak eight games sack snapped last week rams vikings wr adam thielen vs lions cbs darius slay nevin lawson thielen receiver league least five catches every game season relatively quiet game five catches 59 yards first meeting also teams third fumble game allowed lions run final 151 147 win slay teamhigh four interceptions teams havent shadowed thielen yet season stefon diggs equally dangerous side healthy caught five balls 98 yards first meeting rest lions secondary cant sleep thielens speed active safety glover quin need take proper angle risk similar fate rams sunday thielen turned short catch 65yard touchdown player spotlight vikings rb latavius murray coming best performance 10 games viking murray needs play way last time two teams met game oct 1 star rookie dalvin cook suffered torn acl running untouched open hole murray stepped finished 21 yards seven carries looking slow punchless last week murray displayed power advertised 6foot3 230pounder signed ran arm tackles bulled way end zone two touchdown runs fast facts vikings qb case keenum thrown 584 yards five tds two interceptions past two games rb latavius murray rushed 95 yards amp 2 tds last week 4 rush tds past 4 3 career thursday games 332 scrimmage yards 1107 per game amp 4 rush tds wr adam thielen ranks second nfl 916 receiving yards second player franchise history 60 catches 62 900 yards 916 first 10 games randy moss 2003 past six road games 39 receptions 645 yards four tds wr stefon diggs 24 receptions 286 yards score three career games vs detroit two tds past three division road games de everson griffen tied fourth nfl 10 sacks sack eight games season 95 sacks past 11 vs detroit de danielle hunter aims third straight game sack two sacks last meeting four sacks past five division games past six home games detroit qb matthew stafford averaged 3007 passing yards per game 12 td passes three interceptions past six thursday games averaged 325 yards 15 tds two interceptions 2219 yards 15 td passes secondmost thanksgiving nfl history wr golden tate 30 receptions 424 yards 848 per game amp 2 tds past 5 13 catches 183 yards 915 per game amp td past 2 home wr marvin jones led detroit 85 yards td last week four tds past five games de ezekiel ansah 65 sacks four thanksgiving games cb darius slay leads nfc four ints ranks first nfl 15 passes defensed two ints past three home games vs minnesota lb tahir whitehead led detroit nine tackles week 11 29 tackles past three meetings prediction vikings havent lost since last time teams met six straight wins lions lost three good teams played since pick vikings 2724 chris cluff | 752 |
<p>At one point in Space Cowboys, William “Hawk” Hawkins (Tommy Lee Jones) says to Frank Corvin (Clint Eastwood): “Old Age just brings out more of the Frank in you, Frank” The same could be said of Eastwood himself. Like pretty much all of the films he has been unwise enough to try directing, this one goes straight for the cliché cupboard. And the cliché that Clint most enjoys affectionately fingering — and quite possibly the one that his fans will never get tired of — is the one that he is most familiar with and that he has been working and re-working since his days as a star of Sergio Leone’s spaghetti-Westerns. This is the cliché of the tall stranger, a lone, rangy, tight-lipped character who is persuaded (with difficulty) to save an ungrateful and corrupt community which has got itself into a mess.</p>
<p>In this case the community is a corrupt and bureaucratic government dominated by sleazy careerists trying to cover their posteriors. As Frank Corvin, a now-ageing astronaut bumped from the space program 40 years ago as a public relations exercise by a chimpanzee, Clint’s principal antagonist is Col. Bob Gerson (James Cromwell), the man who thought up the PR gimmick and so denied him his chance in space. Frank is not the forgiving and forgetting type, and the Air Force must not like Gerson very much either, as he has apparently been a colonel for 40 years. But we connoisseurs of the cliché know that he is only there as the representative of the corrupt bureaucracy, a man who will screw up royally and have to be bailed out by the outsider who regards — and is regarded by — the system with contempt.</p>
<p>And sure enough, Col Bob has a problem. A Russian communications satellite with (inexplicably) an American design, is about to fall to earth and, as the rather comic little Russian general played by Rade Serbedzija explains it, “a communications failure could plunge us into chaos, and perhaps civil war.” Frank Corvin, who nowadays is having a little trouble getting his garage door-opener installed, designed the satellite’s guidance system back in 1969 and now, as “the only engineer proficient in such obsolete technology,” he is said to be the one man on earth who can fix it. He insists that he will only go into space to do so if he can have his old astronaut team from 1958—which includes, in addition to Hawk Hawkins, Jerry O’Neil (Donald Sutherland) and Tank Sullivan (James Garner) — go with him.</p>
<p>“I don’t know how to break this to you, Frank,” says Gerson, “but you’re an old man.”</p>
<p>“This old man is the only hope you’ve got,” he tells him. “You sent Glenn up, didn’t you?”</p>
<p>“I can’t send up a spaceship full of geriatrics!”</p>
<p>“The clock’s ticking, Bob, and I’m only getting older.”</p>
<p>So of course, the spaceship full of geriatrics has to go. In other words, the film’s premiss is unbelievable not on just one but on several points at once. Why are the oldies the only guys who can do the job? How are we to suppose it possible that men who must be around 70 can all pass a fitness test designed for men 40 years younger? Why on the vague and unbelievable promise that the satellite’s fall will lead to a Russian Civil War does NASA spend (presumably) billions on a mission like this one for a foreign power — and apparently without any political debate? And when one of these questions is answered with a big revelation which I forbear to disclose, the implausibilities only multiply. How could a secret like this have been kept, or been expected to remain a secret even after Frank gets a close look at the satellite? Amidst so many improbable assumptions, the movie’s attempt to portray James Garner as a fundamentalist preacher in Oklahoma goes almost unnoticed.</p>
<p>But forget all these unlikely truths and concentrate on the one undoubted lie. For there is another cliché at work here too: the summer crowd-pleasing reaffirmation of the almost instinctive American belief that you’re only as old as you feel. Frank insists that if he didn’t think he was every bit as spry as a man several decades younger he wouldn’t go near this mission, which shows us that he’s either a liar or a fool. But audiences will resolutely refuse to notice the fact because they want to believe as Frank does, or claims to do, that the years do not matter. Space Cowboys is thus a sort of age-inverted version of X-men: a fantasy of empowerment for geriatrics rather than adolescents. Both are daughter-fantasies of the great Hollywood mother-fantasy that we are used to seeing again and again during these long, hot summers: that you can be a kid forever.</p>
<p>“I have never met a kid who didn’t want to be an astronaut when he grows up,” says Hawk’s love interest, played by Marcia Gay Harden.</p>
<p>“Did you ever meet a kid who wouldn’t grow up?” says one of the senescent astronauts.</p>
<p>Nowadays the better question would be: have we ever met one that would?</p>
<p>Clint gets to have it both ways too because, while remaining a kid both physically and mentally, he gets to keep the old man’s feeling of superiority to the young whippersnapper who does everything by the book and who is therefore a representative of that “system” that he has been so monotonously bucking his whole career. The whippersnapper on this occasion is one Ethan Glance (Loren Dean), and he turns out to be a mole working for the deceitful Col Bob Gerson. Obviously, he has to be taught a lesson, including the lesson that all his technical accomplishment is worthless next to the old guys’ old-guy sagacity. “I’ve got two masters’ degrees from M.I.T.,” says Ethan angrily to Frank when the latter speaks slightingly of his ability to understand the system that he, Frank, designed.</p>
<p>“Maybe you should ask for your money back,” he says to him.</p>
<p>Maybe we should too.</p> | false | 1 | one point space cowboys william hawk hawkins tommy lee jones says frank corvin clint eastwood old age brings frank frank could said eastwood like pretty much films unwise enough try directing one goes straight cliché cupboard cliché clint enjoys affectionately fingering quite possibly one fans never get tired one familiar working reworking since days star sergio leones spaghettiwesterns cliché tall stranger lone rangy tightlipped character persuaded difficulty save ungrateful corrupt community got mess case community corrupt bureaucratic government dominated sleazy careerists trying cover posteriors frank corvin nowageing astronaut bumped space program 40 years ago public relations exercise chimpanzee clints principal antagonist col bob gerson james cromwell man thought pr gimmick denied chance space frank forgiving forgetting type air force must like gerson much either apparently colonel 40 years connoisseurs cliché know representative corrupt bureaucracy man screw royally bailed outsider regards regarded system contempt sure enough col bob problem russian communications satellite inexplicably american design fall earth rather comic little russian general played rade serbedzija explains communications failure could plunge us chaos perhaps civil war frank corvin nowadays little trouble getting garage dooropener installed designed satellites guidance system back 1969 engineer proficient obsolete technology said one man earth fix insists go space old astronaut team 1958which includes addition hawk hawkins jerry oneil donald sutherland tank sullivan james garner go dont know break frank says gerson youre old man old man hope youve got tells sent glenn didnt cant send spaceship full geriatrics clocks ticking bob im getting older course spaceship full geriatrics go words films premiss unbelievable one several points oldies guys job suppose possible men must around 70 pass fitness test designed men 40 years younger vague unbelievable promise satellites fall lead russian civil war nasa spend presumably billions mission like one foreign power apparently without political debate one questions answered big revelation forbear disclose implausibilities multiply could secret like kept expected remain secret even frank gets close look satellite amidst many improbable assumptions movies attempt portray james garner fundamentalist preacher oklahoma goes almost unnoticed forget unlikely truths concentrate one undoubted lie another cliché work summer crowdpleasing reaffirmation almost instinctive american belief youre old feel frank insists didnt think every bit spry man several decades younger wouldnt go near mission shows us hes either liar fool audiences resolutely refuse notice fact want believe frank claims years matter space cowboys thus sort ageinverted version xmen fantasy empowerment geriatrics rather adolescents daughterfantasies great hollywood motherfantasy used seeing long hot summers kid forever never met kid didnt want astronaut grows says hawks love interest played marcia gay harden ever meet kid wouldnt grow says one senescent astronauts nowadays better question would ever met one would clint gets ways remaining kid physically mentally gets keep old mans feeling superiority young whippersnapper everything book therefore representative system monotonously bucking whole career whippersnapper occasion one ethan glance loren dean turns mole working deceitful col bob gerson obviously taught lesson including lesson technical accomplishment worthless next old guys oldguy sagacity ive got two masters degrees mit says ethan angrily frank latter speaks slightingly ability understand system frank designed maybe ask money back says maybe | 517 |
<p>With the Islamic State expanding its reach after two key victories in Ramadi, the capital of Iraq’s Anbar Province, and Palmyra, a strategically important city in Syria, it might a good time to ask: What are the worst foreign policy failures of Barack Obama’s presidency? The list is long; here are several to choose from.</p>
<p>1. The Rise of ISIS. President Obama failed to anticipate the rise of ISIS, which he ridiculed as a “ <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/01/27/going-the-distance-2?currentPage=all" type="external">jayvee team</a>” as recently as last year, and he has since failed to do anything effective to impede it. ISIS had established territory in large parts of Syria and Iraq; it now “ <a href="http://blogs.cfr.org/davidson/2014/07/24/isis-hasnt-gone-anywhere-and-its-getting-stronger/" type="external">controls a volume of resources and territory unmatched in the history of extremist organizations</a>.” Under Mr. Obama’s watch, a jihadist caliphate has been established in the heart of the Middle East — and the president has no strategy to deal with it.</p>
<p>2. Losing the War in Iraq. President Obama’s predecessor handed to him a war that had been won. Don’t take my word for it; take the word of Mr. Obama and his vice president. On December 14, 2011, in welcoming troops home at Ft. Bragg as he was ending the American presence in Iraq, the president <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/12/14/president-obama-fort-bragg-welcome-home" type="external">declared</a> “we’re leaving behind a sovereign, stable and self-reliant Iraq.” It was, the commander-in-chief said, a “moment of success.” A year earlier Vice President Joe Biden put it <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLteUGkvpOc" type="external">this way</a>: “I am very optimistic about Iraq. I think it’s going to be one of the great achievements of this administration.” All our hard-earned achievements were undone by the president’s determined commitment to withdraw all American troops from Iraq during his presidency. He did what he was determined to do and, as a result, Iraq is collapsing and Iran is rushing in, increasing its influence to an unprecedented degree.</p>
<p>3. Failing to Aid Iran’s Green Revolution. &#160;In the summer of 2009, a revolution in Iran threatened to topple the mullahs. Leaders of the so-called “Green Revolution” <a href="http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/article/318891" type="external">pleaded for support</a>. They got none. President Obama, in <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/2012/oct/22/news/la-pn-fact-check-debate-green-revolution-20121022" type="external">saying</a> he “want[ed] to avoid the United States being the issue inside Iran”, did nothing to aid the pro-democracy elements that were seeking to overthrow the Islamic theocracy. &#160;Whether our assistance would have altered the course of events is impossible to know — but the president, in essentially casting his lot with the Iranian regime during its most vulnerable period since the 1979 revolution, ensured the democratic uprising would fail. And with it, our best chance of the Middle East cleansing itself of the most malignant and dangerous regime on earth.</p>
<p>4. Triggering a Nuclear Arms Race in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia has long advocated a Middle East free of nuclear weapons. But President Obama’s determined effort to strike a deal with Iran, in which all the important concessions are made by us and none by the Iranians, has petrified our traditional Sunni allies in the region. Fearful of Iran, nations like Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey and others are now considering and/or preparing to acquire nuclear weapons. Saudi Arabia’s former intelligence chief and ex-ambassador to Washington, Prince Turki al Faisal, <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/saudi-arabia-considers-nuclear-weapons-to-offset-iran-1430999409?mg=id-wsj" type="external">declared in March</a> that whatever Iran gets in its nuclear deal with the United States, “we will want the same.” Ibrahim al-Marie, a retired Saudi colonel and a security analyst in Riyadh, put it this way: “Our leaders will never allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon while we don’t. If Iran declares a nuclear weapon, we can’t afford to wait 30 years more for our own—we should be able to declare ours within a week.”&#160;The president’s effort to strike a deal with Iran, then, is triggering a nuclear arms race in the world’s most volatile region, with the risks of nuclear war increased by the threat of terrorist groups acquiring radioactive material.</p>
<p>5. Erasing the “Red Line” in Syria. In 2012,&#160;President Obama <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxxwfaIAl_Q" type="external">said</a> Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad — who the previous year was referred to as a “ <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2011/11/clinton-no-longer-a-believer-that-assad-is-a-reformer-says-he-cant-sustain-the-armed-opposition-in-syria/" type="external">reformer</a>” by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton — should step down and that the use of chemical weapons by the Assad regime against rebel forces would constitute crossing a “red line.” Mr. Assad crossed the red line, and President Obama did nothing. The brutal Syrian leader is still in power, Syria is being torn apart by a civil war in which <a href="https://www.oxfam.org/sites/www.oxfam.org/files/file_attachments/bp-failing-syria-unsc-resolution-120315-en1.pdf" type="external">around a quarter of a million people have died</a>, around four million have fled as refugees, and around eight million have been internally displaced. Syria’s neighbors are being destabilized. And an unmistakable message of weakness was sent by Mr. Obama and received by every adversary and ally of the United States: Mr. Obama’s words and threats are worthless.</p>
<p>6. The Failure to Arm Syrian Rebels. As Syria began to unravel, in 2012 then-CIA director David Petraeus and then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/03/us/politics/in-behind-scene-blows-and-triumphs-sense-of-clinton-future.html" type="external">developed a plan</a> to vet Syrian&#160;rebels and train a cadre of fighters who would be supplied with weapons. The plan was supported at the time by&#160;Leon Panetta, who was defense secretary, and Martin Dempsey, who was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. But it was ultimately vetoed by President Obama, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/08/us/politics/panetta-speaks-to-senate-panel-on-benghazi-attack.html" type="external">according to Mr. Panetta</a>. The president was worried about becoming more deeply involved in Syria. That hasn’t worked out very well, though. America is not only involved in Syria; we have launched military airstrikes against it and Mr. Obama has proposed a major program to train and arm moderate Syrian rebels, though it’s likely too late to influence events on the ground. It’s impossible to know if the Petraeus plan would have succeeded when it was proposed three years ago. But what we do know is that today, with America taking a hands-off approach, (a) Syria has become a humanitarian and geopolitical catastrophe and (b) we have been drawn into the conflict.</p>
<p>7. Libya Collapses and Becomes a Terrorist Safe Haven. On&#160;March 19, 2011, President Obama unilaterally authorized the U.S. military to begin “a limited military action in Libya” to protect Libyan civilians. He <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/03/19/remarks-president-libya" type="external">said</a> by intervening in Libya’s civil war, he was acting “in the interests of the United States and the world.” Six months later, during a September 21, 2011 speech to the United Nations, President Obama <a href="http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0911/64026.html" type="external">declared</a>, “Forty-two years of tyranny was ended in six months. From Tripoli to Misurata to Benghazi — today, Libya is free… Yesterday, the leaders of a new Libya took their rightful place beside us, and this week, the United States is reopening our embassy in Tripoli. This is how the international community is supposed to work — nations standing together for the sake of peace and security, and individuals claiming their rights.” Since then — and in good part because of the lack of American follow through and engagement — we have closed our embassy. Syria has been <a href="http://www.state.gov/j/ct/rls/crt/2013/224828.htm" type="external">declared a terrorist safe haven</a> by the State Department. No central authority exists. The Libyan state has collapsed and is being torn asunder by civil war. <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/25/world/africa/libyan-unrest.html?ref=world" type="external">According to</a> the New York Times, “the violence threatens to turn Libya into a pocket of chaos destabilizing North Africa for years to come.” An intervention Mr. Obama once hailed as a model now lies in ruins.</p>
<p>8. Russian Aggression in Crimea and Ukraine. In 2009, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton hailed the “ <a href="http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2009/03/06/clinton-reset-button-gift-to-russian-fm-gets-lost-in-translation/" type="external">Russian reset</a>.” It was said to be a “win-win” situation for both sides. It hasn’t worked out quite that way. The United States scrapped a missile-defense system the Poles and the Czech Republic had agreed to house despite Russian threats, as a way to pacify Russia’s Vladimir Putin. In return, Russia has reasserted its presence in the Middle East in ways unseen since the 1970s, propped up the Assad regime in Syria, supported Iran’s nuclear ambitions and its repression at home, invaded Crimea, militarily intervened in Ukraine, and given safe haven to Edward Snowden. During Mr. Obama’s watch, Putin has “position[ed] contemporary Russia as the heir to the Russian Empire as it was constituted under the czars,” <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/after-carving-up-ukraine-where-will-putin-turn-next/2014/05/09/17b86398-d623-11e3-95d3-3bcd77cd4e11_story.html" type="external">according to</a> the Russian American journalist and author Masha Gessen. That is what the “Russian reset” looks like in real life.</p>
<p>A few summary thoughts on all this: There are limits to America’s capacity to influence world events. It’s difficult for even the best presidents to deal with an untidy and sometimes uncooperative world. And in some of the examples I’ve cited, President Obama is more responsible for the failures that have occurred than in others. But in each of these instances Mr. Obama has made things worse, and in most cases he has made things markedly worse. The cumulative and convulsive effects of his failures are extraordinarily damaging to America and the world.</p>
<p>President Obama, in <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/29/us/politics/obama-foreign-policy-west-point-speech.html?_r=0" type="external">describing</a> his foreign policy doctrine in private conversations to reporters, said,&#160;“We don’t do stupid sh*t.” He actually does, quite a lot, and in ways that may be unmatched by any president in our history. Over the course of his presidency, Mr. Obama has implemented the policy he’s wanted. As a result, in several nations and in some regions, he has helped open the gates of hell.</p>
<p>Peter Wehner is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p> | false | 1 | islamic state expanding reach two key victories ramadi capital iraqs anbar province palmyra strategically important city syria might good time ask worst foreign policy failures barack obamas presidency list long several choose 1 rise isis president obama failed anticipate rise isis ridiculed jayvee team recently last year since failed anything effective impede isis established territory large parts syria iraq controls volume resources territory unmatched history extremist organizations mr obamas watch jihadist caliphate established heart middle east president strategy deal 2 losing war iraq president obamas predecessor handed war dont take word take word mr obama vice president december 14 2011 welcoming troops home ft bragg ending american presence iraq president declared leaving behind sovereign stable selfreliant iraq commanderinchief said moment success year earlier vice president joe biden put way optimistic iraq think going one great achievements administration hardearned achievements undone presidents determined commitment withdraw american troops iraq presidency determined result iraq collapsing iran rushing increasing influence unprecedented degree 3 failing aid irans green revolution 160in summer 2009 revolution iran threatened topple mullahs leaders socalled green revolution pleaded support got none president obama saying wanted avoid united states issue inside iran nothing aid prodemocracy elements seeking overthrow islamic theocracy 160whether assistance would altered course events impossible know president essentially casting lot iranian regime vulnerable period since 1979 revolution ensured democratic uprising would fail best chance middle east cleansing malignant dangerous regime earth 4 triggering nuclear arms race middle east saudi arabia long advocated middle east free nuclear weapons president obamas determined effort strike deal iran important concessions made us none iranians petrified traditional sunni allies region fearful iran nations like saudi arabia egypt turkey others considering andor preparing acquire nuclear weapons saudi arabias former intelligence chief exambassador washington prince turki al faisal declared march whatever iran gets nuclear deal united states want ibrahim almarie retired saudi colonel security analyst riyadh put way leaders never allow iran nuclear weapon dont iran declares nuclear weapon cant afford wait 30 years ownwe able declare within week160the presidents effort strike deal iran triggering nuclear arms race worlds volatile region risks nuclear war increased threat terrorist groups acquiring radioactive material 5 erasing red line syria 2012160president obama said syrian leader bashar alassad previous year referred reformer secretary state hillary clinton step use chemical weapons assad regime rebel forces would constitute crossing red line mr assad crossed red line president obama nothing brutal syrian leader still power syria torn apart civil war around quarter million people died around four million fled refugees around eight million internally displaced syrias neighbors destabilized unmistakable message weakness sent mr obama received every adversary ally united states mr obamas words threats worthless 6 failure arm syrian rebels syria began unravel 2012 thencia director david petraeus thensecretary state hillary clinton developed plan vet syrian160rebels train cadre fighters would supplied weapons plan supported time by160leon panetta defense secretary martin dempsey chairman joint chiefs staff ultimately vetoed president obama according mr panetta president worried becoming deeply involved syria hasnt worked well though america involved syria launched military airstrikes mr obama proposed major program train arm moderate syrian rebels though likely late influence events ground impossible know petraeus plan would succeeded proposed three years ago know today america taking handsoff approach syria become humanitarian geopolitical catastrophe b drawn conflict 7 libya collapses becomes terrorist safe on160march 19 2011 president obama unilaterally authorized us military begin limited military action libya protect libyan civilians said intervening libyas civil war acting interests united states world six months later september 21 2011 speech united nations president obama declared fortytwo years tyranny ended six months tripoli misurata benghazi today libya free yesterday leaders new libya took rightful place beside us week united states reopening embassy tripoli international community supposed work nations standing together sake peace security individuals claiming rights since good part lack american follow engagement closed embassy syria declared terrorist safe state department central authority exists libyan state collapsed torn asunder civil war according new york times violence threatens turn libya pocket chaos destabilizing north africa years come intervention mr obama hailed model lies ruins 8 russian aggression crimea ukraine 2009 secretary state hillary clinton hailed russian reset said winwin situation sides hasnt worked quite way united states scrapped missiledefense system poles czech republic agreed house despite russian threats way pacify russias vladimir putin return russia reasserted presence middle east ways unseen since 1970s propped assad regime syria supported irans nuclear ambitions repression home invaded crimea militarily intervened ukraine given safe edward snowden mr obamas watch putin positioned contemporary russia heir russian empire constituted czars according russian american journalist author masha gessen russian reset looks like real life summary thoughts limits americas capacity influence world events difficult even best presidents deal untidy sometimes uncooperative world examples ive cited president obama responsible failures occurred others instances mr obama made things worse cases made things markedly worse cumulative convulsive effects failures extraordinarily damaging america world president obama describing foreign policy doctrine private conversations reporters said160we dont stupid sht actually quite lot ways may unmatched president history course presidency mr obama implemented policy hes wanted result several nations regions helped open gates hell peter wehner senior fellow ethics public policy center | 858 |
<p>For all the controversy surrounding his invitation, President Obama's <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/17/us/politics/17text-obama.html?_r=1&amp;pagewanted=all" type="external">commencement address</a> at the University of Notre Dame on Sunday actually offered pro-lifers some causes for optimism. Although it was certainly not his intention, the president's remarks point to the profound and growing weakness of the case for America's radical abortion laws.</p>
<p>Obama himself, of course, is a cause for short-term pessimism: His policies have so far been true to his pre-presidential record, and there is every reason to expect they will continue to be. And that he can often clothe his substantive extremism in the garb of rhetorical moderation — that he can step back and describe the controversy with apparent distance even as he himself pulls hard for one side — further strengthens his cause in the fight.</p>
<p>But his speech should leave pro-lifers optimistic, because it illustrates the transformation of the abortion debate over the past 15 years. Put simply, defenders of the Roe regime seem incapable of making a case for themselves, and when they reach for the vocabulary of American liberal democracy in an effort to make some kind of argument, they end up closer to the case for their opponents.</p>
<p>Here is what Obama had to say on the stem-cell question, for instance, in the course of a larger argument for taking all sides of controversial disputes seriously:</p>
<p>Those who speak out against stem-cell research may be rooted in an admirable conviction about the sacredness of life, but so are the parents of a child with juvenile diabetes who are convinced that their son's or daughter's hardships can be relieved.</p>
<p>That is precisely the case against Obama's stem-cell policy, and in favor of his predecessor's approach: that we don't have to choose between one life and another, but must pursue the course that lets us champion both.</p>
<p>Here is what Obama said about the difficulty of finding common ground:</p>
<p>And part of the problem, of course, lies in the imperfections of man — our selfishness, our pride, our stubbornness, our acquisitiveness, our insecurities, our egos; all the cruelties large and small that those of us in the Christian tradition understand to be rooted in original sin. We too often seek advantage over others. We cling to outworn prejudice and fear those who are unfamiliar. Too many of us view life only through the lens of immediate self-interest and crass materialism; in which the world is necessarily a zero-sum game. The strong too often dominate the weak, and too many of those with wealth and with power find all manner of justification for their own privilege in the face of poverty and injustice.</p>
<p>Here again, in the case against ego, against letting the strong dominate the weak, against letting self-interest govern all our affairs, is the language and logic of the pro-life movement. It is of course also the language and logic of the larger cause of human rights in America, but that's precisely the point: In the case of abortion, that tradition and that logic point decisively away from the Roe regime. The kind of arguments we used to hear in favor of abortion rights even into the mid-1990s involved precisely the language of cruel, crass, egoistic self-interest.</p>
<p>That kind of language has actually grown far more rare now, and with it the case for abortion has grown weaker. At the only point in his speech when Obama came close to making a positive case, he sought to draw on the language of egalitarianism, not the kind of misguided misapplication of the language of liberty we might have heard a generation ago, and it came linked with a case for respecting the freedom of conscience. He said:</p>
<p>Let's honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion, and draft a sensible conscience clause, and make sure that all of our health-care policies are grounded not only in sound science, but also in clear ethics, as well as respect for the equality of women.</p>
<p>Here the case against Obama's own position (the case for physician conscience, which his administration has <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/02/27/conscience.rollback/index.html" type="external">begun to undermine</a>) is far clearer and more accessible than the case in favor of Obama's view — in which he apparently seeks to imply that the equality of women somehow points to an unlimited abortion right. The language of equality is, of course, at the very heart of the pro-life case, and in a far more familiar, accessible, and rational way.</p>
<p>“I do not suggest that the debate surrounding abortion can or should go away,” Obama told his audience:</p>
<p>Because no matter how much we may want to fudge it — indeed, while we know that the views of most Americans on the subject are complex and even contradictory — the fact is that at some level, the views of the two camps are irreconcilable. Each side will continue to make its case to the public with passion and conviction.</p>
<p>But the striking thing about his speech, and indeed about the contemporary abortion debate more generally, is the absence of a passionate case from conviction for the Roe regime and for abortion itself. The closest thing to it is the case Obama put at the core of his speech: a defensive case for civility without a substantive position.</p>
<p>There is of course great virtue in civility, but when one side to a dispute argues exclusively for civility, it is often because it understands itself at least implicitly to be on the losing side of the substantive debate. That increasingly seems to be the state of abortion-rights advocates in America, and it is surely part of the reason for the <a href="http://www.gallup.com/poll/118399/More-Americans-Pro-Life-Than-Pro-Choice-First-Time.aspx" type="external">gains</a> abortion opponents have made in public opinion in recent years.</p>
<p>None of this means we are on the verge of a breakthrough. On the contrary. Regardless of where his rhetoric points, President Obama is clearly on the side of the unlimited right to abortion. Between Supreme Court picks, policy decisions (on stem cells, conscience protection, taxpayer funding of abortion, and beyond), and personnel appointments, the Obama years look to be a dark time for pro-lifers. But the decline of the case for abortion is a cause for longer-term optimism. Words and ideas matter immensely in American politics, and it is telling that again and again in his remarks at Notre Dame, when the president reached for the words and ideas of the great American story, he ended up implicitly arguing against himself, and raising questions about his past and present extremism on abortion.</p>
<p>Toward the end of his remarks, although he did not have the abortion debate in mind, Obama called upon his listeners to take note of a moral teaching that we can only hope might help inform that debate in the years to come:</p>
<p>For if there is one law that we can be most certain of, it is the law that binds people of all faiths and no faith together. It's no coincidence that it exists in Christianity and Judaism; in Islam and Hinduism; in Buddhism and humanism. It is, of course, the Golden Rule — the call to treat one another as we wish to be treated. The call to love. The call to serve. To do what we can to make a difference in the lives of those with whom we share the same brief moment on this Earth.</p>
<p>Amen.</p>
<p>—&#160;&lt; span class="bioline"&gt;Yuval Levin is a fellow at the <a href="" type="internal">Ethics and Public Policy Center</a> and senior editor of <a href="http://www.thenewatlantis.com/" type="external">The New Atlantis</a> magazine. He is the author of <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/redirect/amazon.p?j=1594032092" type="external">Imagining the Future: Science and American Democracy</a>.</p> | false | 1 | controversy surrounding invitation president obamas commencement address university notre dame sunday actually offered prolifers causes optimism although certainly intention presidents remarks point profound growing weakness case americas radical abortion laws obama course cause shortterm pessimism policies far true prepresidential record every reason expect continue often clothe substantive extremism garb rhetorical moderation step back describe controversy apparent distance even pulls hard one side strengthens cause fight speech leave prolifers optimistic illustrates transformation abortion debate past 15 years put simply defenders roe regime seem incapable making case reach vocabulary american liberal democracy effort make kind argument end closer case opponents obama say stemcell question instance course larger argument taking sides controversial disputes seriously speak stemcell research may rooted admirable conviction sacredness life parents child juvenile diabetes convinced sons daughters hardships relieved precisely case obamas stemcell policy favor predecessors approach dont choose one life another must pursue course lets us champion obama said difficulty finding common ground part problem course lies imperfections man selfishness pride stubbornness acquisitiveness insecurities egos cruelties large small us christian tradition understand rooted original sin often seek advantage others cling outworn prejudice fear unfamiliar many us view life lens immediate selfinterest crass materialism world necessarily zerosum game strong often dominate weak many wealth power find manner justification privilege face poverty injustice case ego letting strong dominate weak letting selfinterest govern affairs language logic prolife movement course also language logic larger cause human rights america thats precisely point case abortion tradition logic point decisively away roe regime kind arguments used hear favor abortion rights even mid1990s involved precisely language cruel crass egoistic selfinterest kind language actually grown far rare case abortion grown weaker point speech obama came close making positive case sought draw language egalitarianism kind misguided misapplication language liberty might heard generation ago came linked case respecting freedom conscience said lets honor conscience disagree abortion draft sensible conscience clause make sure healthcare policies grounded sound science also clear ethics well respect equality women case obamas position case physician conscience administration begun undermine far clearer accessible case favor obamas view apparently seeks imply equality women somehow points unlimited abortion right language equality course heart prolife case far familiar accessible rational way suggest debate surrounding abortion go away obama told audience matter much may want fudge indeed know views americans subject complex even contradictory fact level views two camps irreconcilable side continue make case public passion conviction striking thing speech indeed contemporary abortion debate generally absence passionate case conviction roe regime abortion closest thing case obama put core speech defensive case civility without substantive position course great virtue civility one side dispute argues exclusively civility often understands least implicitly losing side substantive debate increasingly seems state abortionrights advocates america surely part reason gains abortion opponents made public opinion recent years none means verge breakthrough contrary regardless rhetoric points president obama clearly side unlimited right abortion supreme court picks policy decisions stem cells conscience protection taxpayer funding abortion beyond personnel appointments obama years look dark time prolifers decline case abortion cause longerterm optimism words ideas matter immensely american politics telling remarks notre dame president reached words ideas great american story ended implicitly arguing raising questions past present extremism abortion toward end remarks although abortion debate mind obama called upon listeners take note moral teaching hope might help inform debate years come one law certain law binds people faiths faith together coincidence exists christianity judaism islam hinduism buddhism humanism course golden rule call treat one another wish treated call love call serve make difference lives share brief moment earth amen 160lt span classbiolinegtyuval levin fellow ethics public policy center senior editor new atlantis magazine author imagining future science american democracy | 607 |
<p />
<p>Prefatory Note: The post below is a modified version, especially the ending, of a piece published online two days ago in AlJazeera English. &#160;While appreciating the importance of the European moves to endorse Palestinian statehood, seeks a more&#160;definitive repudiation of the Oslo Approach. It calls for an end to the U.S. role as exclusive intermediary and the presumed outcome of a peace process being two states without indicating the character of the Palestinian states. So far, the two-state mantra has been cut back to allow Israel to retain at least the unlawful settlement blocs and to insist on arrangements that uphold their security against unforeseen threats, while granting not a word of acknowledgement to Palestinian security concerns. My own strong belief is that unless the two peoples are treated with full&#160;equality in seeking a solution, the result will not be sustainable or just even in the unlikely event that some&#160;sort of agreement is reached.</p>
<p>&lt;img class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-19651" src="https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/richard-falk-300x162.jpg" alt="Richard Falk" width="300" height="162" /&gt; On October 13m the House of Commons by an overwhelming vote of 274-12 urged the British government to extend diplomatic recognition to Palestine.</p>
<p>At first glance, it would seem a rather meaningless gesture. It is a non-binding resolution, and Prime Minister David Cameron has already declared that this expression of parliamentary opinion will have no effect whatever on existing government policy. So far Britain along with the states in Western Europe adhere to Israel's stubborn insistence, echoed by Washington, that Palestinian statehood can only be established through a solution to the conflict negotiated by the parties.</p>
<p>Even if the British vote was binding, why should it be seen as a dramatic move in Palestine's favor? After all, Palestine has already been accorded recognition by 134 states since Yasir Arafat declared the existence of a Palestinian state within 1967 borders back in 1988.</p>
<p>Such downgrading of the significance of what took place is also part of the Israel tactical response. Its ambassador in London now declining even to comment on the decision after earlier indicating extreme disapproval with the evident hope of discouraging affirmative votes. Before the vote Israeli leaders used their levers of strong influence to discourage the vote. Netanyahu even insisted that such a step would seriously diminish prospects for resumed negotiations and would seriously harm peace prospects. After losing out, the Israeli tone changed, now calling the vote meaningless and devoid of importance.</p>
<p>In actuality, the UK initiative is an important symbolic victory for the Palestinians. Until the recently when the elected Swedish government indicated its intention to recognize Palestine as a state at some future undesignated time, no Western European government had broken ranks on the Oslo approach as interpreted by Israel and the United States. It is this approach that has put a straightjacket on diplomacy, requiring any progress toward a solution to be exclusively through direct negotiations for a Palestinian in which the U.S. acts as the one and only intermediary.</p>
<p>At stake, then, is not only the momentum building for European countries to extend recognition to Palestine, but also a belated admission that this Oslo approach after more than 20 years of futility should no longer be respected as the consensus foundation of Israel-Palestine conflict resolution. The UK action needs to be joined with the recent diplomacy of the Palestinian Authority, first the Fatah/Hamas agreement of April to form a unity government, and even more so, the resolution to be submitted to the Security Council on behalf of the Palestinian Authority that calls for Israeli withdrawal to 1967 borders, including East Jerusalem, no later than November 2016. It is expected that the U.S. will veto this resolution if it is unable to mount enough pressure to prevent nine SC members from voting affirmatively. Such an initiative by Ramallah further signals that the PA is no longer willing to play the waiting game that has given Israel ample time for settlement expansion and ethnic cleansing in East Jerusalem past points of no return.</p>
<p>In Mahmoud Abbas' speech of September 26th to the General Assembly he clearly indicated that he was refusing to cooperate any longer with these diplomatic maneuvers facilitated by the Oslo framework. Responding to Palestinian pressures from below, Abbas left no doubt that he would not pretend that he had "a partner for peace," thereby turning the tables on Tel Aviv. He signaled this clearly when he described Israel's 50-day military operation against Gaza this past summer as "a genocidal war." The G-word was bound to elicit an angry Israeli response, which Netanyahu provided a few days later in the same UN venue, calling Abbas' speech "shameless."</p>
<p>There still remains a lingering and unfortunate ambiguity in these developments suggesting we have not yet truly arrived at a post-Oslo phase of diplomacy. The UK resolution accepted an amendment stating that its purpose was "as a contribution to securing a negotiated two-state solution." The former British Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, elaborated on this, suggesting that was being done was to exert additional pressure on the parties to get on with negotiating a two-state outcome. This tail wagging the dog is a regression, sustaining the illusion that Israel, whatever the context, is at all willing at this stage to allow an independent sovereign Palestinian state to be established within 1967 borders, even if these are slightly modified. In effect,&#160;"Oslo is dead! Long live Oslo!"</p>
<p>Since the latest Gaza war there have been two developments of lasting significance: first, the inter-governmental diplomacy is slowly moving away from the Oslo approach, and Western Europe is beginning to fill the diplomatic vacuum created by the April collapse of the Kerry round of talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. And Secondly, civil society nonviolent militancy and political leadership is beginning to occupy center stage in Palestinian hopes and dreams, particularly taking the form of the growing BDS campaign, but also visible in the refusal of Oakland, California workers to unload an Israeli cargo ship.</p>
<p>This latter fulcrum of resistance within Palestine and without raises serious leadership and representation question. Who now speaks with authority and authenticity on behalf of the Palestinian people? How can this question be answered given the statist manner in which the world is organized? Let me put my own understanding of this issue more directly: I find that the voices of Omar Barghouti and Ali Abunimah to be more authoritative and authentic than are those of the diplomats from Ramallah who a few years ago showed themselves ready to give the store away in the Palestine Papers and on other occasions. They couldn't manage such a transaction since Israel apparently felt it already owned the store and was not ready to show gratitude even for a political outcome heavily slanted in their favor.</p> | false | 1 | prefatory note post modified version especially ending piece published online two days ago aljazeera english 160while appreciating importance european moves endorse palestinian statehood seeks more160definitive repudiation oslo approach calls end us role exclusive intermediary presumed outcome peace process two states without indicating character palestinian states far twostate mantra cut back allow israel retain least unlawful settlement blocs insist arrangements uphold security unforeseen threats granting word acknowledgement palestinian security concerns strong belief unless two peoples treated full160equality seeking solution result sustainable even unlikely event some160sort agreement reached ltimg classalignleft sizemedium wpimage19651 srchttpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201402richardfalk300x162jpg altrichard falk width300 height162 gt october 13m house commons overwhelming vote 27412 urged british government extend diplomatic recognition palestine first glance would seem rather meaningless gesture nonbinding resolution prime minister david cameron already declared expression parliamentary opinion effect whatever existing government policy far britain along states western europe adhere israels stubborn insistence echoed washington palestinian statehood established solution conflict negotiated parties even british vote binding seen dramatic move palestines favor palestine already accorded recognition 134 states since yasir arafat declared existence palestinian state within 1967 borders back 1988 downgrading significance took place also part israel tactical response ambassador london declining even comment decision earlier indicating extreme disapproval evident hope discouraging affirmative votes vote israeli leaders used levers strong influence discourage vote netanyahu even insisted step would seriously diminish prospects resumed negotiations would seriously harm peace prospects losing israeli tone changed calling vote meaningless devoid importance actuality uk initiative important symbolic victory palestinians recently elected swedish government indicated intention recognize palestine state future undesignated time western european government broken ranks oslo approach interpreted israel united states approach put straightjacket diplomacy requiring progress toward solution exclusively direct negotiations palestinian us acts one intermediary stake momentum building european countries extend recognition palestine also belated admission oslo approach 20 years futility longer respected consensus foundation israelpalestine conflict resolution uk action needs joined recent diplomacy palestinian authority first fatahhamas agreement april form unity government even resolution submitted security council behalf palestinian authority calls israeli withdrawal 1967 borders including east jerusalem later november 2016 expected us veto resolution unable mount enough pressure prevent nine sc members voting affirmatively initiative ramallah signals pa longer willing play waiting game given israel ample time settlement expansion ethnic cleansing east jerusalem past points return mahmoud abbas speech september 26th general assembly clearly indicated refusing cooperate longer diplomatic maneuvers facilitated oslo framework responding palestinian pressures abbas left doubt would pretend partner peace thereby turning tables tel aviv signaled clearly described israels 50day military operation gaza past summer genocidal war gword bound elicit angry israeli response netanyahu provided days later un venue calling abbas speech shameless still remains lingering unfortunate ambiguity developments suggesting yet truly arrived postoslo phase diplomacy uk resolution accepted amendment stating purpose contribution securing negotiated twostate solution former british foreign secretary jack straw elaborated suggesting done exert additional pressure parties get negotiating twostate outcome tail wagging dog regression sustaining illusion israel whatever context willing stage allow independent sovereign palestinian state established within 1967 borders even slightly modified effect160oslo dead long live oslo since latest gaza war two developments lasting significance first intergovernmental diplomacy slowly moving away oslo approach western europe beginning fill diplomatic vacuum created april collapse kerry round talks israel palestinian authority secondly civil society nonviolent militancy political leadership beginning occupy center stage palestinian hopes dreams particularly taking form growing bds campaign also visible refusal oakland california workers unload israeli cargo ship latter fulcrum resistance within palestine without raises serious leadership representation question speaks authority authenticity behalf palestinian people question answered given statist manner world organized let put understanding issue directly find voices omar barghouti ali abunimah authoritative authentic diplomats ramallah years ago showed ready give store away palestine papers occasions couldnt manage transaction since israel apparently felt already owned store ready show gratitude even political outcome heavily slanted favor | 633 |
<p>Despite vastly differences approaches, Donald Trump's words convey the same visionless messages as Barack Obama's before him.</p>
<p>The nature of the rhetoric in Donald <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/9/19/16333290/trump-full-speech-transcript-un-general-assembly" type="external">Trump’s first speech</a> at the United Nations General Assembly was largely predictable. Even his bizarre threat to “totally destroy North Korea” was consistent with his overall style and previous warnings.</p>
<p>But how different was his speech, if compared with the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/24/us/politics/24prexy.text.html" type="external">first</a> and <a href="https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2016/09/20/address-president-obama-71st-session-united-nations-general-assembly" type="external">last</a> UN speeches of President Barack Obama?</p>
<p>A 19th Century English author, John Ruskin, once wrote, “Great nations write their autobiographies in three manuscripts—the book of their deeds, the book of their words, and the book of their art.”</p>
<p>Soon after former US President Barack Obama’s arrival in the Oval Office, Harvard Business School Professor, John A. Quelch <a href="http://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Publication%20Files/Quelch,Jocz,%20Brand%20Obama_Rescue%20America_f11ad3bb-b5a8-4352-9497-38faa8da6a0c.pdf" type="external">injected Ruskin’s quote</a> to re-assert the need to strike the balance in US internal politics and foreign policy. Like others, he emphasized that Obama must utilize his positive image to restore ‘the American brand’, which was badly tarnished during the two terms of George W. Bush.</p>
<p>Journalist and author <a href="https://www.newstatesman.com/north-america/2009/05/barack-obama-pilger-bush" type="external">John Pilger</a> was quite astute when he—as early as 2009—raised the issue of the <a href="https://dandelionsalad.wordpress.com/2016/08/17/pilger-obama-is-a-corporate-marketing-creation/" type="external">Obama brand</a>.</p>
<p>Using a plagiarized slogan from the South American union organizer, Cesar Chavez, “Sí, se puede!”—“Yes, we can!”—the Obama campaign managed to breathe life into a greatly discredited US political system.</p>
<p>The brand was such a success that, even before Obama won the people’s vote, the ‘Obama brand’ also won the votes of hundreds of top advertising executives who <a href="https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2008/12/obad-d06.html" type="external">granted the campaign</a> the top award at the annual Association of National Advertisers conference. Thus the ‘Obama brand’ became the “Advertising Age’s marketer of the year for 2008.”</p>
<p>The appreciation of words and skills at the expense of real action continues to resurface whenever Trump sends an embarrassing tweet or gives a belligerent speech. His first speech to the UN on September 19 was a case in point.</p>
<p>But the fact is, despite the vastly different style—Trump’s confrontational approach compared with Obama’s composed attitude—their words promise “more of the same.” To demonstrate, here are the main subjects they raised in their UN speeches, in their own words:</p>
<p>Neither Obama nor Trump took any responsibility for their country’s direct or indirect role in fomenting terrorism—for example, their country’s military invasions of Afghanistan (2001) and Iraq (2003). Instead, they spread fear, while positioning themselves as the global safety net against terrorists and those who fund or support them.</p>
<p>Obama (2009): “Extremists sowing terror in pockets of the world; protracted conflicts that grind on and on; genocide; mass atrocities; more nations with nuclear weapons; melting ice caps and ravaged populations; persistent poverty and pandemic disease. I say this not to sow fear, but to state a fact: The magnitude of our challenges has yet to be met by the measure of our actions.”</p>
<p>Obama (2016): “We’ve taken away terrorist safe havens.”</p>
<p>Trump (2017): “Terrorists and extremists have gathered strength and spread to every region of the planet. Rogue regimes represented in this body not only support terror but threaten other nations and their own people with the most destructive weapons known to humanity.”</p>
<p>For both Trump and Obama, war is a necessary evil, and only the US is capable of making the determination when such evil is to be applied. Neither seemed bothered by the fact that the US is only second to Russia in the number of its nuclear warheads, as it has stockpiled <a href="https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/Nuclearweaponswhohaswhat" type="external">6,800 nuclear weapons</a> compared with North Korea’s estimated 10-40 devices.</p>
<p>Obama (2016): “We cannot escape the prospect of nuclear war unless we all commit to stopping the spread of nuclear weapons and pursuing a world without them … When North Korea tests a bomb that endangers all of us. And any country that breaks this basic bargain must face consequences.”</p>
<p>Trump (2017): “Our military will soon be the strongest it has ever been … North Korea’s reckless pursuit of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles threatens the entire world with unthinkable loss of human life … The United States has great strength and patience, but if it is forced to defend itself or its allies, we will have no choice but to totally destroy North Korea.”</p>
<p>Once again, both Trump and Obama imposed themselves as guardians of a US-centric world order. Their perceptions of China and Russia, in particular, remained unchanged.</p>
<p>Obama (2016): “If Russia continues to interfere in the affairs of its neighbors, it may be popular at home, it may fuel nationalist fervor for a time, but over time it is also going to diminish its stature and make its borders less secure. In the South China Sea, a peaceful resolution of disputes offered by law will mean far greater stability than the militarization of a few rocks and reefs.”</p>
<p>Trump (2017): “We must protect our nations, their interests and their futures. We must reject threats to sovereignty from the Ukraine to the South China Sea.”</p>
<p>Both presidents were quite supportive of Israel. In his speech, Trump did not mention the words ‘Palestine’ or ‘the Palestinians’. He only mentioned Israel in the context of an alleged Iranian threat to destroy it.</p>
<p>On the other hand, Obama’s first UN speech promised the reactivation of the defunct ‘peace process’. In his last speech, he commenced his rhetoric by blaming Palestinians, although spoke of Israeli responsibility, as well. However, <a href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/rania-khalek/obama-hands-israel-largest-military-aid-deal-history" type="external">Obama had given Israel</a> more money than any other president in history.</p>
<p>Obama (2009): “I appointed a Special Envoy for Middle East Peace, and America has worked steadily and aggressively to advance the cause of two states—Israel and Palestine—in which peace and security take root, and the rights of both Israelis and Palestinians are respected.”</p>
<p>Obama (2016): “Surely, Israelis and Palestinians will be better off if Palestinians reject incitement and recognize the legitimacy of Israel, but Israel recognizes that it cannot permanently occupy and settle Palestinian land.”</p>
<p>Trump (2017): “…”</p>
<p>Both presidents provided a romantic depiction of their country’s interventionist role in world affairs. Again, much self-admiration and no responsibility whatsoever.</p>
<p>Obama (2009): “The world must stand together to demonstrate that international law is not an empty promise, and that treaties will be enforced.”</p>
<p>Obama (2016): “The mindset of sectarianism, and extremism, and bloodletting, and retribution that has been taking place will not be quickly reversed … (We must remain) united and relentless in destroying networks like ISIL (Daesh), which show no respect for human life.”</p>
<p>Trump (2017): “From the beaches of Europe to the deserts of the Middle East to the jungles of Asia, it is an eternal credit to the American character that, even after we and our allies emerge victorious from the bloodiest war in history, we did not seek territorial expansion or attempt to oppose and impose our way of life on others.”</p>
<p>Neither president had a true vision, either. For no honest assessment of the present and a meaningful vision for the future can be achieved without self-introspection and serious acceptance of responsibility. Instead, their ‘visions’ were mostly rehashed, romanticized language of no correlation to reality.</p>
<p>Obama (2016): “We must respect the meaning that people draw from their own traditions—from their religion, from their ethnicity, from their sense of nationhood …”</p>
<p>Trump (2017): “We want harmony and friendship, not conflict and strife. We are guided by outcomes, not ideologies. We have a policy of principled realism, rooted in shared goal, interests, and values.”</p>
<p>Based on the obvious logic above, it should not be too difficult to predict the general rhetoric of Trump’s last address to the UN General Assembly; alas, more threats, grandstanding, romanticizing war and another desperate attempt at keeping a dying world order standing, even if for a bit longer.</p>
<p>Romana Rubeo, an Italian writer, contributed to this article.</p> | false | 1 | despite vastly differences approaches donald trumps words convey visionless messages barack obamas nature rhetoric donald trumps first speech united nations general assembly largely predictable even bizarre threat totally destroy north korea consistent overall style previous warnings different speech compared first last un speeches president barack obama 19th century english author john ruskin wrote great nations write autobiographies three manuscriptsthe book deeds book words book art soon former us president barack obamas arrival oval office harvard business school professor john quelch injected ruskins quote reassert need strike balance us internal politics foreign policy like others emphasized obama must utilize positive image restore american brand badly tarnished two terms george w bush journalist author john pilger quite astute heas early 2009raised issue obama brand using plagiarized slogan south american union organizer cesar chavez sí se puedeyes canthe obama campaign managed breathe life greatly discredited us political system brand success even obama peoples vote obama brand also votes hundreds top advertising executives granted campaign top award annual association national advertisers conference thus obama brand became advertising ages marketer year 2008 appreciation words skills expense real action continues resurface whenever trump sends embarrassing tweet gives belligerent speech first speech un september 19 case point fact despite vastly different styletrumps confrontational approach compared obamas composed attitudetheir words promise demonstrate main subjects raised un speeches words neither obama trump took responsibility countrys direct indirect role fomenting terrorismfor example countrys military invasions afghanistan 2001 iraq 2003 instead spread fear positioning global safety net terrorists fund support obama 2009 extremists sowing terror pockets world protracted conflicts grind genocide mass atrocities nations nuclear weapons melting ice caps ravaged populations persistent poverty pandemic disease say sow fear state fact magnitude challenges yet met measure actions obama 2016 weve taken away terrorist safe havens trump 2017 terrorists extremists gathered strength spread every region planet rogue regimes represented body support terror threaten nations people destructive weapons known humanity trump obama war necessary evil us capable making determination evil applied neither seemed bothered fact us second russia number nuclear warheads stockpiled 6800 nuclear weapons compared north koreas estimated 1040 devices obama 2016 escape prospect nuclear war unless commit stopping spread nuclear weapons pursuing world without north korea tests bomb endangers us country breaks basic bargain must face consequences trump 2017 military soon strongest ever north koreas reckless pursuit nuclear weapons ballistic missiles threatens entire world unthinkable loss human life united states great strength patience forced defend allies choice totally destroy north korea trump obama imposed guardians uscentric world order perceptions china russia particular remained unchanged obama 2016 russia continues interfere affairs neighbors may popular home may fuel nationalist fervor time time also going diminish stature make borders less secure south china sea peaceful resolution disputes offered law mean far greater stability militarization rocks reefs trump 2017 must protect nations interests futures must reject threats sovereignty ukraine south china sea presidents quite supportive israel speech trump mention words palestine palestinians mentioned israel context alleged iranian threat destroy hand obamas first un speech promised reactivation defunct peace process last speech commenced rhetoric blaming palestinians although spoke israeli responsibility well however obama given israel money president history obama 2009 appointed special envoy middle east peace america worked steadily aggressively advance cause two statesisrael palestinein peace security take root rights israelis palestinians respected obama 2016 surely israelis palestinians better palestinians reject incitement recognize legitimacy israel israel recognizes permanently occupy settle palestinian land trump 2017 presidents provided romantic depiction countrys interventionist role world affairs much selfadmiration responsibility whatsoever obama 2009 world must stand together demonstrate international law empty promise treaties enforced obama 2016 mindset sectarianism extremism bloodletting retribution taking place quickly reversed must remain united relentless destroying networks like isil daesh show respect human life trump 2017 beaches europe deserts middle east jungles asia eternal credit american character even allies emerge victorious bloodiest war history seek territorial expansion attempt oppose impose way life others neither president true vision either honest assessment present meaningful vision future achieved without selfintrospection serious acceptance responsibility instead visions mostly rehashed romanticized language correlation reality obama 2016 must respect meaning people draw traditionsfrom religion ethnicity sense nationhood trump 2017 want harmony friendship conflict strife guided outcomes ideologies policy principled realism rooted shared goal interests values based obvious logic difficult predict general rhetoric trumps last address un general assembly alas threats grandstanding romanticizing war another desperate attempt keeping dying world order standing even bit longer romana rubeo italian writer contributed article | 736 |
<p>Until journalists and media professionals redeem some respect for their medium, there is no reason whatsoever to celebrate.&#160;</p>
<p>It has been <a href="http://www.al-sharq.com/news/details/367239#.VgWODmuzS3c" type="external">recently announced</a> that Arab ‘media experts’ plan to ‘celebrate’ Arab Media Day on April 21, 2016.&#160; The theme for the first day, of what is meant to be an annual tradition, is: “The Role of the (Arab) Media in Combatting Terrorism”.</p>
<p>The mockery is surely multi-faceted. One is the clearly politicized choice of the theme of the proposed event. The term ‘terrorism’ is a political one, and is rarely applied to violence committed by Arab regimes: it only applies to their detractors.</p>
<p>&lt;img class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-23867" src="https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/ramzy-baroud-300x225.jpg" alt="Ramzy Baroud" width="300" height="225" srcset="https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/ramzy-baroud-300x225.jpg 300w, https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/ramzy-baroud-150x113.jpg 150w, https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/ramzy-baroud.jpg 400w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" /&gt; Another is the fact that the committee of ‘experts’ which made the decision <a href="http://www.youm7.com/story/2015/9/7/%D9%81%D8%B1%D9%8A%D9%82-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AE%D8%A8%D8%B1%D8%A7%D8%A1-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B9%D8%B1%D8%A8-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%85%D8%B9%D9%86%D9%89-%D8%A8%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AA%D8%AD%D8%B6%D9%8A%D8%B1-%D9%84%D9%84%D8%A7%D8%AD%D8%AA%D9%81%D8%A7%D9%84-%D8%A8%D9%8A%D9%88%D9%85-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%A5%D8%B9%D9%84%D8%A7%D9%85-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B9/2337913#.VgWN8GuzS3c" type="external">was itself appointed</a> by the Council of Arab foreign ministers in their Cairo meeting last May. The Council operates under the ineffectual and mostly ceremonial Arab League.</p>
<p>Of course, various Arab countries are enthusiastically planning to join the ‘celebrations’ with some, unscrupulously, <a href="http://www.albawabhnews.com/1489776" type="external">emphasizing the importance of the ‘combatting terrorism’ theme</a>, for obvious reasons: positioning themselves as victims of terror, never as purveyors of violence. The event, as most other common themes in Arab media, is likely to tout rulers as the saviors of nations, and condemn their detractors as terrorists, terrorism sympathizers or potential terrorists.</p>
<p>In reality, Arab media has little to celebrate. If anything, Arabs should lament the moral malaise afflicting their media, whether official, semi-official, independent, or opposition.&#160; This is not to mention the hundreds of useless, glossy magazines that objectify women, belittle the social challenges facing Arab societies, and embrace western globalization as if Arabs only exist to consume, but not to think independently or critically.</p>
<p>If April 21 is to be of any value at all, it should be a day of candid discussion about urgent and practical steps required to escape the complete collapse of credibility under which most Arab media has prevailed since the so-called Arab Spring in the last four-and-a-half years.</p>
<p>As someone who has spent over two decades working in Arab and international media spaces, written about topics related to the Middle East, in general, and engaged in issues concerning the Arab world specifically, I wish to put forward a few suggestions for consideration by the organizers of Arab media committee:</p>
<p>Terms such as ‘al-irhab’ (terrorism) and ‘al-ta’asub’ (extremism) are often lobbed by Arab media in all of its platforms for a specific political end: demonizing the other. Instead, the term ‘al-‘unf’ (violence) should be used and confronted, regardless of who the party responsible for acts of violence is. While the State is often granted monopoly on violence through conveniently enacted laws, this monopoly is not meant to be used so nonchalantly and without an iota of accountability, as is currently the case.</p>
<p>Arab media, in general, and commentators, in particular, tend to treat their readers with palpable pretentiousness. It is as if Arab media is the originator of wisdom and of all that is to be known. If there is any truth to that, Arab media would not be in such a poor state. Instead, owners and managers of media platforms should truly engage society: listen and learn from real people about their real life problems; understand that there exist, outside the sanctified media bubble, intellectuals and ordinary people with much wisdom and insight. Media is not meant to celebrate the seemingly endless virtues of the regime, or be celebrated for its own supposed virtues. It is a perpetual podium for ideas, challenging, difficult and rarely gratifying.</p>
<p>While some Arab regimes have recently enacted laws that punish journalists for promoting what certain governments perceive as fabrications and misinformation, pro-government journalists are largely exempted from such expectations. It is neither the right nor responsibility of governments to define what is true, thus permissible, and untrue, thus punishable by prison term or heavy fines. Journalists’ unions should provide moral guidance to their members, challenge those who permit themselves to serve as mouthpieces to any political party or regime and protect those who remain committed to the integrity of their profession.</p>
<p>Media is not just meant to be a platform for opposing opinions. While this is necessary in order for the media to espouse a healthy democratic space in any society, Arab societies are hardly democratic, and opposing opinions often serve as <a href="http://www.alquds.co.uk/?p=406908" type="external">hate fest between regimes and their enemies</a>. Whenever possible, Arab media should open up a space for those who wish to think outside the political and ideological self-serving box. Arab intellect should not be limited to those ‘pro’ or ‘anti’ this regime or that party. There are always alternative ways of rationalizing which could, with time, offer real alternative to the status quo and conventional wisdom.</p>
<p>Arab media should agree on some basic values that include standing by and defending those victimized by Arab regimes for voicing honest opinions, however critical. When a journalist suffers, is imprisoned, fined or ostracized, the entire media community loses a battle. Solidarity among journalists, regardless of personal political views or even ideological affiliation, should be enshrined into any code of conduct in any self-respecting media community anywhere.</p>
<p>MENA Media Monitoring has recently criticized the <a href="http://www.masralarabia.com/%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B9%D8%B1%D8%A8-%D9%88%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B9%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%85/714755-%D8%AA%D9%82%D8%B1%D9%8A%D8%B1-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%85%D8%B1%D8%A3%D8%A9-%D8%B4%D8%A8%D9%87-%D9%85%D9%82%D8%B5%D9%8A%D8%A9-%D9%81%D9%8A-%D9%88%D8%B3%D8%A7%D8%A6%D9%84-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%A5%D8%B9%D9%84%D8%A7%D9%85-%D8%A8%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AC%D8%B2%D8%A7%D8%A6%D8%B1" type="external">marginalization of Algerian women</a> in the country’s media. According to its report, women are given 29 percent of the media space available, while men enjoy the rest. Women are often restricted, not just in space, but also in the topics to which they are meant to contribute, thus cramped only within areas related to family, food and fashion. In fact, Algeria is, perhaps, more fortunate than other Arab media where women are even more restricted, or used as token, as opposed to being active participants in discussions of serious political weight and societal impact. Engaging women in the media is not a favor to be bestowed by men, but a right— and an essential one—for any thinking society.</p>
<p>One is not oblivious to the fact that no democratic media can truly function in a non-democratic society. However, it is the failure of Arab democracies that should heighten the sense of responsibility among Arab media and journalists. Arab media should set realistic but serious goals, and re-visit these goals with utmost honesty and transparency, no matter the confines and restrictions. There are many battles to be fought and won and, certainly, a price to be paid, but none of these challenges can be undertaken under the cloak of Arab foreign ministers or League.</p>
<p>This is not a judgement on Arab journalism itself, for the Arab world is teeming with journalistic talents that are yet to be utilized or explored. It is an attempt at an honest reading of the unfortunate reality under which Arab media is forced to operate. Until journalists and media professionals, through collective effort and after many uphill battles, redeem some respect for their tightly controlled medium, there is no reason whatsoever to celebrate.</p> | false | 1 | journalists media professionals redeem respect medium reason whatsoever celebrate160 recently announced arab media experts plan celebrate arab media day april 21 2016160 theme first day meant annual tradition role arab media combatting terrorism mockery surely multifaceted one clearly politicized choice theme proposed event term terrorism political one rarely applied violence committed arab regimes applies detractors ltimg classalignleft sizemedium wpimage23867 srchttpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201411ramzybaroud300x225jpg altramzy baroud width300 height225 srcsethttpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201411ramzybaroud300x225jpg 300w httpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201411ramzybaroud150x113jpg 150w httpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201411ramzybaroudjpg 400w sizesmaxwidth 300px 100vw 300px gt another fact committee experts made decision appointed council arab foreign ministers cairo meeting last may council operates ineffectual mostly ceremonial arab league course various arab countries enthusiastically planning join celebrations unscrupulously emphasizing importance combatting terrorism theme obvious reasons positioning victims terror never purveyors violence event common themes arab media likely tout rulers saviors nations condemn detractors terrorists terrorism sympathizers potential terrorists reality arab media little celebrate anything arabs lament moral malaise afflicting media whether official semiofficial independent opposition160 mention hundreds useless glossy magazines objectify women belittle social challenges facing arab societies embrace western globalization arabs exist consume think independently critically april 21 value day candid discussion urgent practical steps required escape complete collapse credibility arab media prevailed since socalled arab spring last fourandahalf years someone spent two decades working arab international media spaces written topics related middle east general engaged issues concerning arab world specifically wish put forward suggestions consideration organizers arab media committee terms alirhab terrorism altaasub extremism often lobbed arab media platforms specific political end demonizing instead term alunf violence used confronted regardless party responsible acts violence state often granted monopoly violence conveniently enacted laws monopoly meant used nonchalantly without iota accountability currently case arab media general commentators particular tend treat readers palpable pretentiousness arab media originator wisdom known truth arab media would poor state instead owners managers media platforms truly engage society listen learn real people real life problems understand exist outside sanctified media bubble intellectuals ordinary people much wisdom insight media meant celebrate seemingly endless virtues regime celebrated supposed virtues perpetual podium ideas challenging difficult rarely gratifying arab regimes recently enacted laws punish journalists promoting certain governments perceive fabrications misinformation progovernment journalists largely exempted expectations neither right responsibility governments define true thus permissible untrue thus punishable prison term heavy fines journalists unions provide moral guidance members challenge permit serve mouthpieces political party regime protect remain committed integrity profession media meant platform opposing opinions necessary order media espouse healthy democratic space society arab societies hardly democratic opposing opinions often serve hate fest regimes enemies whenever possible arab media open space wish think outside political ideological selfserving box arab intellect limited pro anti regime party always alternative ways rationalizing could time offer real alternative status quo conventional wisdom arab media agree basic values include standing defending victimized arab regimes voicing honest opinions however critical journalist suffers imprisoned fined ostracized entire media community loses battle solidarity among journalists regardless personal political views even ideological affiliation enshrined code conduct selfrespecting media community anywhere mena media monitoring recently criticized marginalization algerian women countrys media according report women given 29 percent media space available men enjoy rest women often restricted space also topics meant contribute thus cramped within areas related family food fashion fact algeria perhaps fortunate arab media women even restricted used token opposed active participants discussions serious political weight societal impact engaging women media favor bestowed men right essential onefor thinking society one oblivious fact democratic media truly function nondemocratic society however failure arab democracies heighten sense responsibility among arab media journalists arab media set realistic serious goals revisit goals utmost honesty transparency matter confines restrictions many battles fought certainly price paid none challenges undertaken cloak arab foreign ministers league judgement arab journalism arab world teeming journalistic talents yet utilized explored attempt honest reading unfortunate reality arab media forced operate journalists media professionals collective effort many uphill battles redeem respect tightly controlled medium reason whatsoever celebrate | 641 |
<p>Trump’s prospective line-up of old politicians is not conducive to the achievement of a just peace in Palestine.</p>
<p>Fear and trepidation are slowly building up, as US President-elect, Donald Trump, is fortifying his transitional team with people capable of bringing about a nightmare scenario, not only for Americans but for the rest of the world, as well.</p>
<p>For Palestinians, however, the signs are even more ominous. From former New York mayor, Rudy Giuliani, to Republican leader Newt Gingrich, the Trump team is filling up with dishonorable men who have made careers out of pandering to Israeli interests and unabashedly discounting Palestinian rights.</p>
<p>While Gingrich had claimed in 2011 that <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/dec/10/palestinians-invented-people-newt-gingrich" type="external">Palestinians are ‘invented’ people</a>, Giuliani, <a href="http://www.breakingisraelnews.com/78486/giuliani-latest-pro-israel-contender-secretary-state/#UsvuviiqTsC3ZRhW.97" type="external">according to Jewish News Service</a> “is fondly remembered in the Jewish community for expelling Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) chief, Yasser Arafat, from a United Nations concert at Lincoln Center in 1995.”</p>
<p>Considering earlier <a href="http://www.palestinechronicle.com/lieberman-to-trump-help-us-develop-jewish-settlements/" type="external">statements made by Trump himself last May</a>—that the expansion of illegal Jewish settlements in the Occupied West Bank ‘should keep moving forward’—to more recent comments by Trump’s point person in Israel, <a href="http://www.vox.com/world/2016/11/15/13629690/trump-israel-palestine-peace-process-settlements-jerusalem" type="external">Jason Greenblatt</a>, that the illegal colonies are ‘not an obstacle to peace’, it is fairly certain that the Trump administration is decidedly anti-peace and anti-Palestinians.</p>
<p>Israeli officials are, of course, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/15/world/middleeast/israel-netanyahu-trump-palestinian-settlements.html?_r=0" type="external">rejoicing at the opportunity</a> of working with such an administration, with <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/israeli-minister-donald-trump-election-could-mean-the-end-of-the-palestinian-state-a7418021.html" type="external">Education Minister Naftali Bennet</a> celebrating the ‘end of a Palestinian state’ era and <a href="http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=774015" type="external">Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman</a> inviting Trump to ‘coordinate the development’ of the illegal settlements.</p>
<p>But the <a href="http://www.vox.com/world/2016/11/15/13629690/trump-israel-palestine-peace-process-settlements-jerusalem" type="external">media forecast</a> for the next four years in US foreign policy towards Palestine and Israel is also prejudiced. It is true that Trump’s prospective line-up of old politicians is not conducive to the achievement of a just peace in Palestine by any stretch of the imagination, but presenting the news as if the prospects of a thriving just peace had existed under the administration of Barack Obama is simply laughable.</p>
<p>The Obama administration, despite the uneasy relationship between President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, has been one of the friendliest and most generous towards Israel. Obama has remained steadfast on Israel’s side as they both fought against Palestinian political aspirations in international institutions.</p>
<p>Only recently, Obama signed a <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-israel-statement-idUSKCN11K2CI" type="external">‘landmark agreement’</a> by giving Israel $38 billion in military funding, the largest aid package in US history.</p>
<p>So those worried about things getting worse for Palestinians under a Trump presidency can take comfort in the fact that they already have.</p>
<p>But will this impact the American position towards a Palestinian state?</p>
<p>Not in the least because, again, Obama, like his predecessors fought tirelessly to prevent a Palestinian state from ever taking form. If a distinction is to emerge between the Obama and Trump administrations, it is likely to be manifested in rhetoric, not in action: the former refined and articulate, the latter belligerent and demagogic. Either way, Palestinians lose.</p>
<p>In his last speech before the United Nations, Obama dedicated a single sentence to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict—a sentence that accurately reflected his failure to positively affect the outcomes of the Middle East’s most protracting, destabilizing conflict.</p>
<p>Both sides would “be better off if Palestinians reject incitement and recognize the legitimacy of Israel, but Israel recognizes that it cannot permanently occupy and settle Palestinian land,” he said. Nothing more.</p>
<p>While his previous speeches dedicated much rhetoric to the conflict in Palestine and Israel, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/21/world/barack-obama-unga-2016-united-nations.html" type="external">the last UN speech</a>—and that sentence alone—was a more honest indication of eight years that lacked vision, or even a sincere attempt at finding one.</p>
<p>Over that eight-year period, during which time thousands of innocent people—the vast majority of whom were Palestinians—were killed, Obama purportedly labored to achieve the proverbial, although misleading, ‘middle ground’. The outcome of his policies were quite devastating: whereas he sold Palestinians false hope, he granted Israel most of its needs of military funding and technology, shielding it from international censure, too.</p>
<p>Moreover, during the last Israeli war on Gaza in 2014 which killed and wounded thousands, Obama ensured the <a href="http://972mag.com/amid-gaza-war-idf-buys-ammunition-from-u-s-stock-in-israel/94723/" type="external">Israeli army’s storage of ammunitions</a> and military hardware remained at full capacity.</p>
<p>On the political front, he ensured Palestinian efforts aimed at obtaining recognition for their future state were soundly defeated. He went as far as denying the UN cultural organization, UNESCO, <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/31/world/meast/unesco-palestinian-membership/" type="external">from nearly a quarter of its funding</a> simply for admitting ‘Palestine’ as a new member.</p>
<p>Yet, some are, naively, hoping that Obama will seek recognition for the State of Palestine at the UN Security Council in his remaining weeks in the Oval Office. These hopes have been buoyed by media reports that Obama <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/obamas-israel-surprise-1477956091" type="external">had instructed the State Department</a> to develop an ‘option menu’ regarding his vision for a resolution to the conflict.</p>
<p>While Palestinians and their supporters are optimistic that Obama will redeem himself, even if symbolically, and support the Palestinian push for statehood, Obama is unlikely to carry out any such steps, especially since Trump is bound to defeat such initiatives once he moves into the White House.</p>
<p>Additionally, the soon-to-depart president has had eight full years to show real grit and to take advantage of his first-term popularity to challenge the pro-Israel lobby and present his country as a truly ‘honest broker’ in an unequal conflict. He could have, at least, sided with the majority of humanity by adding his country’s voice to those that recognize a Palestinian state at the United Nations.</p>
<p>As of September of last year, 139 of the UN’s member states (and two non-member states) have recognized Palestine. But those recognitions remain largely symbolic as long as the US is unyielding in its rejection of Palestinian aspirations. An unwavering supporter of Israel, the US is not only blocking&#160; full Palestinian membership at the UN, but is doing its utmost to prevent ‘Palestine’ from gaining access to international institutions.</p>
<p>Regardless of what position is to be recommended by the State Department to Obama in his final days in the White House, the misfortunes of the Palestinians are unlikely to be reversed overnight, or in the foreseeable future. Judging from Trump’s friendly overtures towards Israel -for example, <a href="http://www.breitbart.com/jerusalem/2016/11/10/trump-invites-netanyahu-visit-white-house-first-opportunity/" type="external">inviting Netanyahu</a> and <a href="http://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Sara-Netanyahu-Melania-Trump-have-warm-and-heartfelt-phone-conversation-472415" type="external">his wife</a> to visit Washington shortly after winning the elections—the immediate future does not look promising.</p>
<p>History has taught us that, when it comes to US foreign policy towards Palestine and Israel, things are likely to get worse, not better. Despite the current chasm within American society, among the media and political elites, the American love affair with Israel will continue. The ongoing war on Palestinian rights and aspirations will also linger.</p>
<p>The Palestinian leadership seems unable to understand such an obvious reality. The Palestinian Authority in Ramallah is either unaware or, perhaps, oblivious to the fact that its salvation will not arrive from Washington, but from its ability to navigate the US-Israeli alliance in a resolved and united manner.</p>
<p>Indeed, regardless of what position Obama—or even Trump—may or may not take, it will have little bearing on the outcome if Palestinians remain divided. Far more significant than the inflammatory drivel of Gingrich and Giuliani, Palestinian division and their inability to confront the Israeli Occupation with one unified and daring strategy is Palestine’s greatest, and most pressing challenge.</p> | false | 1 | trumps prospective lineup old politicians conducive achievement peace palestine fear trepidation slowly building us presidentelect donald trump fortifying transitional team people capable bringing nightmare scenario americans rest world well palestinians however signs even ominous former new york mayor rudy giuliani republican leader newt gingrich trump team filling dishonorable men made careers pandering israeli interests unabashedly discounting palestinian rights gingrich claimed 2011 palestinians invented people giuliani according jewish news service fondly remembered jewish community expelling palestine liberation organization plo chief yasser arafat united nations concert lincoln center 1995 considering earlier statements made trump last maythat expansion illegal jewish settlements occupied west bank keep moving forwardto recent comments trumps point person israel jason greenblatt illegal colonies obstacle peace fairly certain trump administration decidedly antipeace antipalestinians israeli officials course rejoicing opportunity working administration education minister naftali bennet celebrating end palestinian state era defense minister avigdor lieberman inviting trump coordinate development illegal settlements media forecast next four years us foreign policy towards palestine israel also prejudiced true trumps prospective lineup old politicians conducive achievement peace palestine stretch imagination presenting news prospects thriving peace existed administration barack obama simply laughable obama administration despite uneasy relationship president barack obama prime minister benjamin netanyahu one friendliest generous towards israel obama remained steadfast israels side fought palestinian political aspirations international institutions recently obama signed landmark agreement giving israel 38 billion military funding largest aid package us history worried things getting worse palestinians trump presidency take comfort fact already impact american position towards palestinian state least obama like predecessors fought tirelessly prevent palestinian state ever taking form distinction emerge obama trump administrations likely manifested rhetoric action former refined articulate latter belligerent demagogic either way palestinians lose last speech united nations obama dedicated single sentence palestinianisraeli conflicta sentence accurately reflected failure positively affect outcomes middle easts protracting destabilizing conflict sides would better palestinians reject incitement recognize legitimacy israel israel recognizes permanently occupy settle palestinian land said nothing previous speeches dedicated much rhetoric conflict palestine israel last un speechand sentence alonewas honest indication eight years lacked vision even sincere attempt finding one eightyear period time thousands innocent peoplethe vast majority palestinianswere killed obama purportedly labored achieve proverbial although misleading middle ground outcome policies quite devastating whereas sold palestinians false hope granted israel needs military funding technology shielding international censure moreover last israeli war gaza 2014 killed wounded thousands obama ensured israeli armys storage ammunitions military hardware remained full capacity political front ensured palestinian efforts aimed obtaining recognition future state soundly defeated went far denying un cultural organization unesco nearly quarter funding simply admitting palestine new member yet naively hoping obama seek recognition state palestine un security council remaining weeks oval office hopes buoyed media reports obama instructed state department develop option menu regarding vision resolution conflict palestinians supporters optimistic obama redeem even symbolically support palestinian push statehood obama unlikely carry steps especially since trump bound defeat initiatives moves white house additionally soontodepart president eight full years show real grit take advantage firstterm popularity challenge proisrael lobby present country truly honest broker unequal conflict could least sided majority humanity adding countrys voice recognize palestinian state united nations september last year 139 uns member states two nonmember states recognized palestine recognitions remain largely symbolic long us unyielding rejection palestinian aspirations unwavering supporter israel us blocking160 full palestinian membership un utmost prevent palestine gaining access international institutions regardless position recommended state department obama final days white house misfortunes palestinians unlikely reversed overnight foreseeable future judging trumps friendly overtures towards israel example inviting netanyahu wife visit washington shortly winning electionsthe immediate future look promising history taught us comes us foreign policy towards palestine israel things likely get worse better despite current chasm within american society among media political elites american love affair israel continue ongoing war palestinian rights aspirations also linger palestinian leadership seems unable understand obvious reality palestinian authority ramallah either unaware perhaps oblivious fact salvation arrive washington ability navigate usisraeli alliance resolved united manner indeed regardless position obamaor even trumpmay may take little bearing outcome palestinians remain divided far significant inflammatory drivel gingrich giuliani palestinian division inability confront israeli occupation one unified daring strategy palestines greatest pressing challenge | 685 |
<p>The Medicare Trustees issued their&#160; <a href="http://www.cms.gov/Research-Statistics-Data-and-Systems/Statistics-Trends-and-Reports/ReportsTrustFunds/downloads/tr2014.pdf" type="external">annual report</a>&#160;on the program’s long-term financing outlook last month, and their findings were&#160; <a href="http://www.treasury.gov/press-center/press-releases/Pages/jl2588.aspx" type="external">greeted by the Obama administration</a>&#160;as evidence that the Affordable Care Act is working. This is nonsense.</p>
<p>The general slowdown in health spending remains largely a phenomenon of economic conditions related to the deep recession of 2007-2009 and factors outside the realm of the ACA. Among other things, it is noteworthy&#160; <a href="http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleID=1885447" type="external">that health spending growth rates have moderated across the developed world in recent years</a>, as measured by the OECD. Even Obamacare’s most enthusiastic apologists might be sheepish about claiming the law somehow caused a global health transformation.</p>
<p>A close examination of the ACA’s provisions, especially those related to Medicare, also produces nothing that would lead one to expect large-scale spending moderation. The main provisions of the ACA provide substantial new subsidies for health insurance, through Medicaid and the federal and state exchanges. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO)&#160; <a href="http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/43900-2014-04-ACAtables2.pdf" type="external">estimates</a>&#160;that these provisions will cost about $1.8 trillion over the period 2015 to 2024. The main effect of this massive increase in subsidization of insurance will be to increase demand for services and thus put upward pressure on prices and costs. This is simple economics. It may take some time for these pressures to emerge, but they will eventually emerge.</p>
<p>Within Medicare, the ACA cut program spending substantially–by more than $700 billion over a decade, <a href="http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/43471-hr6079.pdf" type="external">from CBO’s last assessment of them</a>. But these cuts inspire no confidence. The largest cut is an indiscriminate, across-the-board reduction in payments to all hospitals and other institutions serving Medicare patients, totaling $415 billion over 10 years. Called the “productivity adjustment factor,” the cut reduces the inflation updates for these institutions on the presumption that they will achieve a certain level of productivity improvement each year. But the actuaries who produce Medicare’s spending forecast have been dubious from the beginning that these cuts can be sustained because they would wipe out the positive revenue margins of many facilities around the country, and thus jeopardize access to care for seniors. The actuaries have been so skeptical of this cut that they have produced&#160; <a href="http://www.cms.gov/Research-Statistics-Data-and-Systems/Statistics-Trends-and-Reports/ReportsTrustFunds/Downloads/2014TRAlternativeScenario.pdf" type="external">an alternative projection to the official trustees’ report forecast each year since 2010</a>. The alternative scenario shows what Medicare’s spending trajectory would be if the cuts were overturned. In effect, without this simplistic cut, Medicare spending would closely resemble the projections that were made before the ACA was enacted.</p>
<p>The other significant cut in Medicare spending is a reduction in the payments made to the private insurers providing coverage for Medicare beneficiaries, called Medicare Advantage (MA) plans. In 2012, CBO estimated these cuts would total $156 billion over ten years. The effect of these cuts will be to lower MA enrollment and force more program enrollees back into the traditional, government-run fee-for-service (FFS) part of Medicare. Despite what many critics of MA plans contend, these private insurance options are more efficient than FFS,&#160; <a href="http://www.medpac.gov/chapters/Jun14DataBookSec9.pdf" type="external">according to official government data</a>. The average MA HMO can provide standard Medicare benefits for 95 percent of what it costs FFS to provide these benefits. The plans get paid more than FFS, but the extra payments go toward more expansive benefits for MA enrollees. Cutting payments to MA plans does not increase the efficiency of the overall health system.</p>
<p>The changes in Medicare that ACA advocates like to tout–the so-called “delivery system reforms” such as “Accountable Care Organizations” (ACOs) and reducing payments for hospital readmissions–are very minor relative to the size of Medicare and national health expenditures. At the time the ACA was enacted,&#160; <a href="http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/113xx/doc11379/amendreconprop.pdf" type="external">CBO estimated</a>&#160;Medicare ACOs would save about $4.9 billion over 10 years, and the readmission provision would save another $7.1 billion. These amounts are barely noticeable in Medicare, which will&#160; <a href="http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/44205-2014-04-Medicare.pdf" type="external">spend $6.9 trillion over the coming decade</a>. The ACO program is already widely viewed as a disappointment anyway,&#160; <a href="http://economics21.org/jcapretta/Downloads/140417-cl-aco.pdf" type="external">with fundamental design flaws</a>. The suggestion that these provisions are somehow responsible for the slowdown in health spending in the United States is ludicrous.</p>
<p>The long-term outlook for Medicare is also clouded&#160; <a href="http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304299304577346332422834276" type="external">by the ACA’s double-count of the Medicare cuts aimed at the hospital</a>, or part A, side of the program. The 2014 trustees report says these Medicare cuts have added several additional years to the solvency of the Hospital Insurance (HI) trust fund. But the same cuts were also used to partially finance the Medicaid expansion and the new subsidies paid to lower income households getting insurance through the exchanges. So the same Medicare spending cuts are being used to both create new entitlement spending outside of Medicare and to pay future Medicare benefit claims out of the HI trust fund. That may make the HI trust fund look better on paper, but the federal budget outlook has certainly not improved.</p>
<p>Even with this double-count, Medicare’s outlook remains grim. According to the trustees, the program has $28.1 trillion in unfunded liabilities over the next 75 years. Together with Social Security’s $13.3 trillion shortfall, it is clear the federal government has accumulated entitlement spending commitments that far exceed our capacity to pay for them.</p>
<p>Medicare’s problem is twofold. The program remains highly inefficient because the default FFS option has very little cost control within it. The government attempts to hold down costs with payment regulations, but price-setting does not directly limit volume, or the use of services. In addition, the retirement of the baby boom generation will send enrollment in the program soaring, from 52 million enrollees in 2013 to nearly 82 million in 2030.</p>
<p>Competition and consumer choice,&#160; <a href="http://budget.house.gov/uploadedfiles/wydenryan.pdf" type="external">of the kind Congressman Paul Ryan has proposed in the form of premium support</a>, can slow Medicare’s per capita cost growth by rewarding more efficient care and providing incentives for finding new and less expensive ways of deliver high quality services.</p>
<p>The demographic problem, however, requires an entirely different set of considerations. As Americans live longer lives, and have fewer children, it will not be possible to sustain indefinitely the current policy of fully subsidized Medicare benefits for everyone over the age of 65.</p>
<p>Addressing this demographic problem may require asking future retirees to pay more for their Medicare coverage. This can be done without undermining the significant value the program provides for these retirees. Medicare’s main benefit is that it ensures access to insurance for everyone over the age of 65. Regardless of their health status, the same implied premium applies to all Medicare beneficiaries. This is a significant benefit that a fully private market would not be able to provide.</p>
<p>Medicare could be reformed so that it continues to offer insurance to all Americans over the age of 65 at a premium that is the same for every enrollee. What would change are the tax-and-transfer features of the program that are the source the looming financial shortfall. Workers would be asked to save more during their pre-retirement years so that they could pay for more of their Medicare premium when they retired. That is a logical response to the massive demographic changes already underway, and a response that would ensure Medicare is able to provide secure insurance for seniors for many decades to come.</p>
<p>James C. Capretta is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center&#160;and&#160;a visiting fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.</p> | false | 1 | medicare trustees issued their160 annual report160on programs longterm financing outlook last month findings were160 greeted obama administration160as evidence affordable care act working nonsense general slowdown health spending remains largely phenomenon economic conditions related deep recession 20072009 factors outside realm aca among things noteworthy160 health spending growth rates moderated across developed world recent years measured oecd even obamacares enthusiastic apologists might sheepish claiming law somehow caused global health transformation close examination acas provisions especially related medicare also produces nothing would lead one expect largescale spending moderation main provisions aca provide substantial new subsidies health insurance medicaid federal state exchanges congressional budget office cbo160 estimates160that provisions cost 18 trillion period 2015 2024 main effect massive increase subsidization insurance increase demand services thus put upward pressure prices costs simple economics may take time pressures emerge eventually emerge within medicare aca cut program spending substantiallyby 700 billion decade cbos last assessment cuts inspire confidence largest cut indiscriminate acrosstheboard reduction payments hospitals institutions serving medicare patients totaling 415 billion 10 years called productivity adjustment factor cut reduces inflation updates institutions presumption achieve certain level productivity improvement year actuaries produce medicares spending forecast dubious beginning cuts sustained would wipe positive revenue margins many facilities around country thus jeopardize access care seniors actuaries skeptical cut produced160 alternative projection official trustees report forecast year since 2010 alternative scenario shows medicares spending trajectory would cuts overturned effect without simplistic cut medicare spending would closely resemble projections made aca enacted significant cut medicare spending reduction payments made private insurers providing coverage medicare beneficiaries called medicare advantage plans 2012 cbo estimated cuts would total 156 billion ten years effect cuts lower enrollment force program enrollees back traditional governmentrun feeforservice ffs part medicare despite many critics plans contend private insurance options efficient ffs160 according official government data average hmo provide standard medicare benefits 95 percent costs ffs provide benefits plans get paid ffs extra payments go toward expansive benefits enrollees cutting payments plans increase efficiency overall health system changes medicare aca advocates like toutthe socalled delivery system reforms accountable care organizations acos reducing payments hospital readmissionsare minor relative size medicare national health expenditures time aca enacted160 cbo estimated160medicare acos would save 49 billion 10 years readmission provision would save another 71 billion amounts barely noticeable medicare will160 spend 69 trillion coming decade aco program already widely viewed disappointment anyway160 fundamental design flaws suggestion provisions somehow responsible slowdown health spending united states ludicrous longterm outlook medicare also clouded160 acas doublecount medicare cuts aimed hospital part side program 2014 trustees report says medicare cuts added several additional years solvency hospital insurance hi trust fund cuts also used partially finance medicaid expansion new subsidies paid lower income households getting insurance exchanges medicare spending cuts used create new entitlement spending outside medicare pay future medicare benefit claims hi trust fund may make hi trust fund look better paper federal budget outlook certainly improved even doublecount medicares outlook remains grim according trustees program 281 trillion unfunded liabilities next 75 years together social securitys 133 trillion shortfall clear federal government accumulated entitlement spending commitments far exceed capacity pay medicares problem twofold program remains highly inefficient default ffs option little cost control within government attempts hold costs payment regulations pricesetting directly limit volume use services addition retirement baby boom generation send enrollment program soaring 52 million enrollees 2013 nearly 82 million 2030 competition consumer choice160 kind congressman paul ryan proposed form premium support slow medicares per capita cost growth rewarding efficient care providing incentives finding new less expensive ways deliver high quality services demographic problem however requires entirely different set considerations americans live longer lives fewer children possible sustain indefinitely current policy fully subsidized medicare benefits everyone age 65 addressing demographic problem may require asking future retirees pay medicare coverage done without undermining significant value program provides retirees medicares main benefit ensures access insurance everyone age 65 regardless health status implied premium applies medicare beneficiaries significant benefit fully private market would able provide medicare could reformed continues offer insurance americans age 65 premium every enrollee would change taxandtransfer features program source looming financial shortfall workers would asked save preretirement years could pay medicare premium retired logical response massive demographic changes already underway response would ensure medicare able provide secure insurance seniors many decades come james c capretta senior fellow ethics public policy center160and160a visiting fellow american enterprise institute | 719 |
<p>FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — It’s not too often that <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/New_England_Patriots/" type="external">New England Patriots</a> head coach <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Bill_Belichick/" type="external">Bill Belichick</a> appears content, happy and completely pleased with his team.</p>
<p>It’s even more rare to see the coach in such an expressive state in the middle of the regular season.</p>
<p>But Belichick was almost smitten with the work his team put forth over the last week-plus with a 41-16 win in Denver followed up by Sunday afternoon’s 33-8 blowout of the Raiders in Mexico City.</p>
<p>In between, there was a week of practice at the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs on a rare, true NFL road trip.</p>
<p>“I’ll always be a Navy man, but just wanted to give a shout out and a big thanks to (Lt.) General (Jay) Silveria and his great staff at the United States Air Force Academy for the hospitality and the week we had there,” Belichick said, wearing an Air Force hoodie at his postgame press conference after dominating Oakland.</p>
<p>“This has been a three-leg trip for us and we asked a lot of players, asked a lot of our organization and they all delivered. We had a great nine days. We really got better as a football team. We met all the challenges we needed to meet head on.</p>
<p>“Our players gave a great effort tonight. They came out and performed well early and throughout the game and played great situational football. Credit to the team and the entire organization, all the people planning this trip. It’s good to be going home with two wins on this trip.”</p>
<p>Now tied with the Steelers for the best record in the AFC at 8-2 thanks to a six-game winning streak, New England is clearly playing its best football of the season.</p>
<p>After a month with a lull in scoring, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Tom_Brady/" type="external">Tom Brady</a> and Co. were back in the 30-plus-point mode the last couple weeks, when the quarterback completed six touchdown passes with no interceptions. Defensively, the Patriots have held opponents to 17 points or less in six straight games after allowing 33 or more in three of the first four games of the year.</p>
<p>To a man, players and coaches alike believe that hard work has paid off and led to game-day performances.</p>
<p>“It was a fiesta all over the field,” tight end <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Rob_Gronkowski/" type="external">Rob Gronkowski</a> said, getting into the spirit of the big win at Estadio Azteca with a nod to both the support New England got from fans as well as the performance of the team itself.</p>
<p>“These trips all come down to whether you win or lose,” Brady said. “You remember when you win. If you lose you want to forget as fast as you can.”</p>
<p>As happy as Belichick and his players were with the latest win and winning streak, the coach reined in the positivity after reviewing the film and preparing to turn the page to Sunday’s post-Thanksgiving game against the Dolphins at Gillette Stadium.</p>
<p>“I think the players have worked extremely hard. We’ve had our moments,” Belichick said of the mid-season improvements and winning streak. “There’s still a lot of things that we need to work on and need to improve in.</p>
<p>“Each game gets a little more demanding because your opponent has had another week of things that you know they’ve shown and you have to work on, and so the volume builds up. Of course, our volume has built up over the last 10 weeks, too. We just have to keep grinding away week by week, and that’s what we’ll try to do.”</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>Kicker <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Stephen_Gostkowski/" type="external">Stephen Gostkowski</a> nailed a 62-yard field goal as time expired in the first half in Mexico City, taking advantage of the thin air at 7,200 feet to best his own 58-yard Patriots franchise record that he set earlier this season. It was a kick, one of four field goals on the day, which probably would have been good from another 10 yards or so.</p>
<p>“It was cool,” Gostkowski said afterward. “With kicking, you can wait your whole career and never get a shot like that. You have to be very patient. It’s a very opportunistic job, and you’re only as good as the opportunities you get. I got a good opportunity, and I’m glad I took advantage of it.</p>
<p>“It was just a fun experience to have a hand in the win. To see the excitement in all the guys after making that kick was pretty cool.”</p>
<p>This opportunity came to impressive situational football by quarterback Tom Brady and the offense. Taking over at their own 7 with 33 seconds to play in the second quarter, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Dion-Lewis/" type="external">Dion Lewis</a> burst for a 20-yard gain, wide receiver <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Danny-Amendola/" type="external">Danny Amendola</a> had an 18-yard catch and tight end Rob Gronkowski had a 10-yard reception to the Oakland 45.</p>
<p>“I think every time I’ve kicked a long kick, Gronk made the catch right beforehand, so it’s a nice little Polish connection,” Gostkowski joked.</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>Head coach Bill Belichick notched his 271st career win with the 33-8 blowout of the Raiders in Mexico City, moving past Cowboys legend <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Tom_Landry/" type="external">Tom Landry</a> into third place in NFL history for all-time wins behind <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Don_Shula/" type="external">Don Shula</a> (347) and <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/George_Halas/" type="external">George Halas</a> (324).</p>
<p>Patriots owner <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Robert_Kraft/" type="external">Robert Kraft</a> presented his coach with a game ball after the historic win, though Belichick deflected the attention afterward.</p>
<p>“Really, that’s a credit to our players; players win games,” Belichick said. “They’re the ones who go out there and make the blocks, the tackles, the runs, the throws, the kicks. I think what it means is, No. 1, I’ve been doing this for a long time, and No. 2, I’ve coached a lot of great players. I’ve been very fortunate to have a great coaching staff, great assistant coaches and great players. I’ve had a great opportunity to direct those people and, really, the credit goes to the players.</p>
<p>“They won the game tonight and they deserved to win because they played better. That’s the way it’s been on those 270 games or whatever it is. I’ve been fortunate to have a lot of great players.”</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>Former Patriots first-round pick and Pro-Bowl wide receiver <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Terry_Glenn/" type="external">Terry Glenn</a> died in a car accident in Texas in the early-morning hours Nov. 20. Glenn was drafted with the No. 7 overall pick out of Ohio State in 1996 and helped the Patriots to a Super Bowl that year with a then-NFL rookie record 90 receptions. His career in New England came to a tumultuous close in 2001 when he was suspended and dealt with hamstring injuries that limited him to just four games. He was traded to Green Bay that offseason and finished his career with the Cowboys.</p>
<p>Bill Belichick coached Glenn first as an assistant on <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Bill_Parcells/" type="external">Bill Parcells</a>‘ Patriots staff in 1996 and then for two seasons as New England’s head coach from 2000-01.</p>
<p>“I was pretty close with Terry,” Belichick began. “His rookie season was my first year here in ’96, so I had a lot of interaction with him and other people that were involved in his life and his upbringing separate from the Patriots. Terry was a very smart individual, had a lot of, obviously, a lot of physical skill and talent, could do a lot of things on the football field very naturally. I think he was deep down inside a good person with good intentions and a good heart. Obviously, it’s a very unfortunate passing. I mean, it’s just sad. It’s a sad day. It’s sad news.”</p>
<p>“We were shocked and deeply saddened by today’s news that Terry Glenn died in an auto accident,” Patriots chairman and CEO Robert Kraft said in a statement. “Terry was one of the most gifted receivers we have ever had. For so many Patriots fans, his rookie season will be remembered as one of the most impactful in franchise history. After a disappointing 6-10 finish in 1995, we drafted Terry seventh overall, and in his first year, he helped propel the Patriots to an AFC Championship and Super Bowl appearance.</p>
<p>“One of my favorite memories came when we hosted the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Pittsburgh_Steelers/" type="external">Pittsburgh Steelers</a> in the divisional playoff game. It was my first home playoff game as an owner and just the second home playoff game in our history. It will always be remembered for the fog that filled Foxboro Stadium that day. Yet, on the first play from scrimmage, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Drew_Bledsoe/" type="external">Drew Bledsoe</a> threw a deep pass that disappeared in the fog and reappeared 53 yards downfield in Terry Glenn’s hands. We scored on the next play and ended up winning 28-3.</p>
<p>“Our thoughts and prayers are with Terry’s family, his former teammates and friends who mourn his loss.”</p>
<p>NOTES: DT Malcom Brown (ankle) missed his third straight game, despite returning to practice on a limited basis last week. … WR <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Chris-Hogan/" type="external">Chris Hogan</a> has now missed two-plus games to a shoulder injury that came prior to the Week 9 bye. Hogan, who was last seen in the locker room wearing a sling, remained in New England last week while the team trained in Colorado Springs. … WR Matthew Slater (hamstring) was not in Mexico City for the game against Oakland, returning to New England last week while the Patriots trained in Colorado Springs after reinjuring the hamstring issue that dates back to training camp in the Week 10 win in Denver. … DB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Eric-Rowe/" type="external">Eric Rowe</a> (groin) was once again inactive despite having practiced on a limited basis for the last two weeks. The veteran has now missed the last six games to the injury. … RB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Mike-Gillislee/" type="external">Mike Gillislee</a> was a healthy scratch for the second straight week, now clearly the odd man out in a crowded and healthy Patriots backfield. … C David Andrews missed his first game of the season after missing practice all last week because of an unknown illness. … C/G Ted Karras started in place of David Andrews against Oakland, just the second career start for the second-year backup and first at center. … RT Marcus Cannon (ankle) missed his second straight game with the injury that dates back to the first half of the pre-bye Week 8 win over the Chargers. Veteran LaAdrian Waddle once again filled in for Cannon and more than held his own against <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Khalil-Mack/" type="external">Khalil Mack</a> and the Raiders. … CB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Stephon-Gilmore/" type="external">Stephon Gilmore</a> (dehydration) missed some snaps in the middle of the battle with Oakland in Mexico City. The veteran corner retreated to the locker room, but later returned to finish the game, playing 58 of a possible 74 snaps on defense. … WR Danny Amendola (dehydration) retreated to the locker room in Mexico City, but returned to finish the game.</p>
<p>REPORT CARD VS. RAIDERS</p>
<p>—PASSING OFFENSE: A – Tom Brady earned AFC Offensive Player of the Week honors for his work in Denver and was even better in Mexico City against the overmatched Raiders. Brady completed 30 of 37 throws, including his first 12 of the afternoon, for 339 yards with three touchdowns and no interceptions for a 131.9 rating, once again dominating a <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jack_Del_Rio/" type="external">Jack Del Rio</a> defense. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Brandin-Cooks/" type="external">Brandin Cooks</a> led the receivers with six catches for 149 yards, including a 64-yard touchdown on the opening drive of the third quarter. New England’s banged-up line was good once again, holding Oakland to just one sack.</p>
<p>—RUSHING OFFENSE: B – The ground game was a clear secondary focus against Oakland, but still productive to the tune of 20 attempts for 89 yards. Dion Lewis led the way once again with 10 carries for 60 yards, including a key 20-yard run very late in the second quarter that jump-started a drive to a long field goal as time expired in the half. New England was fortunate that <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Rex-Burkhead/" type="external">Rex Burkhead</a>‘s opening-drive fumble in the red zone was recovered by tight end <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Dwayne-Allen/" type="external">Dwayne Allen</a>.</p>
<p>—PASS DEFENSE: B – Despite once again failing to get much pressure on the passer, New England held <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Derek-Carr/" type="external">Derek Carr</a> to just 28 completions on 49 attempts for 237 yards with one touchdown and one interception. Carr had just 65 yards passing in the first half and was hindered by endless drops by his receivers all afternoon. An area of improvement, the Patriots allowed just two completions over 20 yards, while Duron Harmon hauled in a deflected interception.</p>
<p>—RUSH DEFENSE: C – Playing without defensive tackle Malcom Brown once again, New England’s run defense was again shaky, especially before the score got out of hand. Oakland ran it 21 times for 109 yards (5.2 average) as a team. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Marshawn_Lynch/" type="external">Marshawn Lynch</a> led the way with 11 rushes for 67 yards, including a 25-yarder around right end, with nine of those rushes for 61 yards in the first half.</p>
<p>—SPECIAL TEAMS: A-minus – Stephen Gostkowski certainly enjoyed the thin air in Mexico City, nailing a 62-yard Patriots franchise-record field goal on the final play of the first half. He hit three other field goals (51, 40, 29) and six touchbacks on seven kickoffs. Ryan Allen punted just twice, both downed inside the 20 for a 47.5 net average. Neither team did much of anything in the return game.</p>
<p>—COACHING: B – Head coach Bill Belichick oversaw a two-week road trip in Denver and Mexico City that proved extremely productive. Offensively New England used a more down-the-field approach to the passing game after a few weeks of shorter passing action. Defensively, the unit continues to force/take advantage of turnovers while keeping opponents out of the end zone. Coordinators <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Josh_McDaniels/" type="external">Josh McDaniels</a> and <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Matt-Patricia/" type="external">Matt Patricia</a> seem to be getting quite comfortable with their personnel and approaches on offense and defensive, respectively. That was certainly the case against Oakland.</p> | false | 1 | foxborough mass often new england patriots head coach bill belichick appears content happy completely pleased team even rare see coach expressive state middle regular season belichick almost smitten work team put forth last weekplus 4116 win denver followed sunday afternoons 338 blowout raiders mexico city week practice united states air force academy colorado springs rare true nfl road trip ill always navy man wanted give shout big thanks lt general jay silveria great staff united states air force academy hospitality week belichick said wearing air force hoodie postgame press conference dominating oakland threeleg trip us asked lot players asked lot organization delivered great nine days really got better football team met challenges needed meet head players gave great effort tonight came performed well early throughout game played great situational football credit team entire organization people planning trip good going home two wins trip tied steelers best record afc 82 thanks sixgame winning streak new england clearly playing best football season month lull scoring tom brady co back 30pluspoint mode last couple weeks quarterback completed six touchdown passes interceptions defensively patriots held opponents 17 points less six straight games allowing 33 three first four games year man players coaches alike believe hard work paid led gameday performances fiesta field tight end rob gronkowski said getting spirit big win estadio azteca nod support new england got fans well performance team trips come whether win lose brady said remember win lose want forget fast happy belichick players latest win winning streak coach reined positivity reviewing film preparing turn page sundays postthanksgiving game dolphins gillette stadium think players worked extremely hard weve moments belichick said midseason improvements winning streak theres still lot things need work need improve game gets little demanding opponent another week things know theyve shown work volume builds course volume built last 10 weeks keep grinding away week week thats well try kicker stephen gostkowski nailed 62yard field goal time expired first half mexico city taking advantage thin air 7200 feet best 58yard patriots franchise record set earlier season kick one four field goals day probably would good another 10 yards cool gostkowski said afterward kicking wait whole career never get shot like patient opportunistic job youre good opportunities get got good opportunity im glad took advantage fun experience hand win see excitement guys making kick pretty cool opportunity came impressive situational football quarterback tom brady offense taking 7 33 seconds play second quarter dion lewis burst 20yard gain wide receiver danny amendola 18yard catch tight end rob gronkowski 10yard reception oakland 45 think every time ive kicked long kick gronk made catch right beforehand nice little polish connection gostkowski joked head coach bill belichick notched 271st career win 338 blowout raiders mexico city moving past cowboys legend tom landry third place nfl history alltime wins behind shula 347 george halas 324 patriots owner robert kraft presented coach game ball historic win though belichick deflected attention afterward really thats credit players players win games belichick said theyre ones go make blocks tackles runs throws kicks think means 1 ive long time 2 ive coached lot great players ive fortunate great coaching staff great assistant coaches great players ive great opportunity direct people really credit goes players game tonight deserved win played better thats way 270 games whatever ive fortunate lot great players former patriots firstround pick probowl wide receiver terry glenn died car accident texas earlymorning hours nov 20 glenn drafted 7 overall pick ohio state 1996 helped patriots super bowl year thennfl rookie record 90 receptions career new england came tumultuous close 2001 suspended dealt hamstring injuries limited four games traded green bay offseason finished career cowboys bill belichick coached glenn first assistant bill parcells patriots staff 1996 two seasons new englands head coach 200001 pretty close terry belichick began rookie season first year 96 lot interaction people involved life upbringing separate patriots terry smart individual lot obviously lot physical skill talent could lot things football field naturally think deep inside good person good intentions good heart obviously unfortunate passing mean sad sad day sad news shocked deeply saddened todays news terry glenn died auto accident patriots chairman ceo robert kraft said statement terry one gifted receivers ever many patriots fans rookie season remembered one impactful franchise history disappointing 610 finish 1995 drafted terry seventh overall first year helped propel patriots afc championship super bowl appearance one favorite memories came hosted pittsburgh steelers divisional playoff game first home playoff game owner second home playoff game history always remembered fog filled foxboro stadium day yet first play scrimmage drew bledsoe threw deep pass disappeared fog reappeared 53 yards downfield terry glenns hands scored next play ended winning 283 thoughts prayers terrys family former teammates friends mourn loss notes dt malcom brown ankle missed third straight game despite returning practice limited basis last week wr chris hogan missed twoplus games shoulder injury came prior week 9 bye hogan last seen locker room wearing sling remained new england last week team trained colorado springs wr matthew slater hamstring mexico city game oakland returning new england last week patriots trained colorado springs reinjuring hamstring issue dates back training camp week 10 win denver db eric rowe groin inactive despite practiced limited basis last two weeks veteran missed last six games injury rb mike gillislee healthy scratch second straight week clearly odd man crowded healthy patriots backfield c david andrews missed first game season missing practice last week unknown illness cg ted karras started place david andrews oakland second career start secondyear backup first center rt marcus cannon ankle missed second straight game injury dates back first half prebye week 8 win chargers veteran laadrian waddle filled cannon held khalil mack raiders cb stephon gilmore dehydration missed snaps middle battle oakland mexico city veteran corner retreated locker room later returned finish game playing 58 possible 74 snaps defense wr danny amendola dehydration retreated locker room mexico city returned finish game report card vs raiders passing offense tom brady earned afc offensive player week honors work denver even better mexico city overmatched raiders brady completed 30 37 throws including first 12 afternoon 339 yards three touchdowns interceptions 1319 rating dominating jack del rio defense brandin cooks led receivers six catches 149 yards including 64yard touchdown opening drive third quarter new englands bangedup line good holding oakland one sack rushing offense b ground game clear secondary focus oakland still productive tune 20 attempts 89 yards dion lewis led way 10 carries 60 yards including key 20yard run late second quarter jumpstarted drive long field goal time expired half new england fortunate rex burkheads openingdrive fumble red zone recovered tight end dwayne allen pass defense b despite failing get much pressure passer new england held derek carr 28 completions 49 attempts 237 yards one touchdown one interception carr 65 yards passing first half hindered endless drops receivers afternoon area improvement patriots allowed two completions 20 yards duron harmon hauled deflected interception rush defense c playing without defensive tackle malcom brown new englands run defense shaky especially score got hand oakland ran 21 times 109 yards 52 average team marshawn lynch led way 11 rushes 67 yards including 25yarder around right end nine rushes 61 yards first half special teams aminus stephen gostkowski certainly enjoyed thin air mexico city nailing 62yard patriots franchiserecord field goal final play first half hit three field goals 51 40 29 six touchbacks seven kickoffs ryan allen punted twice downed inside 20 475 net average neither team much anything return game coaching b head coach bill belichick oversaw twoweek road trip denver mexico city proved extremely productive offensively new england used downthefield approach passing game weeks shorter passing action defensively unit continues forcetake advantage turnovers keeping opponents end zone coordinators josh mcdaniels matt patricia seem getting quite comfortable personnel approaches offense defensive respectively certainly case oakland | 1,302 |
<p />
<p>The most recent example is his campaign's effort to distance Obama from comments he made last July. When asked if he would be willing to meet with the leaders of Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Cuba, and North Korea “without precondition” during the first year of his administration, Obama famously answered, “I would.” It's a commitment he repeated throughout the Democratic primary.</p>
<p>But now Obama's top advisers like Tom Daschle are saying, “I would not say that we would meet unconditionally. Of course, there are conditions that we [would] involve in preparation in getting ready for the diplomacy. . . . 'Without precondition' simply means we wouldn't put obstacles in the way of discussing the differences between us. That's really what they're saying, what Barack is saying.” And Obama himself insisted that he didn't necessarily have President Ahmadinejad in mind when he said he'd meet with the leader of Iran — and, anyway, “this obsession with Ahmadinejad is an example of us losing track of what's important.”</p>
<p>This explanation is Clintonian. As Robert Novak helpfully <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/05/mccain_not_disarmed.html" type="external">pointed out in his column on Thursday</a>, last September Obama was asked at a press conference whether he still would meet with Ahmadinejad. Obama replied, “Yeah . . . I find many of President Ahmadinejad's statements odious. . . . But we should never fear to negotiate.” And in November, on NBC's Meet the Press, Obama defended “a conversation with somebody like Ahmadinejad.”</p>
<p>Rather than admit he made a mistake, however, Obama now blames us for our “obsession” with Ahmadinejad. And as is so often the case, any criticism of Obama, on any grounds, is causing us to “lose track of what's important.” One senses that Obama and his supporters, while happy to pound his opponents, believe criticism of him is indecorous and even illegitimate.</p>
<p>There is yet more in the Obama oeuvre of old politics.</p>
<p>In October 2007, Obama and not his critics made the American flag pin on his lapel an issue by saying it had become a “substitute” for “true patriotism.” He proudly declared, “I won't wear that pin on my chest.” That pledge has apparently become inoperative. Obama has been wearing the American flag pin on his lapel at campaign events. Apparently it's no longer a substitute for “true patriotism.”</p>
<p>In his speech on race, Obama said “I can no more disown [the Reverend Jeremiah Wright] than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother.” But after Wright's comments a few weeks later at the National Press Club, the Reverend Wright found himself not only disowned but tossed under the bus — not so much because of Wright's critical comments about America but because of his critical comments about Obama.</p>
<p>Senator Obama has claimed as president he'll be able to rise above partisan politics — yet he has done very little to work with Republicans on major, controversial issues. Obama is not only the most liberal person in the Senate but also one of the most reliable Democratic votes. He has voted against such outstanding Supreme Court nominees as John Roberts and Samuel Alito. No person who is serious about acting in a “post-partisan” manner would have cast those votes or acted the way Obama has during his Senate career.</p>
<p>Obama repeatedly speaks about the corrupting influence lobbyists have on politicians — yet he seems rather less vocal about his close association with Antoin “Tony” Rezko, who is on trial on 24 counts of corruption. Rezko was among the first people to support Obama's maiden campaign, was a key fundraiser for all of Obama's campaigns, and Rezko and his wife helped the Obamas buy their house by purchasing the lot next door.</p>
<p>According to the Chicago Sun-Times, in June 2005 Obama and Rezko purchased adjoining parcels. Obama paid $1.65 million for a home while Rezko paid $625,000 for the adjacent, undeveloped lot. Both closed on their properties on the same day (the Obama's were able to purchase their parcel for $300,000 less than the asking price while Rita Rezko, the wife of Tony Rezko, paid the full price). And in January 2006, Obama paid Rezko $104,500 for portions of his land. The transaction occurred at a time when it was widely known that Rezko was under investigation. And according to ABC News, Rezko contributed more than $120,000 to Obama's 2004 Senate campaign — much of it at a time when Rezko was the target of an FBI investigation. “It surprised me that late in the game [Obama] continued to take contributions from somebody who was under a rather dark cloud in the state,” according to Cynthia Canary of the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform, a group that has worked closely with Obama and supported his legislative efforts.</p>
<p>* * * *</p>
<p>Is Barack Obama's record on these matters unprecedented for a politician? No. Has he acted in ways that are dishonorable or that call into question his basic integrity? Not in my judgment. But they matter because they go to the core of his campaign, which is to present Obama as a figure who is different, and better, than those who have come before him. He is a man who will bring “change” to Washington, cast aside the “old politics,” and heal deep divisions. We are led to believe that he is a transcendent figure, more high-minded and unstained than, well, just about anyone in American politics.</p>
<p>But reality is now shattering the myth. Obama turns out to be a Chicago politician — highly ambitious, extremely talented, and neither untainted nor uncompromised. Maybe it's time for the national media, many of whom (like Newsweek and MSNBC, for starters) are enraptured by Obama, to acquaint themselves with the real man. Is that too much to ask when selecting our next president?</p>
<p>— Peter Wehner, former deputy assistant to the president, is a senior fellow at the <a href="" type="internal">Ethics and Public Policy Center.</a></p> | false | 1 | recent example campaigns effort distance obama comments made last july asked would willing meet leaders iran syria venezuela cuba north korea without precondition first year administration obama famously answered would commitment repeated throughout democratic primary obamas top advisers like tom daschle saying would say would meet unconditionally course conditions would involve preparation getting ready diplomacy without precondition simply means wouldnt put obstacles way discussing differences us thats really theyre saying barack saying obama insisted didnt necessarily president ahmadinejad mind said hed meet leader iran anyway obsession ahmadinejad example us losing track whats important explanation clintonian robert novak helpfully pointed column thursday last september obama asked press conference whether still would meet ahmadinejad obama replied yeah find many president ahmadinejads statements odious never fear negotiate november nbcs meet press obama defended conversation somebody like ahmadinejad rather admit made mistake however obama blames us obsession ahmadinejad often case criticism obama grounds causing us lose track whats important one senses obama supporters happy pound opponents believe criticism indecorous even illegitimate yet obama oeuvre old politics october 2007 obama critics made american flag pin lapel issue saying become substitute true patriotism proudly declared wont wear pin chest pledge apparently become inoperative obama wearing american flag pin lapel campaign events apparently longer substitute true patriotism speech race obama said disown reverend jeremiah wright disown black community disown white grandmother wrights comments weeks later national press club reverend wright found disowned tossed bus much wrights critical comments america critical comments obama senator obama claimed president hell able rise partisan politics yet done little work republicans major controversial issues obama liberal person senate also one reliable democratic votes voted outstanding supreme court nominees john roberts samuel alito person serious acting postpartisan manner would cast votes acted way obama senate career obama repeatedly speaks corrupting influence lobbyists politicians yet seems rather less vocal close association antoin tony rezko trial 24 counts corruption rezko among first people support obamas maiden campaign key fundraiser obamas campaigns rezko wife helped obamas buy house purchasing lot next door according chicago suntimes june 2005 obama rezko purchased adjoining parcels obama paid 165 million home rezko paid 625000 adjacent undeveloped lot closed properties day obamas able purchase parcel 300000 less asking price rita rezko wife tony rezko paid full price january 2006 obama paid rezko 104500 portions land transaction occurred time widely known rezko investigation according abc news rezko contributed 120000 obamas 2004 senate campaign much time rezko target fbi investigation surprised late game obama continued take contributions somebody rather dark cloud state according cynthia canary illinois campaign political reform group worked closely obama supported legislative efforts barack obamas record matters unprecedented politician acted ways dishonorable call question basic integrity judgment matter go core campaign present obama figure different better come man bring change washington cast aside old politics heal deep divisions led believe transcendent figure highminded unstained well anyone american politics reality shattering myth obama turns chicago politician highly ambitious extremely talented neither untainted uncompromised maybe time national media many like newsweek msnbc starters enraptured obama acquaint real man much ask selecting next president peter wehner former deputy assistant president senior fellow ethics public policy center | 523 |
<p>Reactions to the Congressional Budget Office’s May 24 <a href="https://www.cbo.gov/system/files/115th-congress-2017-2018/costestimate/hr1628aspassed.pdf" type="external">score of the American Health Care Act</a> have naturally tended to fall into familiar partisan grooves.</p>
<p>Some Republicans have attacked the CBO in an effort to defend the bill, not only questioning the agency’s methods and pointing to its past failures to project the health economy but even (as in the case of Office of Management and Budget director Mick Mulvaney in <a href="http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/mick-mulvaney-the-day-of-the-cbo-has-probably-come-and-gone/article/2624609" type="external">an interview</a> with the Washington Examiner) accusing it of abject political bias. Some Democrats, meanwhile, have defended the CBO in order to <a href="http://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/335350-dems-plot-recess-offensive-on-obamacare" type="external">attack</a> <a href="http://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/335350-dems-plot-recess-offensive-on-obamacare" type="external">the bill</a>, asserting that the agency’s scoring is unimpeachable and holding up its specific numerical predictions about the AHCA as simple facts.</p>
<p>I’m far from immune to the gravitational pull of this partisanship, and I’m sure what follows will not be free of it. When first reading the CBO’s score, my mind went right to some of its most bizarre and weakest points. There are many to choose from, and I agree with much of what has been written about them by many observers on the right. ( <a href="http://galen.org/the-cbo-bludgeon/?mc_cid=8a33f9543e&amp;mc_eid" type="external">This overview</a> by the Galen Institute’s Doug Badger nicely covers some key concerns.) But it also has to be said that such criticisms of the CBO’s methods, and even criticisms of its intentions, don’t actually amount to defenses of the AHCA, just as the Democrats’ attacks against the bill are not defenses of the substance of the CBO’s score. The two sides of this argument are in many cases talking about two different things, and it is worth distinguishing them.</p>
<p>Drawing such distinctions would also help to clarify that some key concerns about some of the work of the Congressional Budget Office are not best understood as criticisms of it, and certainly not of its staff — which in my experience has always been defined by integrity and professionalism in the face of some enormously difficult pressures. The CBO is not politically biased. But its work is beset by challenges that run much deeper than that: They are structural, and require us to think about both the CBO and the larger congressional budget process in which it plays a part in terms of institutional reform.</p>
<p>The AHCA has its strengths and weaknesses. I’ve written about my sense of both, as many others have of theirs. But here my purpose is neither to defend the bill nor to criticize it. Instead, difficult as it may be, let’s try to think about what the CBO’s score of the AHCA tells us about the CBO — its capacities and its limits, and how its work might be best understood and also strengthened. No reform of the agency’s work could come in time to affect this iteration of the health-care debate, so in this debate we will need to make the most of the scoring we have, to take it seriously, and to try to learn from it. But this bill, for a variety of reasons, brings into the light some key challenges to the work of Congress’s scorekeeper that ought to be thought about with the future in mind.</p>
<p>Gaming the Scorekeeper Part of the trouble the CBO often faces, though in this case a fairly small part, has to do with explicit congressional manipulation of the scorekeeper. Simply put, CBO has to score legislation under assumptions that can be manipulated by the Congress.</p>
<p>We can see an example of this in the statement, on page 16 of the CBO score of the AHCA, that “on the basis of consultation with the budget committees, costs and savings are measured relative to CBO’s March 2016 baseline projections, with adjustments for legislation that was enacted after that baseline was produced.” The “baseline” in this case refers to the starting assumptions the CBO works with about where levels of spending, insurance coverage, and other factors would stand over the coming ten years under current law — that is, if nothing were to change. Proposed changes to the law are then measured against this starting point.</p>
<p>The CBO makes its baseline assumptions for key programs <a href="https://www.cbo.gov/about/products/baseline-projections-selected-programs" type="external">available online</a>. And if you look through them, you’ll find that the March 2016 baseline is not the most recent CBO baseline; a more recent one was produced in January of this year. It differs in some respects that would be quite significant for this particular score. For instance, in its March 2016 baseline, CBO projected that 18 million people would be buying coverage in the Obamacare exchanges in 2026 (if the law didn’t change), while in its January 2017 baseline the agency said 13 million would do so that year. That’s a big difference. Similar differences are evident in projections of Medicaid-expansion enrollment and in some of the agency’s spending projections.</p>
<p>So why would CBO use an older baseline as the foundation for its projections about this new bill? Basically because it was told to by the congressional leadership. That’s what “consultation with the budget committees” means. I think that using the more recent baseline would have yielded (modestly) better projections of insurance coverage but also somewhat higher projections of cost, so the decision to use the earlier baseline may tell us something about the priorities of the relevant policymakers — or of those whose votes were most in doubt.</p>
<p>A more familiar form of congressional manipulation of the scorekeeper — “gaming” the CBO’s assumptions and methods to achieve a certain score — was largely absent from this particular bill, to the detriment of its coverage score. The AHCA has been (so far) crafted with such haste and carelessness that there has been little opportunity to think through ways of juicing its score. But that sort of manipulation, in which elements of legislation are designed or tweaked with the peculiarities of the CBO model in mind specifically to achieve a certain score, is still an important part of the story of the agency’s verdict on the AHCA because of just how much of this kind of gaming happened in the crafting of Obamacare.</p>
<p>As it made its way through Congress in 2009 and 2010, the Affordable Care Act basically took shape through a long series of back-and-forth adjustments between the relevant committees and the Congressional Budget Office, intended to tweak the coverage and cost scores of the bill to accord with the idiosyncrasies of CBO’s modeling. Some forms of this gaming were cynical and reckless — the foremost example must be the CLASS ACT, a long-term-care program known from the start to be completely unsustainable, which was included in the bill purely to manipulate its cost score and then abandoned before it actually took effect. But almost every facet of the legislative design of Obamacare was a product of this kind of back and forth, so that the law in some respects was built to achieve a certain result in CBO’s model even more than in the world outside it. (On this subject, I’d highly recommend political scientist Robert Saldin’s recent book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B01MSBL1CZ/ref=nosim/nationalreviewon" type="external">When Bad Policy Makes Good Politics: Running the Numbers on Health Reform</a>.)</p>
<p>This wasn’t all cynical, of course. The CBO’s assumptions about the effects of various policy measures is the product of a kind of liberal consensus in health economics, so that the views of the designers of Obamacare were already fairly well in line with the assumptions baked into the model about the relative effects of mandates, taxes, regulations, and price controls on the one hand and of competition, consumer choice, state experimentation, and price signals on the other. Both Obamacare’s designers and the CBO’s model took the first set of policy tools to be far more powerful than the second. Maybe that’s not quite a political bias, and maybe it’s not even wrong, but it is a reflection of some implicit assumptions among health economists that have been too rarely questioned over time.</p>
<p>But the design of Obamacare did much more than reflect this broad view. It involved intense gaming of the particular features and quirks of the CBO’s health-economy model. And because its legislative design was so tightly calibrated to the parameters of that model, any changes to that design are almost unavoidably going to be scored as changes for the worse by CBO.</p>
<p>The classic example of this is the individual mandate. It is by this point basically a quirk of the CBO model that it judges the mandate to be exceedingly effective — far more effective than the evidence of the past few years would suggest. The AHCA would eliminate the mandate right away but retain most of the other key features of Obamacare for a two-year transition period, but CBO says that 14 million people would immediately lose or give up their health insurance, and that this would mostly be a function of their no longer being penalized for not buying it. Anything is possible, but that sure isn’t likely.</p>
<p>Late last year, a team that included Jonathan Gruber, the MIT health economist whose earlier work had a great deal to do with CBO’s assumptions about the mandate (among many of its other assumptions), looked into whether it still made sense to think this way about the effect of the individual mandate. As they put it in the New England Journal of Medicine:</p>
<p>When we assessed the mandate’s detailed provisions, which include income-based penalties for lacking coverage and various specific exemptions from those penalties, we did not find that overall coverage rates responded to these aspects of the law. Does that mean the mandate had no effect? Not necessarily. If its primary result was to make all Americans more likely to obtain coverage — whether or not they were subject to the penalty and irrespective of how much it would cost them — our analysis would not capture that effect.</p>
<p>Not exactly strong support for the CBO’s insistence on the power of mandates. But for now at least the agency persists in its view, and because the design of Obamacare answered precisely to its assumptions, its persistence in that view has an enormous effect on how it scores the AHCA’s different approach.</p>
<p>The same is true, if in less stark ways, for other key provisions of Obamacare that the AHCA repeals or replaces. They were fine-tuned to the CBO’s modeling, so changing them sometimes results in strange and very adverse projections. That doesn’t mean that changing them would not in fact result in very adverse real-world effects. The CBO’s model isn’t nonsense. Far from it. It just means that the particular eccentricities and weaknesses of the model — types of problems any health-economy model might have, in different forms — are exaggerated and amplified as a result of the gaming involved in crafting the law now being altered. In a sense, the CBO is scoring the AHCA by measuring how similar it is to Obamacare as much as by projecting its effects on the health system. So it penalizes the new law where it differs from Obamacare’s key provisions, and (as senators are now finding) the only way to get a better score out of the model in such cases sometimes is to re-create some of Obamacare’s provisions — even those that are failing in the real world.</p>
<p>Some of the more peculiar features of the score seem to be functions of this phenomenon. For example, the CBO’s overall coverage score of the AHCA is essentially identical to its coverage score of a bill Republicans sent President Obama in 2015 that would have repealed all of Obamacare’s insurance subsidies without replacing them with anything. (Or rather, it is identical to the effect on coverage that the CBO said that bill would have had if it also repealed Obamacare’s insurance regulations, as explained on page 3 of <a href="https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/115th-congress-2017-2018/reports/52371-coverageandpremiums.pdf" type="external">this CBO report</a>.) In effect, spending almost half a trillion dollars on insurance coverage and market stabilization over ten years is scored as having almost no net effect on coverage levels.</p>
<p>Similarly, the version of the AHCA passed by the House and scored by the most recent CBO report spends about $46 billion more on Medicaid over the next ten years than an earlier version of the bill <a href="https://www.cbo.gov/system/files/115th-congress-2017-2018/costestimate/hr1628.pdf" type="external">scored by the CBO in March</a>. The agency accounts for that additional spending, but scores it as having no effect on Medicaid enrollment. These would seem to be functions of peculiar quirks of the model, brought to light by changes to a legislative architecture that was designed to capitalize on them.</p>
<p>This results in the exaggeration of some of the distinct eccentricities of CBO’s model. That it has such eccentricities is entirely understandable, and indeed unavoidable. Any complex health-economy model would. But when legislation is built around them, as Obamacare was in some key respects, CBO finds itself confronted with some very strange problems.</p>
<p>Layers of Assumptions But the CBO’s report on the AHCA suggests some even more fundamental structural problems than these, which would pose a challenge not only to a bill intended to change a law designed to game the agency’s model but to any bill that doesn’t follow something like the general structure of a Great Society program. Some of these, too, are brought out in unusual relief by the nature of the AHCA — for good and bad.</p>
<p>One is the tendency of the CBO to model competition as having minimal effect on costs while modeling price controls to be efficient and effective. This problem is a matter of degree. It certainly may be the case that the CBO is justified in assuming that blunt policy instruments can be more effective in some instances. And there is no denying the complexity involved in projecting the workings of a vast consumer market rather than a centralized government program. Competition is obviously much more difficult to model than mandates and price controls, but the agency’s experience with Medicare Advantage and the Medicare prescription-drug benefit suggests that it tends to significantly understate the effects of competition — which obviously has consequences for its scoring of reforms intended to increase the market orientation of the health-care system.</p>
<p>CBO is aware of this problem, though it has tended to resist accounting for the effect of competition on its scoring even in retrospect. When the Medicare prescription-drug program (which involves competition among private insurers) turned out to cost 50 percent less in 2013 than the CBO had projected when the program was enacted in 2003, the agency undertook an impressive self-critical exercise to consider what had happened. The <a href="https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/113th-congress-2013-2014/reports/45552-PartD.pdf" type="external">resulting report</a> considered many of the factors that shaped the evolution of the program but ended up punting on the question of competition, arguing that “because other factors have affected costs per beneficiary, determining whether the competitive design of the program has been more or less effective than CBO originally anticipated is not feasible.”</p>
<p>Making such a determination would have been no simple matter, and the CBO has acknowledged that it lacks the tools to do it properly. In <a href="https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-112hhrg67221/html/CHRG-112hhrg67221.htm" type="external">a 2011 hearing</a>, for instance, CBO’s director at the time, Douglas Elmendorf, was asked why the agency did not account for the effects of competition in assessing Medicare-reform proposals, and he responded: “We are not applying any additional effects of competition on this growth rate over time in our analysis of the proposal. And again, we don’t have the tools, the analysis we would need to do a quantitative evaluation of the importance of those factors.” He later described the challenge of modeling competition as “a gap in our toolkit, and a gap we are trying to fill.” The agency has made some progress toward filling that gap, particularly in its assessments of premium-support reforms in Medicare, yet the gap remains significant.</p>
<p>But the greater problem revealed by the score of the AHCA is the difficulty of accounting for policy variation in the states. This is not a problem with the CBO’s model in particular. It would be a problem with any attempt to model the health economy when states have the ability to control and change the regulatory environment. And it becomes a particular problem when states are newly granted, or regranted, the ability to do that all at once.</p>
<p>The AHCA, in its most recent form, would give states that ability with regard to some key facets of health-insurance regulation. It would allow states to obtain waivers that would let them define essential health benefits for themselves, would let them loosen the age bands on premiums, and would let them constrain the reach of community rating in a few narrow circumstances, to create an incentive for younger and healthier people to buy coverage. The trouble for CBO is that it can’t know what states would choose to use these waivers and how they would use them.</p>
<p>In scoring the bill, CBO acknowledges that “the array of market regulations that states could implement makes estimating the outcomes especially uncertain.” That hardly begins to describe the uncertainty involved, of course. CBO continues:</p>
<p>Many factors would influence states’ decisions, as discussed below, and a projection of a specific state’s actions would be highly uncertain. As a result, CBO and JCT’s [Joint Committee on Taxation] estimates reflect an assessment of the probabilities of different outcomes (without any explicit predictions about which states make which choices) and are, by the agencies’ judgment, in the middle of the distribution of potential outcomes. Moreover, CBO and JCT’s assessments in this analysis should not be viewed as representing a single definitive interpretation of how H.R. 1628 should or would be implemented</p>
<p>These are massive caveats. But the report then proceeds to make a series of crucially important yet unexplained assumptions. For instance, it assumes that states that are home to half the U.S. population would not use any waivers, states home to another third would use them modestly, and those home to another sixth would use them more aggressively. Then it works through different implications of each approach, and in the end it adds all this up to arrive at some seemingly precise estimates of coverage levels and federal spending.</p>
<p>In places, the difficulty CBO analysts faced in projecting state decisions and their effects becomes especially evident. The report suggests, for instance, that CBO is not able to estimate insurance-premium costs in the states that would use waivers most aggressively (states in which about 50 million Americans live, according to the agency’s assumption), and yet the report does make coverage estimates for those states and also federal cost estimates, both of which would surely depend on having premium figures in the model.</p>
<p>The report also says that “a few million people” in such states would buy insurance coverage that the states would approve but that CBO won’t count as insurance because it would not sufficiently cover major medical risks. CBO counts those people among the uninsured, even if the states that would be newly re-empowered to regulate health insurance would consider them insured.</p>
<p>These sorts of challenges suggest that CBO confronts a very basic problem when it comes to legislation that affords states or localities meaningful leeway in program design and regulation. If that kind of policy devolution and decentralization is going to be key to the modernization of American government (as <a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/0465061966" type="external">I think it needs to be</a>), then CBO will constantly find itself asked to do things it is not equipped to do.</p>
<p>This already happens now, of course, and the agency’s report on the AHCA makes it pretty clear that CBO’s analysts understand this. It is evident in places in the report that its authors can see that some of what they’re doing — and particularly the pretense of precision they are expected to advance — is absurd. But they have no choice but to proceed toward comically exact-sounding conclusions despite immense uncertainty and layers upon layers of political guesswork that could never be called economic modeling.</p>
<p>Toward the end of the report, CBO offers a hint of how to think properly about what it’s offering policymakers. After laying out the numerous, varied sources of uncertainty bedeviling its work, the report concludes in this extraordinary way:</p>
<p>Despite the uncertainty, the direction of certain effects of the legislation is clear. For example, the amount of federal revenues collected and the amount of spending on Medicaid would almost surely both be lower than under current law. And the number of uninsured people under the legislation would almost surely be greater than under current law.</p>
<p>That is a very limited claim. It’s more than fair, and surely true. Spending would be lower, revenues would be lower, and coverage levels would be lower. But that is a far cry from the kinds of seemingly precise claims thrown around elsewhere in the report. And it is those kinds of claims that unavoidably shape how the legislation is understood.</p>
<p>Strengthening the CBO That the Congressional Budget Office is structurally ill-suited to assess legislation that relies on competition and federalism to achieve its objectives is not an argument against such legislation — but neither is it an argument in its favor. If anything, it points to the need to modernize the CBO’s capacities, and to the need to lower our unrealistic expectations of the agency.</p>
<p>Maybe one way to advance both goals is to increase the transparency of the CBO’s work, so that it functions less as a mysterious oracle that serves up hard numerical pronouncements and more as a facilitator of the effort to consider the potential implications of legislation. But transparency is not as simple as it sounds.</p>
<p>Many observers over the years have suggested, for instance, that the CBO should offer range estimates, rather than precise point projections, when scoring the cost or other consequences of proposed legislation. That would give legislators some sense of the agency’s level of confidence and of the plausible range of outcomes. But in 2014, CBO director Elmendorf addressed that idea in <a href="https://www.cbo.gov/publication/49860" type="external">a blog post</a> in which he nicely articulated the challenges involved in making the CBO more open. For one thing, he noted, the CBO provides point projections because it is required to by Congress. But even apart from a formal requirement, it’s hard to see how a range estimate could actually be used in the legislative process. And perhaps most important, the nature of CBO’s work means, he wrote, “that we often lack a strong analytical basis for constructing such ranges. One obstacle is that most of the models and estimating techniques we use are not formal probability models, so they do not readily yield measures of uncertainty.”</p>
<p>CBO’s work involves much more of an art than the kind of almost mechanical science that outsiders might imagine when we hear the term “model.” Its health-economy model, for instance, as well described <a href="https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/110th-congress-2007-2008/reports/10-31-healthinsurmodel.pdf" type="external">in this 2007 report</a>, is an intricate mix of complicated spreadsheets that requires careful management and a fair bit of judgment. Opening up that work for real-time inspection could well unfairly undermine the CBO’s standing in the eyes of legislators and the public, who would frankly have trouble knowing what to do with the confusing mess that such transparency would reveal.</p>
<p>In his 2014 note about range estimates, Elmendorf gently expressed this sort of concern about what his employers would make of such information. “Surely it is useful for legislators to be aware of the uncertainty of budgetary and economic estimates,” he wrote. “But what else might they do with such quantification?” He was not wrong to worry. But that worry does not resolve the problem that causes people to want more transparency.</p>
<p>A broader transformation of the CBO’s work might better enable such transparency while also strengthening the agency’s capacities and responsiveness. Moving CBO (and JCT) toward more open-source modeling, for instance, could hold out some promise. Rather than produce stark hard-number projections behind a heavy veil, the CBO and JCT could act more as developers and stewards of an open public model, available online to anyone with sufficient technical prowess to use it. The two agencies, with outside help, would create and maintain the model, and would decide on a set of official economic assumptions and policy expectations to be used in modeling for formal budget-process purposes. Anyone could “score” any policy proposal using those official assumptions and could also use the model with other assumptions to project a proposal’s consequences under alternative circumstances.</p>
<p>Users could also propose improvements. And outside developers could build applications that made use of the underlying model to make it easier for non-experts to apply it to a variety of relatively straightforward circumstances. Such an open model would be a public resource, rather than a private secret. It would contribute to greater transparency — putting assumptions on the table to be debated and making the enormous uncertainty of projections better understood. And it would help CBO be a spur to policy innovation, rather than a bottleneck.</p>
<p>There are, of course, enormous technical challenges to overcome before anything like that could happen. (I discussed some of those <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/392938/modernizing-cbo-yuval-levin" type="external">here</a> a few years ago.) Work already being done in this direction by the Tax Policy Center, the American Enterprise Institute, and some academic modelers could help some, but only some. And there are also many more practical challenges. After I wrote about a version of this idea in 2014, Elmendorf kindly got in touch with me to say the CBO was working to improve transparency but was severely constrained by congressional requirements and that a transition to such a mode of work would be enormously challenging.</p>
<p>That is no doubt true. But whether in this way or in others, some fundamental modernizing reforms do seem to be called for — not because CBO is politically biased or doing bad work but because it needs to adjust to how Congress has changed, how the country has changed, and how technology has changed.</p>
<p>Institutional Reform Ultimately, such modernization would need to occur as part of a larger reform of the budget process in Congress, which is terribly broken now.</p>
<p>The Congressional Budget Office was created as part of the 1974 budget reforms, which also created the budget committees in both houses of Congress and the modern budget process. That entire edifice now seems on the verge of collapse. The process, which was intended to (and did for years) make Congress more efficient about budgeting, now exacerbates Congress’s worst vices — and particularly its paralyzing polarization.It has put at the center of the legislative branch’s work a process that invites the parties to fight over abstract visions (in their budget resolutions) rather than concrete policies, and so makes bipartisan agreement even less likely and makes Congress’s work even less focused, specific, and substantive. At this point, the very existence of the two budget committees strikes me as a detriment to the functioning of Congress. It is time for fundamental budget-process reform.</p>
<p>And on this front, too, the AHCA can teach us something important. The bill is being pursued through the reconciliation process, which is supposed to be a way of using the annual budget resolution to advance essential fiscal measures. But whether or not it technically fits as a taxing and spending measure within the parameters of the Senate’s “Byrd rule,” the bill being moved is surely not connected in any meaningful way to the budget process. The Congress has already passed a continuing resolution for the remainder of this fiscal year and yet is still, as a formal matter, pursuing the health-care bill as though it were an element of the 2017 budget process when everyone understands that it is no such thing.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, the work of crafting the bill in both houses has been pursued outside the structure of the committee system, through informal negotiation among different factions of the Republican conference. Senate Republicans have even felt the need to create an ad hoc group of senators — what any observer might call “a committee” — to develop its version of the bill outside the established committee system, which apparently cannot be made to work. We are all naturally focused on the travails of the presidency these days, but Congress looks to be very badly broken.</p>
<p>Maybe this ad hoc approach to health-care legislation suggests the shape of the next functional legislative process in Congress. But it surely also suggests a loss of faith in the existing forms and rules of the legislative process Congress now has. It should invite reflection and reform, in other words. And that reform should naturally make room for a modernized CBO to play a role more in keeping with the needs of the contemporary Congress.</p>
<p>This would be a great time for institutional reform in the legislative branch. It is badly needed. It could speak to the challenges of fragmentation, institutional decay, and cultural change in our politics, and to the need for both greater responsiveness and more-robust institutional structure. It could make for a bipartisan project that would not require the involvement of an executive branch beset by its own mind-boggling problems just now. The reasons are plenty. What is lacking is the will.</p>
<p>All of this suggests that the Congressional Budget Office is by no means at the center of Congress’s problems. It is, if anything, the best functioning of the elements of the 1974 budget process at this point. But along with the rest of that process, it needs to change — and the ways in which that is so have perhaps never been clearer than in the messy and complicated health-care debate we are now witnessing.</p>
<p>— Yuval Levin is the editor of National Affairs, a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, and a contributing editor of National Review.</p> | false | 1 | reactions congressional budget offices may 24 score american health care act naturally tended fall familiar partisan grooves republicans attacked cbo effort defend bill questioning agencys methods pointing past failures project health economy even case office management budget director mick mulvaney interview washington examiner accusing abject political bias democrats meanwhile defended cbo order attack bill asserting agencys scoring unimpeachable holding specific numerical predictions ahca simple facts im far immune gravitational pull partisanship im sure follows free first reading cbos score mind went right bizarre weakest points many choose agree much written many observers right overview galen institutes doug badger nicely covers key concerns also said criticisms cbos methods even criticisms intentions dont actually amount defenses ahca democrats attacks bill defenses substance cbos score two sides argument many cases talking two different things worth distinguishing drawing distinctions would also help clarify key concerns work congressional budget office best understood criticisms certainly staff experience always defined integrity professionalism face enormously difficult pressures cbo politically biased work beset challenges run much deeper structural require us think cbo larger congressional budget process plays part terms institutional reform ahca strengths weaknesses ive written sense many others purpose neither defend bill criticize instead difficult may lets try think cbos score ahca tells us cbo capacities limits work might best understood also strengthened reform agencys work could come time affect iteration healthcare debate debate need make scoring take seriously try learn bill variety reasons brings light key challenges work congresss scorekeeper ought thought future mind gaming scorekeeper part trouble cbo often faces though case fairly small part explicit congressional manipulation scorekeeper simply put cbo score legislation assumptions manipulated congress see example statement page 16 cbo score ahca basis consultation budget committees costs savings measured relative cbos march 2016 baseline projections adjustments legislation enacted baseline produced baseline case refers starting assumptions cbo works levels spending insurance coverage factors would stand coming ten years current law nothing change proposed changes law measured starting point cbo makes baseline assumptions key programs available online look youll find march 2016 baseline recent cbo baseline recent one produced january year differs respects would quite significant particular score instance march 2016 baseline cbo projected 18 million people would buying coverage obamacare exchanges 2026 law didnt change january 2017 baseline agency said 13 million would year thats big difference similar differences evident projections medicaidexpansion enrollment agencys spending projections would cbo use older baseline foundation projections new bill basically told congressional leadership thats consultation budget committees means think using recent baseline would yielded modestly better projections insurance coverage also somewhat higher projections cost decision use earlier baseline may tell us something priorities relevant policymakers whose votes doubt familiar form congressional manipulation scorekeeper gaming cbos assumptions methods achieve certain score largely absent particular bill detriment coverage score ahca far crafted haste carelessness little opportunity think ways juicing score sort manipulation elements legislation designed tweaked peculiarities cbo model mind specifically achieve certain score still important part story agencys verdict ahca much kind gaming happened crafting obamacare made way congress 2009 2010 affordable care act basically took shape long series backandforth adjustments relevant committees congressional budget office intended tweak coverage cost scores bill accord idiosyncrasies cbos modeling forms gaming cynical reckless foremost example must class act longtermcare program known start completely unsustainable included bill purely manipulate cost score abandoned actually took effect almost every facet legislative design obamacare product kind back forth law respects built achieve certain result cbos model even world outside subject id highly recommend political scientist robert saldins recent book bad policy makes good politics running numbers health reform wasnt cynical course cbos assumptions effects various policy measures product kind liberal consensus health economics views designers obamacare already fairly well line assumptions baked model relative effects mandates taxes regulations price controls one hand competition consumer choice state experimentation price signals obamacares designers cbos model took first set policy tools far powerful second maybe thats quite political bias maybe even wrong reflection implicit assumptions among health economists rarely questioned time design obamacare much reflect broad view involved intense gaming particular features quirks cbos healtheconomy model legislative design tightly calibrated parameters model changes design almost unavoidably going scored changes worse cbo classic example individual mandate point basically quirk cbo model judges mandate exceedingly effective far effective evidence past years would suggest ahca would eliminate mandate right away retain key features obamacare twoyear transition period cbo says 14 million people would immediately lose give health insurance would mostly function longer penalized buying anything possible sure isnt likely late last year team included jonathan gruber mit health economist whose earlier work great deal cbos assumptions mandate among many assumptions looked whether still made sense think way effect individual mandate put new england journal medicine assessed mandates detailed provisions include incomebased penalties lacking coverage various specific exemptions penalties find overall coverage rates responded aspects law mean mandate effect necessarily primary result make americans likely obtain coverage whether subject penalty irrespective much would cost analysis would capture effect exactly strong support cbos insistence power mandates least agency persists view design obamacare answered precisely assumptions persistence view enormous effect scores ahcas different approach true less stark ways key provisions obamacare ahca repeals replaces finetuned cbos modeling changing sometimes results strange adverse projections doesnt mean changing would fact result adverse realworld effects cbos model isnt nonsense far means particular eccentricities weaknesses model types problems healtheconomy model might different forms exaggerated amplified result gaming involved crafting law altered sense cbo scoring ahca measuring similar obamacare much projecting effects health system penalizes new law differs obamacares key provisions senators finding way get better score model cases sometimes recreate obamacares provisions even failing real world peculiar features score seem functions phenomenon example cbos overall coverage score ahca essentially identical coverage score bill republicans sent president obama 2015 would repealed obamacares insurance subsidies without replacing anything rather identical effect coverage cbo said bill would also repealed obamacares insurance regulations explained page 3 cbo report effect spending almost half trillion dollars insurance coverage market stabilization ten years scored almost net effect coverage levels similarly version ahca passed house scored recent cbo report spends 46 billion medicaid next ten years earlier version bill scored cbo march agency accounts additional spending scores effect medicaid enrollment would seem functions peculiar quirks model brought light changes legislative architecture designed capitalize results exaggeration distinct eccentricities cbos model eccentricities entirely understandable indeed unavoidable complex healtheconomy model would legislation built around obamacare key respects cbo finds confronted strange problems layers assumptions cbos report ahca suggests even fundamental structural problems would pose challenge bill intended change law designed game agencys model bill doesnt follow something like general structure great society program brought unusual relief nature ahca good bad one tendency cbo model competition minimal effect costs modeling price controls efficient effective problem matter degree certainly may case cbo justified assuming blunt policy instruments effective instances denying complexity involved projecting workings vast consumer market rather centralized government program competition obviously much difficult model mandates price controls agencys experience medicare advantage medicare prescriptiondrug benefit suggests tends significantly understate effects competition obviously consequences scoring reforms intended increase market orientation healthcare system cbo aware problem though tended resist accounting effect competition scoring even retrospect medicare prescriptiondrug program involves competition among private insurers turned cost 50 percent less 2013 cbo projected program enacted 2003 agency undertook impressive selfcritical exercise consider happened resulting report considered many factors shaped evolution program ended punting question competition arguing factors affected costs per beneficiary determining whether competitive design program less effective cbo originally anticipated feasible making determination would simple matter cbo acknowledged lacks tools properly 2011 hearing instance cbos director time douglas elmendorf asked agency account effects competition assessing medicarereform proposals responded applying additional effects competition growth rate time analysis proposal dont tools analysis would need quantitative evaluation importance factors later described challenge modeling competition gap toolkit gap trying fill agency made progress toward filling gap particularly assessments premiumsupport reforms medicare yet gap remains significant greater problem revealed score ahca difficulty accounting policy variation states problem cbos model particular would problem attempt model health economy states ability control change regulatory environment becomes particular problem states newly granted regranted ability ahca recent form would give states ability regard key facets healthinsurance regulation would allow states obtain waivers would let define essential health benefits would let loosen age bands premiums would let constrain reach community rating narrow circumstances create incentive younger healthier people buy coverage trouble cbo cant know states would choose use waivers would use scoring bill cbo acknowledges array market regulations states could implement makes estimating outcomes especially uncertain hardly begins describe uncertainty involved course cbo continues many factors would influence states decisions discussed projection specific states actions would highly uncertain result cbo jcts joint committee taxation estimates reflect assessment probabilities different outcomes without explicit predictions states make choices agencies judgment middle distribution potential outcomes moreover cbo jcts assessments analysis viewed representing single definitive interpretation hr 1628 would implemented massive caveats report proceeds make series crucially important yet unexplained assumptions instance assumes states home half us population would use waivers states home another third would use modestly home another sixth would use aggressively works different implications approach end adds arrive seemingly precise estimates coverage levels federal spending places difficulty cbo analysts faced projecting state decisions effects becomes especially evident report suggests instance cbo able estimate insurancepremium costs states would use waivers aggressively states 50 million americans live according agencys assumption yet report make coverage estimates states also federal cost estimates would surely depend premium figures model report also says million people states would buy insurance coverage states would approve cbo wont count insurance would sufficiently cover major medical risks cbo counts people among uninsured even states would newly reempowered regulate health insurance would consider insured sorts challenges suggest cbo confronts basic problem comes legislation affords states localities meaningful leeway program design regulation kind policy devolution decentralization going key modernization american government think needs cbo constantly find asked things equipped already happens course agencys report ahca makes pretty clear cbos analysts understand evident places report authors see theyre particularly pretense precision expected advance absurd choice proceed toward comically exactsounding conclusions despite immense uncertainty layers upon layers political guesswork could never called economic modeling toward end report cbo offers hint think properly offering policymakers laying numerous varied sources uncertainty bedeviling work report concludes extraordinary way despite uncertainty direction certain effects legislation clear example amount federal revenues collected amount spending medicaid would almost surely lower current law number uninsured people legislation would almost surely greater current law limited claim fair surely true spending would lower revenues would lower coverage levels would lower far cry kinds seemingly precise claims thrown around elsewhere report kinds claims unavoidably shape legislation understood strengthening cbo congressional budget office structurally illsuited assess legislation relies competition federalism achieve objectives argument legislation neither argument favor anything points need modernize cbos capacities need lower unrealistic expectations agency maybe one way advance goals increase transparency cbos work functions less mysterious oracle serves hard numerical pronouncements facilitator effort consider potential implications legislation transparency simple sounds many observers years suggested instance cbo offer range estimates rather precise point projections scoring cost consequences proposed legislation would give legislators sense agencys level confidence plausible range outcomes 2014 cbo director elmendorf addressed idea blog post nicely articulated challenges involved making cbo open one thing noted cbo provides point projections required congress even apart formal requirement hard see range estimate could actually used legislative process perhaps important nature cbos work means wrote often lack strong analytical basis constructing ranges one obstacle models estimating techniques use formal probability models readily yield measures uncertainty cbos work involves much art kind almost mechanical science outsiders might imagine hear term model healtheconomy model instance well described 2007 report intricate mix complicated spreadsheets requires careful management fair bit judgment opening work realtime inspection could well unfairly undermine cbos standing eyes legislators public would frankly trouble knowing confusing mess transparency would reveal 2014 note range estimates elmendorf gently expressed sort concern employers would make information surely useful legislators aware uncertainty budgetary economic estimates wrote else might quantification wrong worry worry resolve problem causes people want transparency broader transformation cbos work might better enable transparency also strengthening agencys capacities responsiveness moving cbo jct toward opensource modeling instance could hold promise rather produce stark hardnumber projections behind heavy veil cbo jct could act developers stewards open public model available online anyone sufficient technical prowess use two agencies outside help would create maintain model would decide set official economic assumptions policy expectations used modeling formal budgetprocess purposes anyone could score policy proposal using official assumptions could also use model assumptions project proposals consequences alternative circumstances users could also propose improvements outside developers could build applications made use underlying model make easier nonexperts apply variety relatively straightforward circumstances open model would public resource rather private secret would contribute greater transparency putting assumptions table debated making enormous uncertainty projections better understood would help cbo spur policy innovation rather bottleneck course enormous technical challenges overcome anything like could happen discussed years ago work already done direction tax policy center american enterprise institute academic modelers could help also many practical challenges wrote version idea 2014 elmendorf kindly got touch say cbo working improve transparency severely constrained congressional requirements transition mode work would enormously challenging doubt true whether way others fundamental modernizing reforms seem called cbo politically biased bad work needs adjust congress changed country changed technology changed institutional reform ultimately modernization would need occur part larger reform budget process congress terribly broken congressional budget office created part 1974 budget reforms also created budget committees houses congress modern budget process entire edifice seems verge collapse process intended years make congress efficient budgeting exacerbates congresss worst vices particularly paralyzing polarizationit put center legislative branchs work process invites parties fight abstract visions budget resolutions rather concrete policies makes bipartisan agreement even less likely makes congresss work even less focused specific substantive point existence two budget committees strikes detriment functioning congress time fundamental budgetprocess reform front ahca teach us something important bill pursued reconciliation process supposed way using annual budget resolution advance essential fiscal measures whether technically fits taxing spending measure within parameters senates byrd rule bill moved surely connected meaningful way budget process congress already passed continuing resolution remainder fiscal year yet still formal matter pursuing healthcare bill though element 2017 budget process everyone understands thing meanwhile work crafting bill houses pursued outside structure committee system informal negotiation among different factions republican conference senate republicans even felt need create ad hoc group senators observer might call committee develop version bill outside established committee system apparently made work naturally focused travails presidency days congress looks badly broken maybe ad hoc approach healthcare legislation suggests shape next functional legislative process congress surely also suggests loss faith existing forms rules legislative process congress invite reflection reform words reform naturally make room modernized cbo play role keeping needs contemporary congress would great time institutional reform legislative branch badly needed could speak challenges fragmentation institutional decay cultural change politics need greater responsiveness morerobust institutional structure could make bipartisan project would require involvement executive branch beset mindboggling problems reasons plenty lacking suggests congressional budget office means center congresss problems anything best functioning elements 1974 budget process point along rest process needs change ways perhaps never clearer messy complicated healthcare debate witnessing yuval levin editor national affairs fellow ethics public policy center contributing editor national review | 2,556 |
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<p>Information has been leaked about the Trans Pacific Partnership, which is being negotiated in secret by US Trade Representative Ron Kirk. Six hundred corporate&#160;“advisors” are in on the know, but not Congress or the media.&#160; Ron Wyden, chairman of the Senate trade subcommittee that has jurisdiction over the TPP, has not been permitted to&#160;see the text or to know the content.</p>
<p>The TPP has been called a “one-percenter” power tool. The agreement essentially abolishes the accountability of foreign corporations to governments of countries with which they trade. Indeed, the agreement makes governments accountable to corporations for costs imposed by regulations, including health, safety and environmental regulations. The agreement gives corporations the right to make governments pay them for the cost of complying with the regulations of government. One wonders how long environmental, labor, and financial regulation can survive when the costs of compliance are imposed on&#160;the taxpayers of countries and not on the economic activity that results in spillover effects such as pollution.</p>
<p>Many will interpret the TPP as another big step toward the establishment of global government in the New World Order.&#160; However, what the TPP actually does is to remove corporations or the spillover effects of their activities from the reach of government. As the TPP does not transfer to corporations the power to govern countries, it is difficult to see how it leads to global government. The real result is global privilege of the corporate class as a class immune to government regulation.</p>
<p>One of the provisions allows corporations to avoid the courts and laws of countries by creating a private tribunal that corporations can use to sue governments for the costs of complying with regulation.&#160; Essentially, the laws of countries&#160;that apply to corporations are supplanted by decisions of a private tribunal of corporate lawyers.</p>
<p>The TPP is open to all countries.&#160; Currently, it is being negotiated between the US, Australia, Brunei, New Zealand, Singapore, Vietnam, Chile, and Peru.&#160; Australia, according to reports, has refused to submit to the private tribunal system.</p>
<p>What are we to make of the TPP?&#160; It is perhaps too early to have all the answers. However, I can offer some ways of thinking about it.</p>
<p>I doubt that the TPP is a New World Order takeover. If anything, the TPP reduces the scope of global government by exempting corporations from government control. Also, global government, unless it is government by the American Empire, is inconsistent with the neoconservative insistence on US hegemony over the world. Powerful US ideological, private, and government interest groups have no intention of losing the power that they have acquired by being rolled into some New World Order unless the New World Order is a euphemism for American Empire.</p>
<p>In the criticisms of the TPP, much emphasis is placed on the costs that corporations of foreign members of the agreement can impose on the US.&#160; However, US corporations gain the same privileges over those countries, as the agreement gives every country’s corporations immunity to the other countries’ laws.</p>
<p>It could be the case that US corporations believe that their penetration of the other countries will greatly exceed the activities in the US of Brunei, New Zealand, Peru, et al.&#160; However, once Japan, Canada, China and others join TPP, the prospect of American firms getting more out of the agreement than foreign firms disappears, unless from the US perspective the definition of foreign firm includes US corporations that offshore the production of the goods and services that they market in the US.&#160; If this is the case, then US offshoring firms would be exempt not only from the laws and courts of foreign countries, but also exempt from the laws and courts of the US.</p>
<p>This point is possibly moot as the agreement requires all governments that are parties to the TPP to harmonize their laws so that the new corporate privileges are equally reflected in every country. To avoid discriminatory law against a country’s own corporations that do not engage in foreign trade, harmonization could mean that domestic corporations would be granted the same privileges as foreign investors. If not, domestic firms might acquire the privileges by setting up a foreign subsidiary consisting of an office.</p>
<p>As&#160; the TPP is clearly an agreement being pushed by US corporations, the implication is that US corporations see it as being to their relative advantage. However, it is unclear&#160;what this advantage is.</p>
<p>Alternatively, TPP is a strategy for securing exemption from regulation under the guise of being a trade agreement.</p>
<p>Another explanation, judging from the unusual collection of the initial parties to the agreement, is that the agreement is part of Washington’s strategy of encircling China with military bases, as the US has done to Russia. One would have thought that an agreement of such path-breaking nature would have begun with Japan, S. Korea, and the Philippines. However, these countries are already part of China’s encirclement.&#160; Brunei, Singapore, New Zealand, and especially Vietnam would be valuable additions. Are the special privileges that Washington is offering these countries part of the bribe to become de facto outposts of American Empire?</p>
<p>Yet another explanation is that Ron Kirk is caught up in the deregulatory mindset that began with the repeal of Glass-Steagall and financial deregulation. If financial markets know best and are self-regulating, requiring no government interference, then so also are other markets and businesses. [Editor’s note: Glass-Steagall was not repealed in full; the separation in the Glass-Steagall Act of&#160; commercial from investment banking was repealed while the Federal Deposit Insurance was not, meaning that taxpayers would ultimately be on the hook for any risky activities of the banks necessitating bailouts.]</p>
<p>Some ‘free market’ economists view regulations as “takings.” The argument is that regulations take corporate property—profits, for example, by making corporations comply with health, safety, and environmental regulation—just as government takes private property when it builds or widens a road.&#160; Therefore, corporations should be compensated for takings that result from regulation. As the argument goes, if government wants corporations to protect the environment, the government should pay the corporations for the cost of doing so. This argument gets rid of “external costs” or “social costs”—costs that corporations impose on others and future generations by the pollution and exhaustion of natural resources, for example. The argument turns social costs into&#160;compensation for takings.</p>
<p>The TPP is likely serving many agendas.&#160; As we learn more, the motives behind the TPP will become clearer.&#160; From my perspective as an economist and former member of government, the problem with Ron Kirk’s TPP is that the agreement is constructed to serve private, not public interests.&#160; Kirk is a public official charged with serving and protecting the public interest. Yet, he has conspired in secret with private interests to produce a document that exempts private corporations from public accountability.</p>
<p>There is a paradox here. While financial corporations and now all corporations are being made independent of government, US citizens have lost the protection of law and are now subject to being detained indefinitely or murdered without due process of law. Corporations gain an unimaginable freedom while citizens lose all freedom and the rights that define their freedom. Similarly, foreign countries, which as members of TPP can be exempt from US law, are subject to “pre-emptive” US violation of their air space and borders by drones and troops sent in to assassinate some suspected terrorist, but which also kill citizens of those countries who are merely going about their normal business.</p>
<p>Perhaps one way to understand TPP is that the US government is now extending its own right to be lawless to corporations. Just as the US government today is only answerable to itself, the TPP makes corporations answerable only to themselves.</p>
<p>Public Citizen’s analysis of TPP <a href="https://www.citizen.org/documents/Leaked-TPP-Investment-Analysis.pdf" type="external">can be found here</a> and the <a href="http://www.citizenstrade.org/ctc/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/tppinvestment.pdf" type="external">leaked document here</a>.</p>
<p>This article was originally published at <a href="http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/" type="external">PaulCraigRoberts.org</a> and has been used here with permission.</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | false | 1 | information leaked trans pacific partnership negotiated secret us trade representative ron kirk six hundred corporate160advisors know congress media160 ron wyden chairman senate trade subcommittee jurisdiction tpp permitted to160see text know content tpp called onepercenter power tool agreement essentially abolishes accountability foreign corporations governments countries trade indeed agreement makes governments accountable corporations costs imposed regulations including health safety environmental regulations agreement gives corporations right make governments pay cost complying regulations government one wonders long environmental labor financial regulation survive costs compliance imposed on160the taxpayers countries economic activity results spillover effects pollution many interpret tpp another big step toward establishment global government new world order160 however tpp actually remove corporations spillover effects activities reach government tpp transfer corporations power govern countries difficult see leads global government real result global privilege corporate class class immune government regulation one provisions allows corporations avoid courts laws countries creating private tribunal corporations use sue governments costs complying regulation160 essentially laws countries160that apply corporations supplanted decisions private tribunal corporate lawyers tpp open countries160 currently negotiated us australia brunei new zealand singapore vietnam chile peru160 australia according reports refused submit private tribunal system make tpp160 perhaps early answers however offer ways thinking doubt tpp new world order takeover anything tpp reduces scope global government exempting corporations government control also global government unless government american empire inconsistent neoconservative insistence us hegemony world powerful us ideological private government interest groups intention losing power acquired rolled new world order unless new world order euphemism american empire criticisms tpp much emphasis placed costs corporations foreign members agreement impose us160 however us corporations gain privileges countries agreement gives every countrys corporations immunity countries laws could case us corporations believe penetration countries greatly exceed activities us brunei new zealand peru et al160 however japan canada china others join tpp prospect american firms getting agreement foreign firms disappears unless us perspective definition foreign firm includes us corporations offshore production goods services market us160 case us offshoring firms would exempt laws courts foreign countries also exempt laws courts us point possibly moot agreement requires governments parties tpp harmonize laws new corporate privileges equally reflected every country avoid discriminatory law countrys corporations engage foreign trade harmonization could mean domestic corporations would granted privileges foreign investors domestic firms might acquire privileges setting foreign subsidiary consisting office as160 tpp clearly agreement pushed us corporations implication us corporations see relative advantage however unclear160what advantage alternatively tpp strategy securing exemption regulation guise trade agreement another explanation judging unusual collection initial parties agreement agreement part washingtons strategy encircling china military bases us done russia one would thought agreement pathbreaking nature would begun japan korea philippines however countries already part chinas encirclement160 brunei singapore new zealand especially vietnam would valuable additions special privileges washington offering countries part bribe become de facto outposts american empire yet another explanation ron kirk caught deregulatory mindset began repeal glasssteagall financial deregulation financial markets know best selfregulating requiring government interference also markets businesses editors note glasssteagall repealed full separation glasssteagall act of160 commercial investment banking repealed federal deposit insurance meaning taxpayers would ultimately hook risky activities banks necessitating bailouts free market economists view regulations takings argument regulations take corporate propertyprofits example making corporations comply health safety environmental regulationjust government takes private property builds widens road160 therefore corporations compensated takings result regulation argument goes government wants corporations protect environment government pay corporations cost argument gets rid external costs social costscosts corporations impose others future generations pollution exhaustion natural resources example argument turns social costs into160compensation takings tpp likely serving many agendas160 learn motives behind tpp become clearer160 perspective economist former member government problem ron kirks tpp agreement constructed serve private public interests160 kirk public official charged serving protecting public interest yet conspired secret private interests produce document exempts private corporations public accountability paradox financial corporations corporations made independent government us citizens lost protection law subject detained indefinitely murdered without due process law corporations gain unimaginable freedom citizens lose freedom rights define freedom similarly foreign countries members tpp exempt us law subject preemptive us violation air space borders drones troops sent assassinate suspected terrorist also kill citizens countries merely going normal business perhaps one way understand tpp us government extending right lawless corporations us government today answerable tpp makes corporations answerable public citizens analysis tpp found leaked document article originally published paulcraigrobertsorg used permission 160 | 715 |
<p><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/159698001X/ref=ase_wwweppcorg-20/104-6284162-7691931?s=books&amp;v=glance&amp;n=283155&amp;tagActionCode=wwweppcorg-20" type="external">The Heritage Guide to the Constitution</a>, edited by Edwin Meese III, Matthew Spalding, and David Forte (Regnery, 475 pp., $35)</p>
<p>The political combat over President Bush’s nominations of John Roberts and Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court reflects an underlying battle over the meaning of the Constitution and the power of the judiciary. The major combatants in this jurisprudential battle are originalists, on one hand, and advocates of the “living Constitution,” on the other.</p>
<p>In much the same way that Molière’s character was delighted to discover that he had been speaking in prose all his life without knowing it, most Americans would be surprised to discover that they are originalists. Even some ardent critics of “originalism” haven’t the slightest understanding of what they are criticizing: In a recent debate on the Alito nomination, a lefty law professor arguing against me ridiculously charged that originalists seek a return to the original 1787 Constitution, without any of the amendments, “not even the Bill of Rights!” An anti-Alito editorial in the Boston Globe hinged on a similar mistake.</p>
<p>The term “originalism” merely identifies the traditional, common-sense principle that the meaning of the various provisions of the Constitution — yes, including all those amendments — is to be determined in accordance with the sense they bore at the time they were adopted. This principle, which inheres in the very nature of the Constitution as law, is readily grasped outside the realm of contentious political issues. Virtually everyone will intuitively understand, for example, that the only sensible way to determine what it means to be a “natural born Citizen” — a criterion of eligibility for the presidency — is to look to the sense of that phrase at the time it was adopted.</p>
<p>We originalists understand the Constitution to have created a scheme of representative government in which the vast bulk of decisions are, for better or worse, made by the people through their elected representatives. Judges, under an originalist perspective, can legitimately intervene to override a legislative enactment only when the enactment violates the original meaning of a constitutional provision.</p>
<p>Originalist jurisprudence does not provide an easy answer to every constitutional question, for originalists will differ among themselves on the scope of the rules and principles set forth in the Constitution as well as on subsidiary methodological questions. But originalism provides an objective — and, we originalists maintain, the only legitimate — measure of what the Constitution actually means.</p>
<p>Proponents of the “living Constitution,” by contrast, maintain, at bottom, that the Constitution means whatever five justices want it to mean. This plasticity is necessary, they claim, in order for our society to adapt to changing circumstances. But this claim ignores the broader play that originalism gives to the democratic processes to adapt policies to new conditions. And, by entrenching current policy preferences in the Constitution, the “living Constitution” approach deprives future generations of the very adaptability that it vaunts.</p>
<p>The “living Constitution” is a deceptive euphemism, not a coherent theory. Though intellectually bankrupt, its approach is politically powerful because it promises — and has delivered — results. For decades now, the Left has won through the courts undeserved victories — on matters like abortion, radical secularism, and obscenity — that it could not possibly have won through the political processes. The more unpopular its agenda (same-sex marriage, anyone?), the more dependent it is on judicial usurpation.</p>
<p>The “living Constitution” was regnant in 1985 when Ed Meese, President Reagan’s attorney general, launched an intellectual campaign for the revival of the orthodoxy of originalism. More than two decades later, the battle for originalism continues — and so do Meese’s tremendous contributions to that battle. President Bush’s appointments of Roberts and Alito, both products of the Reagan Justice Department, promise to bolster the cause of originalism on the Court. And, under the auspices of the Heritage Foundation, Meese, together with Matthew Spalding and David Forte, has compiled a comprehensive explanation of the original meaning of every line of the Constitution.</p>
<p>The Heritage Guide to the Constitution is an invaluable reference work that anyone interested in learning more about the Constitution should have on his bookshelf. It consists primarily of a couple hundred or so brief essays — the vast majority no more than a page or two in length — on every clause or subclause in the Constitution. Each essay attempts to explain the original meaning of the provision that it addresses as well as to set forth the current state of the law on that provision. Each essay also sets forth, where appropriate, cross-references to other relevant provisions in the Constitution, citations to legal materials for further exploration, and a list of significant cases.</p>
<p>More than 100 experts — mostly law professors but also academics from a variety of other fields as well as a smattering of judges and lawyers — have contributed the essays. The essays are clearly written, concise, and highly informative. They are scholarly and dispassionate, not polemical. The Heritage Guide also contains three brief and elegant introductory essays by the editors — one by Meese on basic constitutional principles, one by Spalding on the history of the Constitutional Convention, and one by Forte on originalism.</p>
<p>Anyone doing serious research on a question of constitutional law will find the Heritage Guide an excellent starting point. But the book is also a pleasure to browse, as the casual reader can bounce from topics like the Recess Appointments Clause to Treason to the Rights Retained by the People. The fact that less than one-fourth of the book relates to constitutional amendments may also serve to remind the modern reader, who too often hears about little other than the Bill of Rights and some generalized, nontextual right of privacy, that the real genius of the Constitution, the greatest guarantee of our liberties, lies in its scheme of separated powers.</p>
<p>My one modest complaint about the Heritage Guide is that more thought could have been devoted to making it easier to navigate. The Constitution at the front serves as a sort of table of contents, but the sidebar headings don’t match the essay headings and don’t include any references to page numbers. As a result, finding an essay on a particular provision is more cumbersome than it needs to be. Even this defect, though, has the upside that the search can turn into an enjoyable frolic and detour, as the reader runs across obscure constitutional provisions that pique his interest.</p>
<p>Overall, the Heritage Guide is a grand achievement. Let’s hope that its originalist explanations have increasing influence as changes in the composition of the Supreme Court offer the prospect of greater conformity between Supreme Court case law and the actual Constitution.</p>
<p>— Mr. Whelan, a former law clerk to Justice Antonin Scalia, is president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center and a regular contributor to National Review Online’s Bench Memos blog on judicial nominations.</p> | false | 1 | heritage guide constitution edited edwin meese iii matthew spalding david forte regnery 475 pp 35 political combat president bushs nominations john roberts samuel alito supreme court reflects underlying battle meaning constitution power judiciary major combatants jurisprudential battle originalists one hand advocates living constitution much way molières character delighted discover speaking prose life without knowing americans would surprised discover originalists even ardent critics originalism havent slightest understanding criticizing recent debate alito nomination lefty law professor arguing ridiculously charged originalists seek return original 1787 constitution without amendments even bill rights antialito editorial boston globe hinged similar mistake term originalism merely identifies traditional commonsense principle meaning various provisions constitution yes including amendments determined accordance sense bore time adopted principle inheres nature constitution law readily grasped outside realm contentious political issues virtually everyone intuitively understand example sensible way determine means natural born citizen criterion eligibility presidency look sense phrase time adopted originalists understand constitution created scheme representative government vast bulk decisions better worse made people elected representatives judges originalist perspective legitimately intervene override legislative enactment enactment violates original meaning constitutional provision originalist jurisprudence provide easy answer every constitutional question originalists differ among scope rules principles set forth constitution well subsidiary methodological questions originalism provides objective originalists maintain legitimate measure constitution actually means proponents living constitution contrast maintain bottom constitution means whatever five justices want mean plasticity necessary claim order society adapt changing circumstances claim ignores broader play originalism gives democratic processes adapt policies new conditions entrenching current policy preferences constitution living constitution approach deprives future generations adaptability vaunts living constitution deceptive euphemism coherent theory though intellectually bankrupt approach politically powerful promises delivered results decades left courts undeserved victories matters like abortion radical secularism obscenity could possibly political processes unpopular agenda samesex marriage anyone dependent judicial usurpation living constitution regnant 1985 ed meese president reagans attorney general launched intellectual campaign revival orthodoxy originalism two decades later battle originalism continues meeses tremendous contributions battle president bushs appointments roberts alito products reagan justice department promise bolster cause originalism court auspices heritage foundation meese together matthew spalding david forte compiled comprehensive explanation original meaning every line constitution heritage guide constitution invaluable reference work anyone interested learning constitution bookshelf consists primarily couple hundred brief essays vast majority page two length every clause subclause constitution essay attempts explain original meaning provision addresses well set forth current state law provision essay also sets forth appropriate crossreferences relevant provisions constitution citations legal materials exploration list significant cases 100 experts mostly law professors also academics variety fields well smattering judges lawyers contributed essays essays clearly written concise highly informative scholarly dispassionate polemical heritage guide also contains three brief elegant introductory essays editors one meese basic constitutional principles one spalding history constitutional convention one forte originalism anyone serious research question constitutional law find heritage guide excellent starting point book also pleasure browse casual reader bounce topics like recess appointments clause treason rights retained people fact less onefourth book relates constitutional amendments may also serve remind modern reader often hears little bill rights generalized nontextual right privacy real genius constitution greatest guarantee liberties lies scheme separated powers one modest complaint heritage guide thought could devoted making easier navigate constitution front serves sort table contents sidebar headings dont match essay headings dont include references page numbers result finding essay particular provision cumbersome needs even defect though upside search turn enjoyable frolic detour reader runs across obscure constitutional provisions pique interest overall heritage guide grand achievement lets hope originalist explanations increasing influence changes composition supreme court offer prospect greater conformity supreme court case law actual constitution mr whelan former law clerk justice antonin scalia president ethics public policy center regular contributor national review onlines bench memos blog judicial nominations | 612 |
<p>For more than three decades we have called attention on this page to what we called the “reserve-currency curse.” Since some politicians and economists have recently insisted that the dollar’s official role as the world’s reserve currency is instead a great blessing, it is time to revisit the issue.</p>
<p>The 1922 Genoa conference, which was intended to supervise Europe’s post-World War I financial reconstruction, recommended “some means of economizing the use of gold by maintaining reserves in the form of foreign balances”—initially pound-sterling and dollar IOUs. This established the interwar “gold exchange standard.”</p>
<p>A decade later Jacques Rueff, an influential French economist, explained the result of this profound change from the classical gold standard. When a foreign monetary authority accepts claims denominated in dollars to settle its balance-of-payments deficits instead of gold, purchasing power “has simply been duplicated.” If the Banque de Francecounts among its reserves dollar claims (and not just gold and French francs)—for example a Banque de France deposit in a New York bank—this increases the money supply in France but without reducing the money supply of the U.S. So both countries can use these dollar assets to grant credit. “As a result,” Rueff said, “the gold-exchange standard was one of the major causes of the wave of speculation that culminated in the September 1929 crisis.” A vast expansion of dollar reserves had inflated the prices of stocks and commodities; their contraction deflated both.</p>
<p>The gold-exchange standard’s demand-duplicating feature, based on the dollar’s reserve-currency role, was again enshrined in the 1944 Bretton Woods agreement. What ensued was an unprecedented expansion of official dollar reserves, and the consumer price level in the U.S. and elsewhere roughly doubled. Foreign governments holding dollars increasingly demanded gold before the U.S. finally suspended gold payments in 1971.</p>
<p>The economic crisis of 2008-09 was similar to the crisis that triggered the Great Depression. This time, foreign monetary authorities had purchased trillions of dollars in U.S. public debt, including nearly $1 trillion in mortgage-backed securities issued by two government-sponsored enterprises, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The foreign holdings of dollars were promptly returned to the dollar market, an example of demand duplication. This helped fuel a boom-and-bust in foreign markets and U.S. housing prices. The global excess credit creation also spilled over to commodity markets, in particular causing the world price of crude oil (which is denominated in dollars) to spike to $150 a barrel.</p>
<p>Perhaps surprisingly, given Keynes ’s central role in authoring the reserve-currency system, some American Keynesians such as Kenneth Austin, a monetary economist at the U.S. Treasury; Jared Bernstein, an economic adviser to Vice President Joe Biden; and Michael Pettis, a Beijing-based economist at the Carnegie Endowment, have expressed concern about the growing burden of the dollar’s status as the world’s reserve currency. For example, Mr. Bernstein argued in a New York Times op-ed article that “what was once a privilege is now a burden, undermining job growth, pumping up budget and trade deficits and inflating financial bubbles.” He urged that, “To get the American economy on track, the government needs to drop its commitment to maintaining the dollar’s reserve-currency status.”</p>
<p>Meanwhile, a number of conservatives, such as Bryan Riley and William Wilson at the Heritage Foundation, James Pethokoukis at the American Enterprise Institute and Ramesh Ponnuru at National Review are fiercely defending the dollar’s reserve-currency role. Messrs. Riley and Wilson claim that “The largest benefit has been ‘seignorage,’ which means that foreigners must sell real goods and services or ownership of the real capital stock to add to their dollar reserve holdings.”</p>
<p>This was exactly what Keynes and other British monetary experts promoted in the 1922 Genoa agreement: a means by which to finance systemic balance-of-payments deficits, forestall their settlement or repayment and put off demands for repayment in gold of Britain’s enormous debts resulting from financing World War I on central bank and foreign credit. Similarly, the dollar’s “exorbitant privilege” enabled the U.S. to finance government deficit spending more cheaply.</p>
<p>But we have since learned a great deal that Keynes did not take into consideration. As Robert Mundell noted in “Monetary Theory” (1971), “The Keynesian model is a short run model of a closed economy, dominated by pessimistic expectations and rigid wages,” a model not relevant to modern economies. In working out a “more general theory of interest, inflation, and growth of the world economy,” Mr. Mundell and others learned a great deal from Rueff, who was the master and professor of the monetary approach to the balance of payments.</p>
<p>Those lessons are reflected in the recent writings of Keynesians such as Mr. Austin, who has outlined what he calls the “iron identities” of international payments, which flow from the fact that global “current accounts, global capital accounts, and global net reserve sales, must (and do) sum to zero.” This means that a trillion-dollar purchase, say, of U.S. public debt by the People’s Bank of China entails an equal, simultaneous increase in U.S. combined deficits in the current and capital accounts. The iron identities necessarily link official dollar-reserve expansion to the declining U.S. investment position.</p>
<p>The total U.S. international investment position declined from net foreign assets worth about 10% of gross domestic product in 1976 to minus-30% of GDP in 2013—while the books of U.S. private residents went from 10% of U.S. GDP in 1976 down to balance with the rest of the world in 2013. The entire decline in the U.S. net international investment position was due to federal borrowing from foreign monetary authorities—i.e., government deficit-financing through the dollar’s official reserve-currency role.</p>
<p>Ending the dollar’s reserve-currency role will limit deficit financing, increase net national savings and release resources to U.S. companies and their employees in order to remain competitive with the rest of the world.</p>
<p>Messrs. Riley and Wilson argue that “no other global currency is ready to replace the U.S. dollar.” That is true of other paper and credit currencies, but the world’s monetary authorities still hold nearly 900 million ounces of gold, which is enough to restore, at the appropriate parity, the classical gold standard: the least imperfect monetary system of history.</p>
<p>Messrs. Lehrman and Mueller are principals of LBMC LLC, an economic and financial market consulting firm. Mr. Lehrman is the author of “The True Gold Standard: A Monetary Reform Plan Without Official Reserve Currencies” (TLI Books, 2012). Mr. Mueller is the author of “Redeeming Economics: Rediscovering the Missing Element” (ISI Books, 2014).</p> | false | 1 | three decades called attention page called reservecurrency curse since politicians economists recently insisted dollars official role worlds reserve currency instead great blessing time revisit issue 1922 genoa conference intended supervise europes postworld war financial reconstruction recommended means economizing use gold maintaining reserves form foreign balancesinitially poundsterling dollar ious established interwar gold exchange standard decade later jacques rueff influential french economist explained result profound change classical gold standard foreign monetary authority accepts claims denominated dollars settle balanceofpayments deficits instead gold purchasing power simply duplicated banque de francecounts among reserves dollar claims gold french francsfor example banque de france deposit new york bankthis increases money supply france without reducing money supply us countries use dollar assets grant credit result rueff said goldexchange standard one major causes wave speculation culminated september 1929 crisis vast expansion dollar reserves inflated prices stocks commodities contraction deflated goldexchange standards demandduplicating feature based dollars reservecurrency role enshrined 1944 bretton woods agreement ensued unprecedented expansion official dollar reserves consumer price level us elsewhere roughly doubled foreign governments holding dollars increasingly demanded gold us finally suspended gold payments 1971 economic crisis 200809 similar crisis triggered great depression time foreign monetary authorities purchased trillions dollars us public debt including nearly 1 trillion mortgagebacked securities issued two governmentsponsored enterprises fannie mae freddie mac foreign holdings dollars promptly returned dollar market example demand duplication helped fuel boomandbust foreign markets us housing prices global excess credit creation also spilled commodity markets particular causing world price crude oil denominated dollars spike 150 barrel perhaps surprisingly given keynes central role authoring reservecurrency system american keynesians kenneth austin monetary economist us treasury jared bernstein economic adviser vice president joe biden michael pettis beijingbased economist carnegie endowment expressed concern growing burden dollars status worlds reserve currency example mr bernstein argued new york times oped article privilege burden undermining job growth pumping budget trade deficits inflating financial bubbles urged get american economy track government needs drop commitment maintaining dollars reservecurrency status meanwhile number conservatives bryan riley william wilson heritage foundation james pethokoukis american enterprise institute ramesh ponnuru national review fiercely defending dollars reservecurrency role messrs riley wilson claim largest benefit seignorage means foreigners must sell real goods services ownership real capital stock add dollar reserve holdings exactly keynes british monetary experts promoted 1922 genoa agreement means finance systemic balanceofpayments deficits forestall settlement repayment put demands repayment gold britains enormous debts resulting financing world war central bank foreign credit similarly dollars exorbitant privilege enabled us finance government deficit spending cheaply since learned great deal keynes take consideration robert mundell noted monetary theory 1971 keynesian model short run model closed economy dominated pessimistic expectations rigid wages model relevant modern economies working general theory interest inflation growth world economy mr mundell others learned great deal rueff master professor monetary approach balance payments lessons reflected recent writings keynesians mr austin outlined calls iron identities international payments flow fact global current accounts global capital accounts global net reserve sales must sum zero means trilliondollar purchase say us public debt peoples bank china entails equal simultaneous increase us combined deficits current capital accounts iron identities necessarily link official dollarreserve expansion declining us investment position total us international investment position declined net foreign assets worth 10 gross domestic product 1976 minus30 gdp 2013while books us private residents went 10 us gdp 1976 balance rest world 2013 entire decline us net international investment position due federal borrowing foreign monetary authoritiesie government deficitfinancing dollars official reservecurrency role ending dollars reservecurrency role limit deficit financing increase net national savings release resources us companies employees order remain competitive rest world messrs riley wilson argue global currency ready replace us dollar true paper credit currencies worlds monetary authorities still hold nearly 900 million ounces gold enough restore appropriate parity classical gold standard least imperfect monetary system history messrs lehrman mueller principals lbmc llc economic financial market consulting firm mr lehrman author true gold standard monetary reform plan without official reserve currencies tli books 2012 mr mueller author redeeming economics rediscovering missing element isi books 2014 | 664 |
<p>Aug. 11 (UPI) — It’s finally here. Most of your mock drafting should be complete. You should be well read on the latest fantasy <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/John_Walker/" type="external">football</a> magazines and have those sleepers buried in the back of your brain.</p>
<p>If you are one of the unlucky fantasy football players with a draft during the preseason, you still could be in for a scare from a fluke injury or suspension. But either way, you should pay close attention to rankings updates and camp battles to best arm your squad for glory.</p>
<p>Although last season seemed to be the year of the wide receiver in fantasy football circles, there are still plenty of strong pass-catching candidates worthy of going high in your draft. If you are the type of owner who wants to build your team around skilled wide outs, you’re going to need to snatch these guys up early and also eye some depth in sleepers with high ceilings.</p>
<p>That is why we have ranked our top 100 wide receivers for your 2017 fantasy football draft kit. Feel free to also check out <a href="https://www.upi.com/Fantasy-Football-2017-draft-rankings-David-Johnson-leads-UPIs-top-150/3261501932853/" type="external">our Top 150 players overall this year</a> in fantasy football.</p>
<p>SCROLL DOWN FOR TOP 100</p>
<p>For clarity, here are some of the best pass-catchers to look out for in five separate tiers, as well as some unheralded sleepers.</p>
<p>HALL OF FAME</p>
<p>1. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Julio-Jones/" type="external">Julio Jones</a>, 2. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Antonio_Brown/" type="external">Antonio Brown</a>, 3. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Odell-Beckham/" type="external">Odell Beckham</a> Jr., 4. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/AJ-Green/" type="external">A.J. Green</a></p>
<p>Only <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/David_Johnson/" type="external">David Johnson</a> and <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/LeVeon-Bell/" type="external">Le’Veon Bell</a> are worthy of being selected before <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Atlanta-Falcons/" type="external">Atlanta Falcons</a> star Julio Jones in fantasy football drafts this year. That is, unless you are a wide-receiver-centric owner. Jones had a ridiculous 1,871 yards on 136 receptions in 2015. He responded with his second straight All-Pro campaign in 2016, snagging 83 receptions for 1,409 yards and six scores. Jones leads the league with 108.7 receiving yards per game over the last two seasons. He’s due for another huge season this year catching passes for 2016 NFL MVP <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Matt_Ryan/" type="external">Matt Ryan</a>. Jones faces just one pass defense this season that finished in the top 5 for fewest fantasy points allowed to receivers in 2016.</p>
<p>Odell Beckham Jr. heads into the 2017 season lining up with the best complementary wide receiver of his career, in <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/New_York_Giants/" type="external">New York Giants</a> wide out <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Brandon_Marshall/" type="external">Brandon Marshall</a>. While some believe this could hamper Beckham’s value, I believe it will definitely help the young superstar. Beckham played 16 games for the first time in his career last season, snagging a career-best 101 receptions for 1,367 yards and 10 scores. He is a lock for at least 10 scores this season and could get open for even more long balls with defensive backs also eying Marshall. There is still good case for OBJ as the No. 1 overall pick in your draft if you are keen on taking wide receivers in the first round.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Cincinnati-Bengals/" type="external">Cincinnati Bengals</a> wide receiver A.J. Green somehow does not get enough publicity. Green has maintained a quiet swagger throughout his six-year career. He has been to the Pro Bowl every season and remains unquestionably the Bengals’ best offensive weapon. This season, the Bengals’ running game is expected to get a jumpstart from second-round pick <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Joe-Mixon/" type="external">Joe Mixon</a>. Burner <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/John_Ross/" type="external">John Ross</a> will demand attention in the slot. Tight end <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Tyler-Eifert/" type="external">Tyler Eifert</a> is expected to be on the field at the start of the season. What is not to like about Green? If you are looking for safety at the start of your draft — which you should be — take Green. Green finished 36 yards short of his sixth-consecutive 1,000-yard season in 2016, playing in just 10 games due to injury. This year he will see from 120-150 targets in this offense. He has at least 10 scores and 1,200 receiving yards in every season in which he has been targeted at least 132 times.</p>
<p>ALL-PRO</p>
<p>6. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Mike_Evans/" type="external">Mike Evans</a>, 7. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Michael_Thomas/" type="external">Michael Thomas</a>, 10. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/TY-Hilton/" type="external">T.Y. Hilton</a></p>
<p><a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Tampa-Bay-Buccaneers/" type="external">Tampa Bay Buccaneers</a> wide out Mike Evans is another stud to build your team around. He should likely be taken in the second round in larger leagues as a second wide receiver or a complement to a top-tier running back. But Evans is in no way a complement to the Buccaneers’ offense. He is <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jameis-Winston/" type="external">Jameis Winston</a>‘s favorite weapon. And this year’s Buccaneers are absolutely loaded. Evans was a questionable early-round pick last season. Fantasy football team owners were worried after Evans followed up his stellar rookie season with just three scores in 2015. He rebounded in 2016, setting career highs with 96 receptions, 1,321 receiving yards and 12 touchdowns. Like Green, Evans has a burner complement in <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/DeSean_Jackson/" type="external">DeSean Jackson</a>. He now also has some help down the seam in rookie <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/OJ-Howard/" type="external">O.J. Howard</a> and established tight end Cameron Brate. Look for another big year for both Evans and Winston in this sizzling offense.</p>
<p>With <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Brandin-Cooks/" type="external">Brandin Cooks</a> out of the picture, Michael Thomas is <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Drew_Brees/" type="external">Drew Brees</a>‘ No. 1 option for the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/New-Orleans-Saints/" type="external">New Orleans Saints</a>. That’s always a good thing in fantasy football. The Saints’ present talent had to be a factor in their willingness to shed Cooks to the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/New_England_Patriots/" type="external">New England Patriots</a>. Thomas is the best they have. I don’t expect a sophomore slump in this spot like Evans. Thomas had 121 targets last season and he only started 12 games. He finished the year with 1,137 yards and nine scores. At this time next year, we will be pondering Thomas as a possible first-round option.</p>
<p>SCROLL DOWN FOR TOP 100</p>
<p>PRO-BOWL</p>
<p>11. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Sammy-Watkins/" type="external">Sammy Watkins</a>, 12. Brandon Cooks, 13. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Demaryius_Thomas/" type="external">Demaryius Thomas</a></p>
<p>Stop me if you’ve heard this before: Sammy Watkins is primed for a big season. But no, really. I just can’t quit Sammy. The Bills’ top option in the passing game appeared in just eight games last season, catching 28 passes for 430 yards and two scores. He now has complementary pass catchers in <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Anquan_Boldin/" type="external">Anquan Boldin</a> and Zay Jones. I don’t expect Watkins to be leaned upon as much in this offense, which could be a good thing for his fantasy value. Expect Jones and Boldin to clear up some coverage for Watkins and quarterback <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Tyrod_Taylor/" type="external">Tyrod Taylor</a> to elevate his game this year. I’m predicting eight scores and 1,200 yards for Watkins in 2017 if he plays in at least 14 games.</p>
<p>JUST NAPPING [EARLY TO MID-ROUND SLEEPERS]</p>
<p>16. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Terrelle_Pryor/" type="external">Terrelle Pryor</a>, 18. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Michael_Crabtree/" type="external">Michael Crabtree</a>, 20. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Alshon-Jeffery/" type="external">Alshon Jeffery</a></p>
<p>Terrelle Pryor had to be Mr. Do Everything last season for the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Cleveland-Browns/" type="external">Cleveland Browns</a>. Now he’ll be <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Kirk-Cousins/" type="external">Kirk Cousins</a>‘ best option in the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Washington-Redskins/" type="external">Washington Redskins</a>‘ pass-heavy offense. Pryor will truly get a chance to show off his receiving ability in 2017 in this prolific offense. He should be the biggest benefactor of Cousins playing for his mega contract. Pryor has been impressive in training camp and looks the part of a No. 1 wide out. He should be looked at as a WR2 in your draft and is a great target if you decide to get running-back-heavy early on. I’m expecting career-highs in receiving yards and touchdowns here, putting Pryor at a possible nine receiving scores and over 1,200 yards.</p>
<p>DRIFTING OFF [MID TO LATE-ROUND SLEEPERS]</p>
<p>29. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Martavis-Bryant/" type="external">Martavis Bryant</a>, 33. Brandon Marshall, 41. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/John_Brown/" type="external">John Brown</a>, 48. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/DeVante-Parker/" type="external">DeVante Parker</a></p> | false | 1 | aug 11 upi finally mock drafting complete well read latest fantasy football magazines sleepers buried back brain one unlucky fantasy football players draft preseason still could scare fluke injury suspension either way pay close attention rankings updates camp battles best arm squad glory although last season seemed year wide receiver fantasy football circles still plenty strong passcatching candidates worthy going high draft type owner wants build team around skilled wide outs youre going need snatch guys early also eye depth sleepers high ceilings ranked top 100 wide receivers 2017 fantasy football draft kit feel free also check top 150 players overall year fantasy football scroll top 100 clarity best passcatchers look five separate tiers well unheralded sleepers hall fame 1 julio jones 2 antonio brown 3 odell beckham jr 4 aj green david johnson leveon bell worthy selected atlanta falcons star julio jones fantasy football drafts year unless widereceivercentric owner jones ridiculous 1871 yards 136 receptions 2015 responded second straight allpro campaign 2016 snagging 83 receptions 1409 yards six scores jones leads league 1087 receiving yards per game last two seasons hes due another huge season year catching passes 2016 nfl mvp matt ryan jones faces one pass defense season finished top 5 fewest fantasy points allowed receivers 2016 odell beckham jr heads 2017 season lining best complementary wide receiver career new york giants wide brandon marshall believe could hamper beckhams value believe definitely help young superstar beckham played 16 games first time career last season snagging careerbest 101 receptions 1367 yards 10 scores lock least 10 scores season could get open even long balls defensive backs also eying marshall still good case obj 1 overall pick draft keen taking wide receivers first round cincinnati bengals wide receiver aj green somehow get enough publicity green maintained quiet swagger throughout sixyear career pro bowl every season remains unquestionably bengals best offensive weapon season bengals running game expected get jumpstart secondround pick joe mixon burner john ross demand attention slot tight end tyler eifert expected field start season like green looking safety start draft take green green finished 36 yards short sixthconsecutive 1000yard season 2016 playing 10 games due injury year see 120150 targets offense least 10 scores 1200 receiving yards every season targeted least 132 times allpro 6 mike evans 7 michael thomas 10 ty hilton tampa bay buccaneers wide mike evans another stud build team around likely taken second round larger leagues second wide receiver complement toptier running back evans way complement buccaneers offense jameis winstons favorite weapon years buccaneers absolutely loaded evans questionable earlyround pick last season fantasy football team owners worried evans followed stellar rookie season three scores 2015 rebounded 2016 setting career highs 96 receptions 1321 receiving yards 12 touchdowns like green evans burner complement desean jackson also help seam rookie oj howard established tight end cameron brate look another big year evans winston sizzling offense brandin cooks picture michael thomas drew brees 1 option new orleans saints thats always good thing fantasy football saints present talent factor willingness shed cooks new england patriots thomas best dont expect sophomore slump spot like evans thomas 121 targets last season started 12 games finished year 1137 yards nine scores time next year pondering thomas possible firstround option scroll top 100 probowl 11 sammy watkins 12 brandon cooks 13 demaryius thomas stop youve heard sammy watkins primed big season really cant quit sammy bills top option passing game appeared eight games last season catching 28 passes 430 yards two scores complementary pass catchers anquan boldin zay jones dont expect watkins leaned upon much offense could good thing fantasy value expect jones boldin clear coverage watkins quarterback tyrod taylor elevate game year im predicting eight scores 1200 yards watkins 2017 plays least 14 games napping early midround sleepers 16 terrelle pryor 18 michael crabtree 20 alshon jeffery terrelle pryor mr everything last season cleveland browns hell kirk cousins best option washington redskins passheavy offense pryor truly get chance show receiving ability 2017 prolific offense biggest benefactor cousins playing mega contract pryor impressive training camp looks part 1 wide looked wr2 draft great target decide get runningbackheavy early im expecting careerhighs receiving yards touchdowns putting pryor possible nine receiving scores 1200 yards drifting mid lateround sleepers 29 martavis bryant 33 brandon marshall 41 john brown 48 devante parker | 716 |
<p>In today’s roundup, the live musical production of “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/rent/" type="external">Rent</a>” will premiere in 2019, Paramount Network offers a first look at Taylor Kitsch in “Waco,” and Sanaa Lathan joins the cast of Showtime’s “The Affair.”</p>
<p>PREMIERE DATES</p>
<p>The live musical production of the musical “Rent” will air Sunday, Jan. 27, 2019&#160;on <a href="http://variety.com/t/fox/" type="external">Fox</a>.&#160;More details and casting will be announced later.&#160;Set in New York City’s East Village, “Rent” tells the story of seven artists struggling to follow their dreams during a time of great social and political turmoil. A re-imagining of Puccini’s “La Boheme,” the Broadway show celebrates its 20th anniversary this year.&#160;“Rent” will be executive-produced by Marc Platt (“Grease: Live,” “La&#160;La&#160;Land,” “Wicked”), Adam Siegel, Julie Larson, Al Larson, and Revolution Studios’ Vince&#160;Totino, Scott Hemming and Marla Levine.</p>
<p>The upcoming <a href="http://variety.com/t/hbo/" type="external">HBO</a> documentary “The Newspaperman: The Life and Times of Ben Bradlee” will debut on Dec. 4.&#160;Told primarily in his own words, the documentary is an intimate portrait of the late Washington Post executive editor Ben Bradlee, an influential figure who played a key role in the resignation of President Richard Nixon in 1974 after Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein broke the Watergate scandal. “The Newspaperman” traces Bradlee’s ascent from a boy who suffered from polio to the one of the most consequential journalistic figures of the 20th century.&#160;The film features previously unseen home movies, photographs, archival footage and interviews with a who’s who of American journalism, Washington insiders, and family and friends who knew him best, including: Woodward, Bernstein, Henry Kissinger, Jim Lehrer, John Dean, Norman Lear, Robert Redford, Sally Bedell Smith, Sally Quinn, Tina Brown and Tom Brokaw.</p>
<p>History’s new drama “Knightfall” makes its series debut on Wednesday, Dec. 6 at 10 p.m.&#160;The 10-episode season takes viewers from inside the medieval politics and warfare of the Knights Templar, the most powerful, wealthy, and mysterious military order of the Middle Ages who were&#160;entrusted with protecting Christianity’s most precious relics. “Knightfall” stars Tom Cullen (“Downton Abbey”) as Templar Knight Landry,&#160;Pádraic Delaney (“The Tudors”) as Gawain, and Simon Merrells (“Spartacus”) as Tancrede.</p>
<p>CASTING</p>
<p><a href="http://variety.com/t/amazon/" type="external">Amazon</a>’s “Carnival Row” has added&#160;David Gyasi (“Interstellar”), Karla Crome (“Under the Dome”), Indira Varma (“Game of Thrones”), and Tamzin Merchant (“Salem”) to join the recently announced cast of Orlando Bloom and Cara Delevingne.&#160;Gyasi will play Agreus, a mysteriously wealthy faun who moves into an affluent human neighborhood in defiance of the social order. Crome will play Tourmaline, a quick-witted faerie love poet driven from her war-torn homeland and forced to work in a brothel on Carnival Row. Varma will play Piety Breakspear, the regal and cunning matriarch of the powerful family that rules the city of the Burgue. Merchant will play Imogen Spurnrose, a young woman who sees in Agreus an opportunity to turn her aristocratic family’s fading fortunes around. The series is scheduled to begin filming this fall for a 2019 release. “Carnival Row” is a fantasy set in a neo-Victorian city. Mythical creatures fleeing their war-torn homeland have gathered in the city, and tensions are simmering between citizens and the growing immigrant population. The series follows the investigation of a string of unsolved murders which are eating away at whatever uneasy peace still exists.</p>
<p>SundanceTV announced Louis Gossett Jr., Corbin Bernsen, and Andrew Dice Clay will join the cast of “Hap and Leonard: The Two-Bear Mambo.”&#160;They will be joining series’ stars James Purefoy (Hap) and Michael Kenneth Williams (Leonard). Gossett Jr. will play Bacon, a veterinarian-turned-cook at the local diner.&#160;Bernsen will play Chief Cantuck, the foul-mouthed, morally ambiguous head of the Grovetown Police department. Dice Clay will star as Sonny Knox, the town’s politically incorrect radio disc jockey. In its third season, the anthology series, based on the books of the same name by Joe R. Lansdale, follows two lifelong best friends, Hap Collins and Leonard Pine.&#160;John Wirth returns as showrunner and executive producer for Season 3, and Jim Mickle, Nick Damici, Jeremy Platt, and Linda Moran return as executive producers.</p>
<p>Sanaa Lathan (“American Assassin”) will recur on Showtime’s “The Affair.” Lathan will play Jenelle, the tough-as-nails principal of the charter school where Noah (Dominic West) teaches, who intrigues him. She’s got a lot to prove to her school’s oppositional administration and faculty, who seem to fight her at every turn. “The Affair” will return for its fourth season on Showtime in 2018.&#160;The series explores the emotional and psychological effects of an affair that destroyed two marriages, and the crime that brings these individuals back together.</p>
<p>EXECUTIVE NEWS</p>
<p>Kannie Yu LaPack has been promoted to senior vice president of Publicity and Public Affairs for Lifetime and Lifetime Movies. Yu LaPack oversees the Lifetime and Lifetime Movies publicity teams in all consumer, trade, awards strategy, and public affairs initiatives. She will be based in Los Angeles and report to Michael Feeney, executive vice president of Corporate Communications for A+E Networks.&#160;Previously, she was vice president of publicity.&#160;Prior to her tenure at Lifetime, Yu LaPack was a publicist with ABC Family (now Freeform).</p>
<p>DEVELOPMENT</p>
<p>Showtime announced R.J. Fried has been named showrunner and executive producer of the new untitled half-hour animated series featuring the two-dimensional avatars of President Donald Trump and his family. Stephen Colbert will also executive produce the 10-episode animated series, which will premiere on Showtime in early 2018.&#160;The series will present the truish adventures of Trump’s confidants — family, top associates, heads of government, golf pros and anyone else straying into his orbit — intrepidly exploring their histories and their psyches, revealing insights into what makes them so definitively Trumpian. It’s a workplace comedy where the office happens to be oval; it’s a character study in search of character, as seen through the eyes of an imaginary documentary crew.&#160;Tim Luecke, who co-created the “Late Show” version of Animated Trump, will serve as lead animator and co-executive producer.</p>
<p>AWARD SHOWS</p>
<p>Actresses Katherine Langford (“13 Reasons Why”) and Danielle Macdonald (“Patti Cake$) are among the honorees at this year’s Australians in Film Awards on&#160;Wednesday, Oct. 18. Actor Patrick Brammall will host the event at Neuehouse Hollywood.&#160;Langford and Macdonald, along with&#160;director Alethea Jones, screenwriter-cinematographer-director Warwick Thornton will receive the screen Australia breakthrough award, which recognizes Austrailian screen talent who have had major international presence over the past year.&#160;Multi-hyphenate Tim Minchin&#160;will be honored with the Qantas Orry-Kelly Award, which celebrates an Australian who has contributed to the national identity of Australia with their body of work and has created opportunities and inspiration for other Australians internationally.</p>
<p>FIRST LOOKS</p>
<p>Paramount Network debut first images from “Waco” ahead of its January 2018 premiere.&#160;With an all-star cast including Taylor Kitsch, Michael Shannon, John Leguizamo, Andrea Riseborough, Rory Culkin, Melissa Benoist, Paul Sparks, Shea Whigham, Camryn Manheim, and Julia Garner, “Waco” is a six-part scripted event series based on the controversial and harrowing true story of the 1993 standoff between the FBI, ATF, and David Koresh’s spiritual sect in Waco, TX that resulted in a deadly shootout and fire. “Waco” is executive produced by Weinstein Television, written by John Erick Dowdle and Drew Dowdle and directed by John Erick Dowdle.</p>
<p>(Pictured: Taylor Kitsch in “Waco”)</p> | false | 1 | todays roundup live musical production rent premiere 2019 paramount network offers first look taylor kitsch waco sanaa lathan joins cast showtimes affair premiere dates live musical production musical rent air sunday jan 27 2019160on fox160more details casting announced later160set new york citys east village rent tells story seven artists struggling follow dreams time great social political turmoil reimagining puccinis la boheme broadway show celebrates 20th anniversary year160rent executiveproduced marc platt grease live la160la160land wicked adam siegel julie larson al larson revolution studios vince160totino scott hemming marla levine upcoming hbo documentary newspaperman life times ben bradlee debut dec 4160told primarily words documentary intimate portrait late washington post executive editor ben bradlee influential figure played key role resignation president richard nixon 1974 post reporters bob woodward carl bernstein broke watergate scandal newspaperman traces bradlees ascent boy suffered polio one consequential journalistic figures 20th century160the film features previously unseen home movies photographs archival footage interviews whos american journalism washington insiders family friends knew best including woodward bernstein henry kissinger jim lehrer john dean norman lear robert redford sally bedell smith sally quinn tina brown tom brokaw historys new drama knightfall makes series debut wednesday dec 6 10 pm160the 10episode season takes viewers inside medieval politics warfare knights templar powerful wealthy mysterious military order middle ages were160entrusted protecting christianitys precious relics knightfall stars tom cullen downton abbey templar knight landry160pádraic delaney tudors gawain simon merrells spartacus tancrede casting amazons carnival row added160david gyasi interstellar karla crome dome indira varma game thrones tamzin merchant salem join recently announced cast orlando bloom cara delevingne160gyasi play agreus mysteriously wealthy faun moves affluent human neighborhood defiance social order crome play tourmaline quickwitted faerie love poet driven wartorn homeland forced work brothel carnival row varma play piety breakspear regal cunning matriarch powerful family rules city burgue merchant play imogen spurnrose young woman sees agreus opportunity turn aristocratic familys fading fortunes around series scheduled begin filming fall 2019 release carnival row fantasy set neovictorian city mythical creatures fleeing wartorn homeland gathered city tensions simmering citizens growing immigrant population series follows investigation string unsolved murders eating away whatever uneasy peace still exists sundancetv announced louis gossett jr corbin bernsen andrew dice clay join cast hap leonard twobear mambo160they joining series stars james purefoy hap michael kenneth williams leonard gossett jr play bacon veterinarianturnedcook local diner160bernsen play chief cantuck foulmouthed morally ambiguous head grovetown police department dice clay star sonny knox towns politically incorrect radio disc jockey third season anthology series based books name joe r lansdale follows two lifelong best friends hap collins leonard pine160john wirth returns showrunner executive producer season 3 jim mickle nick damici jeremy platt linda moran return executive producers sanaa lathan american assassin recur showtimes affair lathan play jenelle toughasnails principal charter school noah dominic west teaches intrigues shes got lot prove schools oppositional administration faculty seem fight every turn affair return fourth season showtime 2018160the series explores emotional psychological effects affair destroyed two marriages crime brings individuals back together executive news kannie yu lapack promoted senior vice president publicity public affairs lifetime lifetime movies yu lapack oversees lifetime lifetime movies publicity teams consumer trade awards strategy public affairs initiatives based los angeles report michael feeney executive vice president corporate communications ae networks160previously vice president publicity160prior tenure lifetime yu lapack publicist abc family freeform development showtime announced rj fried named showrunner executive producer new untitled halfhour animated series featuring twodimensional avatars president donald trump family stephen colbert also executive produce 10episode animated series premiere showtime early 2018160the series present truish adventures trumps confidants family top associates heads government golf pros anyone else straying orbit intrepidly exploring histories psyches revealing insights makes definitively trumpian workplace comedy office happens oval character study search character seen eyes imaginary documentary crew160tim luecke cocreated late show version animated trump serve lead animator coexecutive producer award shows actresses katherine langford 13 reasons danielle macdonald patti cake among honorees years australians film awards on160wednesday oct 18 actor patrick brammall host event neuehouse hollywood160langford macdonald along with160director alethea jones screenwritercinematographerdirector warwick thornton receive screen australia breakthrough award recognizes austrailian screen talent major international presence past year160multihyphenate tim minchin160will honored qantas orrykelly award celebrates australian contributed national identity australia body work created opportunities inspiration australians internationally first looks paramount network debut first images waco ahead january 2018 premiere160with allstar cast including taylor kitsch michael shannon john leguizamo andrea riseborough rory culkin melissa benoist paul sparks shea whigham camryn manheim julia garner waco sixpart scripted event series based controversial harrowing true story 1993 standoff fbi atf david koreshs spiritual sect waco tx resulted deadly shootout fire waco executive produced weinstein television written john erick dowdle drew dowdle directed john erick dowdle pictured taylor kitsch waco | 778 |
<p>Business guru Ken Langone predicts that President Donald Trump will easily be re-elected to a second term if the economy continues to strengthen and the stock market surges to record highs seemingly on a daily basis.</p>
<p>“Guess what, if this economy continues to strengthen and it strengthens over the next three years, like it or not Trump’s going to win again,” Langone told <a href="http://video.foxbusiness.com/v/5530101422001/?#sp=show-clips" type="external">Fox Business Network</a>.</p>
<p>Trump took to Twitter to trumpet his success in delivering an economy that just witnessed the blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average close&#160;above&#160;the 22,000 mark for the first time.</p>
<p>Business is looking better than ever with business enthusiasm at record levels. Stock Market at an all-time high. That doesn’t just happen!</p>
<p>— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/893081237082001409" type="external">August 3, 2017</a></p>
<p>I am continuing to get rid of costly and unnecessary regulations. Much work left to do but effect will be great! Business &amp; jobs will grow.</p>
<p>— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/893082107081244672" type="external">August 3, 2017</a></p>
<p><a href="http://www.newsmax.com/Finance/StreetTalk/apple-dow-stock-market-22000/2017/08/02/id/805288/" type="external">The Dow eclipsed 22,000</a> for the first time Wednesday, part of an 11 percent increase thus far in 2017.&#160;</p>
<p>Trump himself claimed credit for the surge, noting on Twitter Tuesday that the Dow stood only at 18,000 points around Election Day and crowing Wednesday that “we have a lot of things happening that are really great.”</p>
<p>Stock Market could hit all-time high (again) 22,000 today. Was 18,000 only 6 months ago on Election Day. Mainstream media seldom mentions!</p>
<p>— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/892366646542782464" type="external">August 1, 2017</a></p>
<p>But leading analysts attribute the market’s latest push higher primarily to strong results from blue-chip companies, most recently Apple, by far the biggest gainer in the Dow Wednesday rising 4.7 percent, <a href="http://www.newsmax.com/Finance/Economy/dow-trump-landmark-agenda/2017/08/03/id/805512/" type="external">AFP reported.</a></p>
<p>The more than eight-year-old bull market in U.S. stocks got a second wind after last year’s election of Trump as U.S. president, on expectations that his business-friendly policies including tax cuts and deregulation would boost corporate gains and economic growth.</p>
<p>For his part, the Home Depot co-founder praised the president for conquering opposition in the Democratic Party, Republican Party and within the media.</p>
<p>“[Trump] beat three dynasties: Obama, Bush, Clinton. The American people have spoken loud and clear. Like it or not, he won fair and square and the American people are fed up, and these people in Congress ought to get off their butts and get something done. Shame on them,” he said.</p>
<p>Langone also urged Congress to accept that the nation’s healthcare system in beyond repair.</p>
<p>“I don’t know if there is a solution to Obamacare but I do know that the Republicans in Congress look like fools, stumblebums, they don’t know where they’re going or how to get there,” he said.</p>
<p>“You want to know the dark secret? You can’t fix Obamacare. It’s too late, it’s too late, you can’t take back from I don’t know how many millions of American people. Can’t take it back, it’s done, it’s over, move on.”</p>
<p>Langone also praised Trump for&#160;“attacking some of these insane regulations.”</p>
<p>Langone said “business people are feeling better about an environment that is less hostile to them,” as Trump has eliminated red tape in a bid to reward success and innovation.</p>
<p>Meanwhile on Wall Street, investor fears about the sustainability of the gains took the shine off the round number Dow milestone because some technical indicators were flashing warning signs, <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-stocks-dow-analysis-idUSKBN1AI2LB" type="external">Reuters</a> reported.</p>
<p>“The market gain has been built on a narrow group of issues. That typically is not indicative of great health,” said Mark Luschini, chief investment strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott in Philadelphia. “I would not be shocked … if we saw a pullback.”</p>
<p>And with the Dow industrials at a record high, Dow theory suggests that the Dow Transportation Average index should also hit a record in order to confirm the market’s march higher.&#160;But that index trails the Dow industrials’ year-to-date performance by almost 10 percentage points and is nearly 6 percent below its own July 14 record high.</p>
<p>Naeem Aslam, chief market analyst at Think Markets in London, said the Dow milestone was “a remarkable thing for investors … but at the same time, this could also be a trap if the momentum does not follow.”</p>
<p>But tax cuts and other parts of the Trump agenda have not materialized, leaving earnings growth as the real engine of the market.</p>
<p>“Earnings growth allows the market to be patient about Washington. It allows the market to be patient about fiscal reform,” said Steven Chiavarone, portfolio manager at Federated Investors in New York, who said they would “be buyers on any weakness.”</p>
<p>Fundamentals remain strong. With 350 of 500 companies’ reports in, the S&amp;P 500 index is on track to post back-to-back double-digit quarterly earnings growth for the first time in almost six years.</p>
<p>Still, the market is expensive by historical standards. Investors are paying $18 for every $1 in expected S&amp;P 500 earnings over the next 12 months, near the highest since 2004 and above the long-term price-to-earnings average multiple of 15.</p>
<p>“The market isn’t without issues as it relates to valuations which are full if not somewhat expensive,” said Mark Luschini, chief investment strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott in Philadelphia. He expects the Dow to go beyond 22,000, however.</p>
<p>(Newsmax wires services contributed to this report).</p> | false | 1 | business guru ken langone predicts president donald trump easily reelected second term economy continues strengthen stock market surges record highs seemingly daily basis guess economy continues strengthen strengthens next three years like trumps going win langone told fox business network trump took twitter trumpet success delivering economy witnessed bluechip dow jones industrial average close160above160the 22000 mark first time business looking better ever business enthusiasm record levels stock market alltime high doesnt happen donald j trump realdonaldtrump august 3 2017 continuing get rid costly unnecessary regulations much work left effect great business amp jobs grow donald j trump realdonaldtrump august 3 2017 dow eclipsed 22000 first time wednesday part 11 percent increase thus far 2017160 trump claimed credit surge noting twitter tuesday dow stood 18000 points around election day crowing wednesday lot things happening really great stock market could hit alltime high 22000 today 18000 6 months ago election day mainstream media seldom mentions donald j trump realdonaldtrump august 1 2017 leading analysts attribute markets latest push higher primarily strong results bluechip companies recently apple far biggest gainer dow wednesday rising 47 percent afp reported eightyearold bull market us stocks got second wind last years election trump us president expectations businessfriendly policies including tax cuts deregulation would boost corporate gains economic growth part home depot cofounder praised president conquering opposition democratic party republican party within media trump beat three dynasties obama bush clinton american people spoken loud clear like fair square american people fed people congress ought get butts get something done shame said langone also urged congress accept nations healthcare system beyond repair dont know solution obamacare know republicans congress look like fools stumblebums dont know theyre going get said want know dark secret cant fix obamacare late late cant take back dont know many millions american people cant take back done move langone also praised trump for160attacking insane regulations langone said business people feeling better environment less hostile trump eliminated red tape bid reward success innovation meanwhile wall street investor fears sustainability gains took shine round number dow milestone technical indicators flashing warning signs reuters reported market gain built narrow group issues typically indicative great health said mark luschini chief investment strategist janney montgomery scott philadelphia would shocked saw pullback dow industrials record high dow theory suggests dow transportation average index also hit record order confirm markets march higher160but index trails dow industrials yeartodate performance almost 10 percentage points nearly 6 percent july 14 record high naeem aslam chief market analyst think markets london said dow milestone remarkable thing investors time could also trap momentum follow tax cuts parts trump agenda materialized leaving earnings growth real engine market earnings growth allows market patient washington allows market patient fiscal reform said steven chiavarone portfolio manager federated investors new york said would buyers weakness fundamentals remain strong 350 500 companies reports sampp 500 index track post backtoback doubledigit quarterly earnings growth first time almost six years still market expensive historical standards investors paying 18 every 1 expected sampp 500 earnings next 12 months near highest since 2004 longterm pricetoearnings average multiple 15 market isnt without issues relates valuations full somewhat expensive said mark luschini chief investment strategist janney montgomery scott philadelphia expects dow go beyond 22000 however newsmax wires services contributed report | 541 |
<p>Vienna in the late 19th and early 20th centuries was a hotbed of genius, and the arch-journalist, poet, and playwright Karl Kraus (1874-1936) presided over this efflorescence of art and thought, knowing everything and everybody, making all the right friends and all the right enemies. From 1899 until his death, Kraus edited Die Fackel (the Torch) and for many years was the sole contributor to this landmark journal, which appeared whenever some gross fatuity in public life or telling grotesquerie in the daily press inflamed him—and which, on an especially inauspicious occasion, might run to some 300 pages of closely argued and eviscerating animadversion.</p>
<p>His admirers were legion, as one learns from Edward Timms’s recent masterly intellectual biography. Freud wrote him fan letters in praise of his enlightened attitude toward sexuality; Kraus, in turn, congratulated Freud for recognizing that homosexuality ought not to be considered criminal or insane. (In due course Kraus soured on Freudian theory, and his most famous aphorism declares that “psychoanalysis is the mental illness for which it claims to be a cure.”)</p>
<p>The modernist architect Adolf Loos, who disdained ornament and was bemused by the way Kraus excavated elemental truths buried in everyday palaver, designed the starkly elegant covers for Kraus’s books. The Expressionist artist Oscar Kokoschka illustrated an apocalyptic Kraus essay with a lithograph of subhuman hordes poised to descend upon an overripe Europe. For Frank Wedekind, author of the scarifying Lulu plays, Kraus produced (and played a small role in) Pandora’s Box, and the two friends took turns with the beautiful actress who starred in the show.</p>
<p>Alban Berg, whose opera Lulu was based on Wedekind’s plays, wrote to Anton Webern: “Oh the Fackel! I know it off by heart! I worship every line by this man Kraus—even if it’s printed on the cover!” Webern applied Kraus’s theory of language to his own prescriptions for musical composition, and the atonal crowd was unanimous in its appreciation, as Arnold Schoenberg pronounced Kraus “a truly great man.” Gershom Scholem and Walter Benjamin spent hours in their student days discussing the origins of Kraus’s manner of multilayered commentary in medieval Hebrew writings; Scholem continued his subscription to Die Fackel when he emigrated to Palestine, and Benjamin wrote a celebrated essay on Kraus.</p>
<p>Elias Canetti, who couldn’t understand the fuss at first, soon became a Kraus devotee, “filled with him as with a Bible. I did not doubt a single word he said. .  .  . It was only in him that you find justice—no, you didn’t find justice, he was justice.”</p>
<p>Of Kraus’s monumental play Die letzten Tage der Menschheit (The Last Days of Mankind), Canetti recalls hearing, when he first arrived in Vienna, that it “contain[ed] everything that had happened in the war.” To contain the entire Great War took Kraus some 600 pages and over 500 characters. He started work in 1915 and wrote most of it during the war, but could not begin publication in Die Fackel until the war was lost and the Austro-Hungarian Empire had fallen. The play appeared as a book in 1922. In 2015 the entire play—The Last Days of Mankind, translated by Fred Bridgham and Edward Timms (Yale, 672 pp., $40)—was published in English, a signal event in the literary history of the First World War.</p>
<p>The Last Days of Mankind was intended to be the last word on the “war to end all wars”—a phrase and concept Kraus subjects to a thorough mauling. As Kraus states in his preface, “The performance of this drama, which would take some 10 evenings in terrestrial time, is intended for a theatre on Mars. Theatre-goers on planet earth would find it unendurable.” For Martians, presumably, the spectacle would be a lesson in primitive zoology, describing the vilest creature the universe has brought forth; human beings could only be disgusted with the sight of themselves.</p>
<p>The opening scene recalls War and Peace: As in an aristocratic St. Petersburg drawing room in 1805, with Napoleon greedily eyeing Russia, so on a busy Vienna streetcorner in 1914, with newsboys proclaiming the outbreak of war, the eternal and inevitable chatter about momentous events is interspersed with chatter about matters of no consequence—in Kraus’s rendering, the clamor for a passing operetta star’s autograph, and a ruffian trying to snatch a prostitute’s handbag. All the talk is pointedly uncomprehending: The inadequacy of understanding, the failure to see what is being done in the name of imperial honor and glory but is actually perpetrated in the service of avarice—that will be Kraus’s major theme.</p>
<p>In this age of grandeur, Austria-Hungary and Germany stand shoulder to shoulder, fighting a defensive war forced upon them to uphold true culture against the predations of rapacious shopkeeper-nations. Kraus presents the drivel of mindless speech and writing, as everyone reaches for the ready-made phrase nearest at hand. The populace is stupefied by official and semi-official discourse, reducing matters of life and death to formulaic nonsense.</p>
<p>Morally, the worst of the war is on the home front. Kraus contrasts the horror of soldiers’ suffering with the whining of prosperous civilians who see war as their main chance to make a killing. The ironies are obvious, and formulaic: For example, a Big Eater and a Normal Eater commiserating about the lack of really good restaurant chow, ignoring the starving beggar who pleads for a crust.</p>
<p>The fact that Kraus flays noncombatants for their greed and lack of compassion, however, does not mean that he spares the fighting men. The officer class comprises psychopathic morons and moronic psychopaths; martinets pitched to frenzy at the failings of common soldiers consign clueless offenders to suicidal frontline duty. At a ceremonial banquet at corps headquarters, before a colossal painting of the emperor and his chiefs of staff on some imaginary battlefield, an Austrian general’s malapropisms, slips of the tongue, and fractured logic betray a military mind bursting with stupidity:</p>
<p>At this time we think fondly of our loved ones back home—who are far away and thinking of us with faithful devotion. Especially the mothers who have set us an example—joyfully sacrificing their sons on the altar of the Fatherland, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. .  .  . Victory, gentlemen—do you know what that means? It is the choice a soldier has—if he doesn’t want to die covered with glory!</p>
<p>Much of The Last Days of Mankind is drawn straight from life; Kraus witnessed some of these scenes, read or heard these unspeakable words: Antic, astringent, icy, overheated, on the edge of tears, on the verge of hysteria, he tells the unendurable truth. At the play’s end, the factual truth is stretched a bit so that Kraus’s version of the moral truth might emerge: After the editor of the premier Vienna newspaper announces himself to be Lord of the Hyenas and the Antichrist, a Martian ray annihilates all mankind, as the Voice of God protests, “THIS IS NOT WHAT I INTENDED.”</p>
<p>Kraus’s lethal vision puts The Last Days of Mankind on the shelf of Great War classics among All Quiet on the Western Front, Goodbye to All That, A Farewell to Arms, The Good Soldier Švejk, and the poems of Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon. But what does that distinction amount to? These are the books that shaped the thinking and feeling of civilized men between the two world wars. And in so doing, they constitute a canon of the ineffectual.</p>
<p>In 1933, Kraus wrote an anti-Hitler essay entitled Die dritte Walpurgisnacht (“The Third Walpurgis Night”), but he never published it. Did he fear for his life—or like his alter-ego, the Grumbler in Last Days, was he afraid that his words would prove useless? After Engelbert Dollfuss, the Austrian chancellor who was his country’s surest stay against absorption by Germany, was assassinated in 1934, Karl Kraus gave up writing about politics. Die Fackel was devoted henceforth to studies of Shakespeare and Offenbach. And Kraus died in 1936, before he could see the worst.</p>
<p>Algis Valiunas is a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p> | false | 1 | vienna late 19th early 20th centuries hotbed genius archjournalist poet playwright karl kraus 18741936 presided efflorescence art thought knowing everything everybody making right friends right enemies 1899 death kraus edited die fackel torch many years sole contributor landmark journal appeared whenever gross fatuity public life telling grotesquerie daily press inflamed himand especially inauspicious occasion might run 300 pages closely argued eviscerating animadversion admirers legion one learns edward timmss recent masterly intellectual biography freud wrote fan letters praise enlightened attitude toward sexuality kraus turn congratulated freud recognizing homosexuality ought considered criminal insane due course kraus soured freudian theory famous aphorism declares psychoanalysis mental illness claims cure modernist architect adolf loos disdained ornament bemused way kraus excavated elemental truths buried everyday palaver designed starkly elegant covers krauss books expressionist artist oscar kokoschka illustrated apocalyptic kraus essay lithograph subhuman hordes poised descend upon overripe europe frank wedekind author scarifying lulu plays kraus produced played small role pandoras box two friends took turns beautiful actress starred show alban berg whose opera lulu based wedekinds plays wrote anton webern oh fackel know heart worship every line man krauseven printed cover webern applied krauss theory language prescriptions musical composition atonal crowd unanimous appreciation arnold schoenberg pronounced kraus truly great man gershom scholem walter benjamin spent hours student days discussing origins krauss manner multilayered commentary medieval hebrew writings scholem continued subscription die fackel emigrated palestine benjamin wrote celebrated essay kraus elias canetti couldnt understand fuss first soon became kraus devotee filled bible doubt single word said find justiceno didnt find justice justice krauss monumental play die letzten tage der menschheit last days mankind canetti recalls hearing first arrived vienna contained everything happened war contain entire great war took kraus 600 pages 500 characters started work 1915 wrote war could begin publication die fackel war lost austrohungarian empire fallen play appeared book 1922 2015 entire playthe last days mankind translated fred bridgham edward timms yale 672 pp 40was published english signal event literary history first world war last days mankind intended last word war end warsa phrase concept kraus subjects thorough mauling kraus states preface performance drama would take 10 evenings terrestrial time intended theatre mars theatregoers planet earth would find unendurable martians presumably spectacle would lesson primitive zoology describing vilest creature universe brought forth human beings could disgusted sight opening scene recalls war peace aristocratic st petersburg drawing room 1805 napoleon greedily eyeing russia busy vienna streetcorner 1914 newsboys proclaiming outbreak war eternal inevitable chatter momentous events interspersed chatter matters consequencein krauss rendering clamor passing operetta stars autograph ruffian trying snatch prostitutes handbag talk pointedly uncomprehending inadequacy understanding failure see done name imperial honor glory actually perpetrated service avaricethat krauss major theme age grandeur austriahungary germany stand shoulder shoulder fighting defensive war forced upon uphold true culture predations rapacious shopkeepernations kraus presents drivel mindless speech writing everyone reaches readymade phrase nearest hand populace stupefied official semiofficial discourse reducing matters life death formulaic nonsense morally worst war home front kraus contrasts horror soldiers suffering whining prosperous civilians see war main chance make killing ironies obvious formulaic example big eater normal eater commiserating lack really good restaurant chow ignoring starving beggar pleads crust fact kraus flays noncombatants greed lack compassion however mean spares fighting men officer class comprises psychopathic morons moronic psychopaths martinets pitched frenzy failings common soldiers consign clueless offenders suicidal frontline duty ceremonial banquet corps headquarters colossal painting emperor chiefs staff imaginary battlefield austrian generals malapropisms slips tongue fractured logic betray military mind bursting stupidity time think fondly loved ones back homewho far away thinking us faithful devotion especially mothers set us examplejoyfully sacrificing sons altar fatherland natural thing world victory gentlemendo know means choice soldier hasif doesnt want die covered glory much last days mankind drawn straight life kraus witnessed scenes read heard unspeakable words antic astringent icy overheated edge tears verge hysteria tells unendurable truth plays end factual truth stretched bit krauss version moral truth might emerge editor premier vienna newspaper announces lord hyenas antichrist martian ray annihilates mankind voice god protests intended krauss lethal vision puts last days mankind shelf great war classics among quiet western front goodbye farewell arms good soldier Švejk poems wilfred owen siegfried sassoon distinction amount books shaped thinking feeling civilized men two world wars constitute canon ineffectual 1933 kraus wrote antihitler essay entitled die dritte walpurgisnacht third walpurgis night never published fear lifeor like alterego grumbler last days afraid words would prove useless engelbert dollfuss austrian chancellor countrys surest stay absorption germany assassinated 1934 karl kraus gave writing politics die fackel devoted henceforth studies shakespeare offenbach kraus died 1936 could see worst algis valiunas fellow ethics public policy center | 770 |
<p />
<p>While there has been much focus on military women deployed to war zones, little attention has been paid to their foreign civilian counterparts.&#160; These women operate in countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan on behalf of government agencies, private entities, and non-profit organizations.&#160; We hear about them traveling to dangerous places and getting injured or killed but not about their daily lives.</p>
<p>With the growing rate of females joining the workforce over the last fifty years, more are going to places where once it would have been rare.&#160; Still, the professional field in war zones is dominated by men.&#160; Amid the politics of being severely outnumbered and the pressures of dangerous surroundings, these women face sexual tension, harassment, and marginalization beyond what unfolds in a normal work environment—most of which remain unreported. &#160;Moreover, a slew of unforeseen gender-related challenges arise.&#160; Adding the complication of functioning within an unfamiliar culture, language, and religion, life was not only difficult and trying but curious and startling.</p>
<p>In 2010, I went to Baghdad, Iraq, as an instructor for a U.S. government-funded educational program.&#160; Upon arrival at a small compound inside the International Zone (IZ), I was immediately warned by a foreign woman who showed me to my trailer with, “You should stick close to your room and the office.&#160; Don’t wander down other walkways.&#160; All those rooms are occupied by men and they haven’t seen their wives for a while.”&#160; The compound housed about five women and approximately 40 men.</p>
<p>From the start, it was apparent there were problems, some stemming from women themselves.&#160; &#160;Many in the IZ were given favors and catered to by their male colleagues.&#160; Men paid for meals and offered rides to shops and invitations to bars.&#160; Extramarital affairs took place where desire and convenience allowed.&#160; Some women took advantage of their sexual power and used it to the detriment of others.&#160; Two at our compound repeatedly allowed unauthorized male guests to overnight, compromising everyone’s security.&#160;&#160; One even became engaged to an Iraqi man who spoke rudimentary English and was twenty years her junior.&#160; She spoke no Arabic nor was she Muslim.&#160; After having given him large amounts of her own money to use in persuading a local judge to permit the marriage, she was allegedly rejected by his family on cultural and religious grounds.&#160; The man and money were never seen again.&#160; This caused her great anguish and absences from work, while the team suffered from lower productivity.</p>
<p>As the gender dynamics became more intense the locals were there to witness.</p>
<p>Loud shouting came from the hall one day while I was teaching a seminar to Iraqi government officials from the Prime Minister’s Office, the majority of whom were men.&#160; A male colleague was berating a female on a work-related issue.&#160; In his rage, he used pejorative language to name and demean her private body parts.&#160; Small-framed with nowhere to run inside the cramp compound, she stood frozen.&#160; Everyone in my class heard him.&#160;&#160; Embarrassed beyond speech, I sat quietly.&#160; Finally one of the male Iraqis looked at me and said gravely, “You are a woman too.&#160; I must apologize for him because he has insulted all women.”</p>
<p>As I moved to another war zone, new gender issues arose.</p>
<p>Freshly arrived in Afghanistan a year later on a rule of law mission, I was being issued a bullet-proof vest, one that was too large, clumsy and ill-fitting.&#160;&#160; When I asked for a smaller size, stating that my measurements had been solicited by and provided to our employer months ago, the security officer shrugged, reiterating that this was a male-dominated field.&#160; Smaller sizes were not available.&#160; Then as I settled into my office, which was shared with several men, music was played in the afternoons that contained derogatory sexual lyrics.&#160; No one seemed bothered except me.&#160; It was not until I spoke up that my colleagues remembered it was no longer an all-boys’ club.</p>
<p>Then things got even more personal.&#160; One day after a collegial conversation, quite unexpectedly, a coworker in Kabul asked if I wanted to be in an intimate “in-country” relationship with him.&#160; Then as if to justify the proposition, he revealed that he was a married man but did not have anyone special in Afghanistan.&#160; Similarly, months later in Kunduz province, a security manager after a work meeting asked if he could come to my room that evening.&#160; When I inquired why, he stated that I should help shave his back.&#160; Astounded, I suggested he find a man to assist him—to which he quickly retorted that he was homophobic.</p>
<p>As the only female living and working in a remote camp in Kunduz with over 700 men, life was not easy.&#160; It was crucial that I not only be cautious and aware of my surroundings but professional and respectable at all times.&#160; Daily, I was sharing workspace, cafeterias, camp facilities and the gym with macho men sporting huge muscles and tattoos.&#160; I walked into offices where guy-talk reigned, oaths were uttered and in one room, a nude centerfold was prominently displayed.&#160; In one large compound meeting, several men entered into a loud verbal altercation over security matters.&#160; Absurdly, each time an expletive was used its speaker turned to me, said my name, apologized to me and continued with the swearing.&#160; It was the most surreal combination of inclusion, crudity, and propriety.</p>
<p>Despite the goals of promoting democracy, gender-equality, and Afghan women empowerment some men did not know how to strategically include their female colleagues in programs.&#160; In Kunduz one afternoon, while I was putting together a long-awaited seminar for Afghan women, a male coworker stated to me that he would take care of all the arrangements himself, to include meeting with the female students.&#160; He volunteered that all I should do was sit in the office and write reports.&#160; He justified this by referring to his years of experience in Afghanistan and how well he understood local women.&#160; Unfortunately, in his desire to be in control, he failed to discern that the conservative nature of Afghan females caused them to be more at ease with foreign women than men, whatever the men’s experience.</p>
<p>Nor did some male supervisors respect the professional boundaries between superiors and subordinates.&#160; In 2000, I was in Kosovo during the Albanian-Serbian crisis when local secure housing for international staff was at a premium.&#160; The acting chief of mission for an American non-profit organization used his position try to move a female subordinate into his house, instead of offering the empty room to a person who needed it.&#160; She failed to share her boss’s romantic sentiment and already had a place to live.&#160; He showered her with gifts and took out her to meals under the guise of being work-related.&#160; Uncomfortable and pressured, she hurriedly finished her contract, refused a renewal, and left the country.&#160; This fruitless incident not only rankled office morale and cost the lady herself a job, but robbed the program of an experienced individual.</p>
<p>But international men were not the only ones who created difficulties for foreign women in war zones.&#160; The host of challenges women faced interacting with local men deserve books of their own.&#160; I remember my daily walk inside the Kunduz camp for exercise attracted a lot of attention from the hundreds of Afghan police trainees who lived there.&#160; No matter how conservatively I dressed, Afghan men would gather and stare.&#160; This continued until a small crowd grew to an intimidating number.&#160; A colleague expressed similar frustrations with the Afghan men at her camp in Herat.&#160; Another in Mazar-i-Sharif voiced vexation about her local male staff, feeling she had to prove herself to them.&#160; Though they were hired to promote rule of law and gender equality, some had problems with taking direction from a woman.</p>
<p>Yet there were positive sides to being an international female.&#160; In Baghdad, Kabul and Kunduz, local women were willing to talk to me rather than to my male colleagues, sharing aspects of their daily lives.&#160; In Baghdad, several Iraqi women invited me to their homes for dinner and one took me to a mosque for prayer.&#160; In Kabul, Afghan female attorneys stayed after classes to chat with me about their lives and work.&#160; In Kunduz, the local women periodically attending our courses approached me and related their concerns about the lack of camp amenities for females rather than raising this with my male counterparts.&#160; Being a foreign woman in a war zone, one was the go-to person for the local women, their communication line to the international community.</p>
<p>Nor were all men problematic.&#160;&#160; Many demonstrated intelligence, consideration and helpfulness.&#160; Memorable incidents include one in Kabul where an American male co-worker who, when I was new, asked to see the first aid kit I had just been issued.&#160; After examining it he reached into his own kit, took out essential items and put them in mine because it was missing critical pieces.&#160; Similarly a British male security officer in Kunduz, who observed that feminine hygiene products were not sold in the convenience store on our all-male compound, diplomatically asked if I needed assistance, saying he would obtain those items from elsewhere if needed.&#160; In Iraq, an American contractor, learning that I was a runner, troubled himself by signing me into the U.S. embassy’s gym daily as he had access and I did not.&#160; Finally, the majority of local men employed by international entities in these venues faithfully performed their jobs as subject matter experts and support staff without giving trouble to their foreign female colleagues.</p>
<p>Foreign civilian women working in war zones experience a wide variety of gender-related issues and problems, some a lot worse than others with many incidents going unreported.&#160; To be fair, life for the men was not easy, either, as they had to balance security concerns, work pressures, a new culture, and long periods away from the family.&#160; Yet inside offices of war-torn countries where stress levels are high, danger is near, and one sex greatly outnumbers the other, sexual tension, harassment, discrimination, and other gender-related disagreements are bound to happen.&#160; With the lack of robust support systems nearby, such as a human resources department trained to deal with these issues, an ombudsman and or an inspector general office, foreign civilian women sparsely populated can end up feeling very vulnerable.</p>
<p>Given the politics, the huge profits to be made, and the time it takes to recruit qualified individuals, entities operating in these venues are reluctant to terminate employees.&#160; Many simply rotated the individual to a satellite office whenever there was a behavior problem instead of addressing the issue.&#160;&#160; This leaves way for the offense to reoccur which lowered employee morale, especially women who saw their concerns continually ignored.&#160; Some never spoke up as whistleblowing statues did not protect contractors whose contract need not be renewed.&#160; Office productivity suffered as employees spent time harboring ill feelings instead of nurturing teamwork.&#160;&#160; Eventually, more women than men resigned, adding to the personnel cost of training and replacing them.&#160; And ultimately, it subtracted from the international community’s credibility and success, particularly in its gender equality programs.</p>
<p>While there is not one solution to this complex web of challenges surrounding foreign civilian women working in conflict-ridden countries, there are steps the international community can take to alleviate the known and repetitive concerns.</p>
<p>First, prior to deployment, detailed and accurate information must be provided about living and working conditions in the specific host country, not just a mere power point presentation about working in conflict areas in general.&#160; In the pre-deployment trainings I attended, the presentations were often generic, not country specific.&#160; Moreover, many of the presenters had never been to the host country and the information from those who had was outdated.</p>
<p>Second, both men and women must be required to attend a training devoted to sexual harassment, discrimination, and other known gender-related problems, making them more cognizant of these issues and how these can be exacerbated when one sex severely outnumbers the other.&#160; This training should use examples from the field and must be required annually for those who stay beyond a year.</p>
<p>Third, employers should have a robust hotline or support system for all employees who experience difficulties.&#160; This system should allow the employee to remain anonymous if he or she wishes and should be one that has the power and authority to make changes if necessary.&#160; From experience, oftentimes the trained persons assigned to deal with these matters or the human resources support needed was usually located in the home country, far away, in a different time zone, and unable to respond promptly if at all.</p>
<p>Fourth, the pre-deployment security briefing needs to include discussions about the different ways a person can compromise everyone’s safety, including one’s personal relationships.</p>
<p>Fifth, government agencies, organizations and private companies hiring women for these positions need to ensure that females are just as valued as males, affecting costs, morale and program results, and provide them with protective gear that actually fit.</p>
<p>Finally, and most importantly, managers need to be acutely aware that they set the example.&#160; Organizations should swiftly investigate and remove those supervisors who fail to follow and enforce rules, and those who use their positions to promote, condone or ignore unethical outcomes.&#160; Moreover the funding sources of these programs, whether they are governmental or private, need to play a closer role in hiring, monitoring and evaluating.&#160; Given the disadvantages of distance, time difference, and accessibility, problems in the field can last for months without discovery, particularly when the funding party is located in the home country and pays only periodic visits to the program.&#160; Entities receiving these funds are not inclined to reveal internal problems as that might jeopardize their contracts.&#160; Above all, organizations and their funding partners need to recognize that while a seemingly small incident in the field may not have big consequences, leaving it unaddressed will only pave the way for repetition and costlier repercussions later.</p>
<p>In countries beset with crisis, insurgency is only one of the challenges that foreign civilian women face.&#160; The constant onslaught of gender-related complications aggravated by perilous conditions, an unfamiliar culture and being severely outnumbered by men can be even more taxing.&#160; Given the difficulties of working in these environments and what we have now learned, governments and companies must use this knowledge to help guide their staffing in future missions abroad, making sure the same problems do not needlessly repeat themselves costing morale, program success, billions of dollars, and lives.</p> | false | 1 | much focus military women deployed war zones little attention paid foreign civilian counterparts160 women operate countries iraq afghanistan behalf government agencies private entities nonprofit organizations160 hear traveling dangerous places getting injured killed daily lives growing rate females joining workforce last fifty years going places would rare160 still professional field war zones dominated men160 amid politics severely outnumbered pressures dangerous surroundings women face sexual tension harassment marginalization beyond unfolds normal work environmentmost remain unreported 160moreover slew unforeseen genderrelated challenges arise160 adding complication functioning within unfamiliar culture language religion life difficult trying curious startling 2010 went baghdad iraq instructor us governmentfunded educational program160 upon arrival small compound inside international zone iz immediately warned foreign woman showed trailer stick close room office160 dont wander walkways160 rooms occupied men havent seen wives while160 compound housed five women approximately 40 men start apparent problems stemming women themselves160 160many iz given favors catered male colleagues160 men paid meals offered rides shops invitations bars160 extramarital affairs took place desire convenience allowed160 women took advantage sexual power used detriment others160 two compound repeatedly allowed unauthorized male guests overnight compromising everyones security160160 one even became engaged iraqi man spoke rudimentary english twenty years junior160 spoke arabic muslim160 given large amounts money use persuading local judge permit marriage allegedly rejected family cultural religious grounds160 man money never seen again160 caused great anguish absences work team suffered lower productivity gender dynamics became intense locals witness loud shouting came hall one day teaching seminar iraqi government officials prime ministers office majority men160 male colleague berating female workrelated issue160 rage used pejorative language name demean private body parts160 smallframed nowhere run inside cramp compound stood frozen160 everyone class heard him160160 embarrassed beyond speech sat quietly160 finally one male iraqis looked said gravely woman too160 must apologize insulted women moved another war zone new gender issues arose freshly arrived afghanistan year later rule law mission issued bulletproof vest one large clumsy illfitting160160 asked smaller size stating measurements solicited provided employer months ago security officer shrugged reiterating maledominated field160 smaller sizes available160 settled office shared several men music played afternoons contained derogatory sexual lyrics160 one seemed bothered except me160 spoke colleagues remembered longer allboys club things got even personal160 one day collegial conversation quite unexpectedly coworker kabul asked wanted intimate incountry relationship him160 justify proposition revealed married man anyone special afghanistan160 similarly months later kunduz province security manager work meeting asked could come room evening160 inquired stated help shave back160 astounded suggested find man assist himto quickly retorted homophobic female living working remote camp kunduz 700 men life easy160 crucial cautious aware surroundings professional respectable times160 daily sharing workspace cafeterias camp facilities gym macho men sporting huge muscles tattoos160 walked offices guytalk reigned oaths uttered one room nude centerfold prominently displayed160 one large compound meeting several men entered loud verbal altercation security matters160 absurdly time expletive used speaker turned said name apologized continued swearing160 surreal combination inclusion crudity propriety despite goals promoting democracy genderequality afghan women empowerment men know strategically include female colleagues programs160 kunduz one afternoon putting together longawaited seminar afghan women male coworker stated would take care arrangements include meeting female students160 volunteered sit office write reports160 justified referring years experience afghanistan well understood local women160 unfortunately desire control failed discern conservative nature afghan females caused ease foreign women men whatever mens experience male supervisors respect professional boundaries superiors subordinates160 2000 kosovo albanianserbian crisis local secure housing international staff premium160 acting chief mission american nonprofit organization used position try move female subordinate house instead offering empty room person needed it160 failed share bosss romantic sentiment already place live160 showered gifts took meals guise workrelated160 uncomfortable pressured hurriedly finished contract refused renewal left country160 fruitless incident rankled office morale cost lady job robbed program experienced individual international men ones created difficulties foreign women war zones160 host challenges women faced interacting local men deserve books own160 remember daily walk inside kunduz camp exercise attracted lot attention hundreds afghan police trainees lived there160 matter conservatively dressed afghan men would gather stare160 continued small crowd grew intimidating number160 colleague expressed similar frustrations afghan men camp herat160 another mazarisharif voiced vexation local male staff feeling prove them160 though hired promote rule law gender equality problems taking direction woman yet positive sides international female160 baghdad kabul kunduz local women willing talk rather male colleagues sharing aspects daily lives160 baghdad several iraqi women invited homes dinner one took mosque prayer160 kabul afghan female attorneys stayed classes chat lives work160 kunduz local women periodically attending courses approached related concerns lack camp amenities females rather raising male counterparts160 foreign woman war zone one goto person local women communication line international community men problematic160160 many demonstrated intelligence consideration helpfulness160 memorable incidents include one kabul american male coworker new asked see first aid kit issued160 examining reached kit took essential items put mine missing critical pieces160 similarly british male security officer kunduz observed feminine hygiene products sold convenience store allmale compound diplomatically asked needed assistance saying would obtain items elsewhere needed160 iraq american contractor learning runner troubled signing us embassys gym daily access not160 finally majority local men employed international entities venues faithfully performed jobs subject matter experts support staff without giving trouble foreign female colleagues foreign civilian women working war zones experience wide variety genderrelated issues problems lot worse others many incidents going unreported160 fair life men easy either balance security concerns work pressures new culture long periods away family160 yet inside offices wartorn countries stress levels high danger near one sex greatly outnumbers sexual tension harassment discrimination genderrelated disagreements bound happen160 lack robust support systems nearby human resources department trained deal issues ombudsman inspector general office foreign civilian women sparsely populated end feeling vulnerable given politics huge profits made time takes recruit qualified individuals entities operating venues reluctant terminate employees160 many simply rotated individual satellite office whenever behavior problem instead addressing issue160160 leaves way offense reoccur lowered employee morale especially women saw concerns continually ignored160 never spoke whistleblowing statues protect contractors whose contract need renewed160 office productivity suffered employees spent time harboring ill feelings instead nurturing teamwork160160 eventually women men resigned adding personnel cost training replacing them160 ultimately subtracted international communitys credibility success particularly gender equality programs one solution complex web challenges surrounding foreign civilian women working conflictridden countries steps international community take alleviate known repetitive concerns first prior deployment detailed accurate information must provided living working conditions specific host country mere power point presentation working conflict areas general160 predeployment trainings attended presentations often generic country specific160 moreover many presenters never host country information outdated second men women must required attend training devoted sexual harassment discrimination known genderrelated problems making cognizant issues exacerbated one sex severely outnumbers other160 training use examples field must required annually stay beyond year third employers robust hotline support system employees experience difficulties160 system allow employee remain anonymous wishes one power authority make changes necessary160 experience oftentimes trained persons assigned deal matters human resources support needed usually located home country far away different time zone unable respond promptly fourth predeployment security briefing needs include discussions different ways person compromise everyones safety including ones personal relationships fifth government agencies organizations private companies hiring women positions need ensure females valued males affecting costs morale program results provide protective gear actually fit finally importantly managers need acutely aware set example160 organizations swiftly investigate remove supervisors fail follow enforce rules use positions promote condone ignore unethical outcomes160 moreover funding sources programs whether governmental private need play closer role hiring monitoring evaluating160 given disadvantages distance time difference accessibility problems field last months without discovery particularly funding party located home country pays periodic visits program160 entities receiving funds inclined reveal internal problems might jeopardize contracts160 organizations funding partners need recognize seemingly small incident field may big consequences leaving unaddressed pave way repetition costlier repercussions later countries beset crisis insurgency one challenges foreign civilian women face160 constant onslaught genderrelated complications aggravated perilous conditions unfamiliar culture severely outnumbered men even taxing160 given difficulties working environments learned governments companies must use knowledge help guide staffing future missions abroad making sure problems needlessly repeat costing morale program success billions dollars lives | 1,343 |
<p>A look at NFL prospects who helped and may have hurt themselves this past weekend:</p>
<p>Who helped themselves?</p>
<p>Kerryon Johnson, RB, Auburn, JR. (5-11, 212, 4.45, #21)</p>
<p>There is a list of reasons why Auburn knocked off No. 1 ranked Georgia, but Johnson belongs at the top of the list. The junior posted 233 yards of total offense (167 yards rushing, 66 yards receiving) and became the first player this season to rush for over 100 yards against Georgia’s defense.</p>
<p>Johnson, who leads the SEC in rushing yards (1,035) and rushing touchdowns (15), is a slippery runner due to his lateral movement skills and quick decision-making skills, making it a chore on defenders to square him up and finish him to the ground. He is high-cut and long-legged for the position, but those strides allow him to accelerate in a hurry, reaching the second level before defenders can react.</p>
<p>Johnson has seen his workload increase since Kamryn Pettway’s injury and he has responded well, averaging 30.6 offensive touches in the past five games without any signs of slowing down. Johnson might not be a NFL Combine marvel, but his running back-specific traits are why he has been so productive, including his patience to allow Auburn’s dominant offensive line to do its job.</p>
<p>Derrick Nnadi, DT, Florida State, SR. (6-0, 312, 5.17, #91)</p>
<p>After a few subpar performances this season, Nnadi was at his best against Clemson, showing off a skill-set that might make him a top-50 selection in April. He is a mobile tree trunk in the middle of the field, taking on double-teams and clogging inside run lanes. Nnadi uses his natural leverage and upper-body power to engage, hold his ground and shed, quickly resetting his eyes to find the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/John_Walker/" type="external">football</a> and pursue. His smooth hips allows him to break down and quickly redirect in short spaces.</p>
<p>Nnadi finished with six tackles against the Tigers and, although he didn’t have any tackles for loss or sacks, backfield penetration is not what he is asked to do. Similar to several of the Seminoles’ talented prospects, Nnadi has had an up-and-down senior campaign, but the Clemson game film, which will be a match-up that NFL teams focus on, showcases his strengths for the next level.</p>
<p>James Hearns, DE, Louisville, rSR. (6-2, 249, 4.74, #99)</p>
<p>Against Virginia on Saturday, it was a game of threes for Hearns — three sacks, three tackles for loss and three forced fumbles. The Cavaliers’ offensive tackles had trouble slowing down his motor off the edge and even though several of his pressures could be attributed to the coverage, Hearns deserves credit for having the hustle and speed to get home.</p>
<p>He has the arc speed to get his inside shoulder past the outside shoulder of the edge blocker, but he showed a variety of moves in this contest, including an efficient inside spin move that flushed the quarterback from the pocket. Hearns is more of a straight-line athlete and lacks ideal change-of-direction skills to make tight turns, but his quickness out of his cuts allows him to elude blockers in space.</p>
<p>His strong hands on tackle attempts also stands out, punching the ball out on normal hits. Although he finds himself up-field past the quarterback too often and can be controlled in the run game, Hearns competes with the hunger and play speed that will give him a chance in the NFL.</p>
<p>Rodney Anderson, RB, Oklahoma, rSO. (6-1, 220, 4.54, #24)</p>
<p>With Samaje Perine and <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Joe-Mixon/" type="external">Joe Mixon</a> off to the NFL, the Oklahoma running back depth chart had a few question marks entering this season. Anderson missed last season after suffering a neck injury during preseason practice so while there was optimism he could play a role, there was also caution. He touched the ball a total of 15 times over the first five games of the season, but lately, Anderson has proven to be the most valuable member of the offense, aside from the Heisman favorite at quarterback.</p>
<p>Against TCU on Saturday night, Anderson enjoyed a career night with 290 yards of total offense, collecting 151 yards rushing (6.6 average), 139 yards receiving (27.8) and four total touchdowns (two rushing, two receiving). With his combination of size, athleticism and balance, Anderson was quick through the hole with the run strength to shrug off TCU defenders and the agility to make open-field moves at the second level. He also flashed soft hands to catch the ball away from his body with excellent hand-eye coordination to finish.</p>
<p>With 100-plus yards in each of the last four games, Anderson is heating up down the stretch and will have a NFL decision to make after his breakout second half of the season.</p>
<p>Who hurt themselves?</p>
<p>Josh Adams, RB, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Notre_Dame/" type="external">Notre Dame</a>, JR. (6-1, 219, 4.58, #3)</p>
<p>After dominant performances against USC (19-191-3) and N.C. State (27-202-1), Adams missed most of the Wake Forest game due to an illness and was completely ineffective against the athleticism of the Miami defense. He finished with 40 yards on 16 carries for a season-low 2.5 average.</p>
<p>To be fair, the Irish had no passing game and the normally dominant Notre Dame offensive line did him few favors, but Adams struggled to produce with limited opportunities he was given. His lack of speed to the outside really showed vs. the play speed of the Hurricanes’ defense and even when the hole was there, Adams doesn’t always show the needed urgency to attack expiring run lanes.</p>
<p>Adams has linebacker size and will bounce off defenders, but his lack of grace in short spaces also stands out, bouncing off his own blockers and disrupting the timing of the play.</p>
<p>Other notes:</p>
<p>–Wyoming redshirt junior QB Josh Allen (6-4, 233, 4.76, #17) put together a strong first half against Air Force on Saturday night, completing 8 of 11 passes for 70 yards and two touchdowns. However, he took a hard hit to his shoulder on one of the final plays before halftime and received treatment. Allen attempted to play in the third quarter, but after his first throw, he removed himself from the game. He was diagnosed with a strain to the A/C joint in his right shoulder and is considered a “game-time decision” for Saturday.</p>
<p>–Louisville junior QB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Lamar-Jackson/" type="external">Lamar Jackson</a> (6-2, 212, 4.42, #8) had a productive outing in the win over Virginia and, after charting every throw, his accuracy was consistent with what we have seen all season. Against the Cavaliers, he was near perfect on throws 15 yards or less, delivering an accurate ball on 16 of 17 attempts (94.1 percent). On throws over 16 yards, his accuracy rating was only 40 percent (4 of 10), which isn’t a terrible number, but scouts want to see that number above 60 percent (remember, those aren’t completion percentages, but rather accuracy percentages). Bottom line with Jackson, he has improved with his accuracy and touch this season, but his deep ball is clearly an area that requires more work.</p>
<p>–Another polarizing quarterback prospect, Ohio State redshirt senior QB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/JT-Barrett/" type="external">J.T. Barrett</a> (6-1, 225, 4.52, #16) will be an interesting prospect to track during the process. I reached out to three NFL scouts for their opinion on whether or not the Buckeyes’ all-time leader in total offense will be drafted. I received three varied responses: 1. “My gut says no.” 2. “Probably, but not by us.” 3. “Oh yeah, he’s this year’s (Joshua) Dobbs.”</p>
<p>–Auburn senior RG Braden Smith (6-5, 303, 5.12, #71) had another outstanding performance in the win over Auburn, helping Kerryon Johnson have his big day. If not for Notre Dame’s Quenton Nelson, Smith would be receiving much more attention as the draft’s top guard prospect.</p>
<p>–UTSA senior DE/OLB Marcus Davenport (6-5, 252, 4.77, #93) continued his impressive 2017 season with 2.5 tackles for loss and one sack against UAB on Saturday. He now has 45 tackles, 14.5 tackles for loss, 7.5 sacks and three forced fumbles on the season and with his impressive tape, Davenport is making a strong case to be a top-50 draft pick. A positive week in Mobile at the Senior Bowl would continue to push his draft value higher and higher.</p>
<p>–Speaking of the Senior Bowl, several SEC prospects have received their invitations like Florida CB Duke Dawson (5-10, 208, 4.57, #7), Arkansas OC Frank Ragnow (6-4, 319, 5.33, #72) and Ole Miss DE/OLB Marquis Haynes (6-2, 225, 4.73, #38). And Haynes will be an interesting player to watch because he is somewhat of a pass-rushing tweener. He will likely play linebacker at the Senior Bowl, giving scouts a chance to see him in space and covering backs and tight ends.</p>
<p>–Another week, another noteworthy performance by Iowa junior CB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Joshua_Jackson/" type="external">Joshua Jackson</a> (6-0, 193, 4.48, #15). Although it came in a loss, he accounted for both of the Hawkeyes’ touchdowns with a pair of pick-sixes. In the last two weeks, Jackson now has five interceptions, accounting for 117 return yards, and the two touchdowns. His combination of athleticism, length and ball skills are the main reason for his production this season — and the main reason why NFL teams will consider him in the first round of the NFL Draft.</p>
<p>–A pair of Division-II offensive tackles have garnered plenty of NFL attention: Humboldt State redshirt senior LT Alex Cappa (6-6, 305, 5.27, #71) and West Georgia redshirt senior LT Desmond Harrison (6-7, 292, 5.18, #68). Both have impressive tape, but the all-star game circuit is where they can truly boost their draft value, especially with all 32 NFL teams looking for offensive tackle help.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Dane-Brugler/" type="external">Dane Brugler</a> is a Senior Analyst for NFLDraftScout.com, a collaboration between The Sports Xchange and Pro Football Hall of Fame.</p> | false | 1 | look nfl prospects helped may hurt past weekend helped kerryon johnson rb auburn jr 511 212 445 21 list reasons auburn knocked 1 ranked georgia johnson belongs top list junior posted 233 yards total offense 167 yards rushing 66 yards receiving became first player season rush 100 yards georgias defense johnson leads sec rushing yards 1035 rushing touchdowns 15 slippery runner due lateral movement skills quick decisionmaking skills making chore defenders square finish ground highcut longlegged position strides allow accelerate hurry reaching second level defenders react johnson seen workload increase since kamryn pettways injury responded well averaging 306 offensive touches past five games without signs slowing johnson might nfl combine marvel running backspecific traits productive including patience allow auburns dominant offensive line job derrick nnadi dt florida state sr 60 312 517 91 subpar performances season nnadi best clemson showing skillset might make top50 selection april mobile tree trunk middle field taking doubleteams clogging inside run lanes nnadi uses natural leverage upperbody power engage hold ground shed quickly resetting eyes find football pursue smooth hips allows break quickly redirect short spaces nnadi finished six tackles tigers although didnt tackles loss sacks backfield penetration asked similar several seminoles talented prospects nnadi upanddown senior campaign clemson game film matchup nfl teams focus showcases strengths next level james hearns de louisville rsr 62 249 474 99 virginia saturday game threes hearns three sacks three tackles loss three forced fumbles cavaliers offensive tackles trouble slowing motor edge even though several pressures could attributed coverage hearns deserves credit hustle speed get home arc speed get inside shoulder past outside shoulder edge blocker showed variety moves contest including efficient inside spin move flushed quarterback pocket hearns straightline athlete lacks ideal changeofdirection skills make tight turns quickness cuts allows elude blockers space strong hands tackle attempts also stands punching ball normal hits although finds upfield past quarterback often controlled run game hearns competes hunger play speed give chance nfl rodney anderson rb oklahoma rso 61 220 454 24 samaje perine joe mixon nfl oklahoma running back depth chart question marks entering season anderson missed last season suffering neck injury preseason practice optimism could play role also caution touched ball total 15 times first five games season lately anderson proven valuable member offense aside heisman favorite quarterback tcu saturday night anderson enjoyed career night 290 yards total offense collecting 151 yards rushing 66 average 139 yards receiving 278 four total touchdowns two rushing two receiving combination size athleticism balance anderson quick hole run strength shrug tcu defenders agility make openfield moves second level also flashed soft hands catch ball away body excellent handeye coordination finish 100plus yards last four games anderson heating stretch nfl decision make breakout second half season hurt josh adams rb notre dame jr 61 219 458 3 dominant performances usc 191913 nc state 272021 adams missed wake forest game due illness completely ineffective athleticism miami defense finished 40 yards 16 carries seasonlow 25 average fair irish passing game normally dominant notre dame offensive line favors adams struggled produce limited opportunities given lack speed outside really showed vs play speed hurricanes defense even hole adams doesnt always show needed urgency attack expiring run lanes adams linebacker size bounce defenders lack grace short spaces also stands bouncing blockers disrupting timing play notes wyoming redshirt junior qb josh allen 64 233 476 17 put together strong first half air force saturday night completing 8 11 passes 70 yards two touchdowns however took hard hit shoulder one final plays halftime received treatment allen attempted play third quarter first throw removed game diagnosed strain ac joint right shoulder considered gametime decision saturday louisville junior qb lamar jackson 62 212 442 8 productive outing win virginia charting every throw accuracy consistent seen season cavaliers near perfect throws 15 yards less delivering accurate ball 16 17 attempts 941 percent throws 16 yards accuracy rating 40 percent 4 10 isnt terrible number scouts want see number 60 percent remember arent completion percentages rather accuracy percentages bottom line jackson improved accuracy touch season deep ball clearly area requires work another polarizing quarterback prospect ohio state redshirt senior qb jt barrett 61 225 452 16 interesting prospect track process reached three nfl scouts opinion whether buckeyes alltime leader total offense drafted received three varied responses 1 gut says 2 probably us 3 oh yeah hes years joshua dobbs auburn senior rg braden smith 65 303 512 71 another outstanding performance win auburn helping kerryon johnson big day notre dames quenton nelson smith would receiving much attention drafts top guard prospect utsa senior deolb marcus davenport 65 252 477 93 continued impressive 2017 season 25 tackles loss one sack uab saturday 45 tackles 145 tackles loss 75 sacks three forced fumbles season impressive tape davenport making strong case top50 draft pick positive week mobile senior bowl would continue push draft value higher higher speaking senior bowl several sec prospects received invitations like florida cb duke dawson 510 208 457 7 arkansas oc frank ragnow 64 319 533 72 ole miss deolb marquis haynes 62 225 473 38 haynes interesting player watch somewhat passrushing tweener likely play linebacker senior bowl giving scouts chance see space covering backs tight ends another week another noteworthy performance iowa junior cb joshua jackson 60 193 448 15 although came loss accounted hawkeyes touchdowns pair picksixes last two weeks jackson five interceptions accounting 117 return yards two touchdowns combination athleticism length ball skills main reason production season main reason nfl teams consider first round nfl draft pair divisionii offensive tackles garnered plenty nfl attention humboldt state redshirt senior lt alex cappa 66 305 527 71 west georgia redshirt senior lt desmond harrison 67 292 518 68 impressive tape allstar game circuit truly boost draft value especially 32 nfl teams looking offensive tackle help dane brugler senior analyst nfldraftscoutcom collaboration sports xchange pro football hall fame | 974 |
<p>Police were still scrambling, bodies were still warm, almost no facts about the shooter or the event were established, but already political operators were pushing their narrative in the wake of Friday’s deadly shooting at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs.</p>
<p>And the narrative that the media are pushing is not only insane — as in, utterly divorced from reality — but deeply, deeply saddening as it reveals a profound inability to understand people at a basic level.</p>
<p>First, let’s get the obvious — or what should be obvious — out of the way: The shooting suspect, Robert Lewis Dear, is likely insane. Not just “insane” in the sense that anybody who would shoot someone unprovoked is “insane”, but “insane” in the “thinking he’s a poached egg” sense. He lived in a shack without indoor plumbing, was arrested for being a peeping tom, and told anyone who would listen <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/alleged-colorado-gunman-was-adrift-and-alienated/2015/11/28/7cb93b62-95f5-11e5-8aa0-5d0946560a97_story.html?hpid=hp_rhp-top-table-main_no-name%3Ahomepage%2Fstory" type="external">about conspiracy theories</a>. Nobody has been able to find a link between him and a pro-life organization, or a church. According to law enforcement sources, Dear said something about “baby parts,” in reference to the undercover videos about Planned Parenthood by the Center for Medical Progress, but, according to <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/planned-parenthood-shooting-suspect-made-comment-about-no-more-baby-n470706" type="external">NBC</a>, “the sources stressed that Dear said many things to law enforcement and the extent to which the ‘baby parts’ remark played into any decision to target the Planned Parenthood office was not yet clear.”</p>
<p>Given this picture, the idea that the main cause for Dear’s shooting was the Planned Parenthood videos, and the pro-life movement at large, and not Dear’s own utterly ruined psyche is a stretch — to put it lightly.</p>
<p>Despite disregard for the facts, progressives who want to make such a claim ought to be careful about sawing off the branch they’re sitting on. If the Center for Medical Progress is responsible for Dear’s victims, are gay rights activists to be blamed for the death of the Family Research Council’s security guard, since the shooter in that instance <a href="http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/fbi-video-domestic-terrorist-says-he-targeted-conservative-group-for-being-anti-gay/article/2528072" type="external">said</a> he attacked FRC because they are “anti-gay”? Should we place Richard Dawkins under arrest when a self-proclaimed “anti-theist” <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2015/02/chapel-hill-shooting-white-male-atheist-murders-three-muslim-students" type="external">goes postal</a> on Muslims? Or, to recall an old debate, why didn’t we shut down video game studios in the wake of the Columbine shooting?</p>
<p>And, to confront the elephant in the room, what about Islamic terrorism? Jihadist terrorists are always very explicit about what motivates them: They believe that they are accomplishing the will of the one God who chose Muhammad as his Prophet. Yet we are consistently informed that this <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/1/7/7509265/charlie-hebdo-cartoons" type="external">cannot</a> be the true <a href="http://scholars-stage.blogspot.fr/2015/11/vox-will-never-understand-islam-or-any.html" type="external">reason</a> for their actions. In the Islamic world, there are literally thousands of preachers who, in various ways, with varying degrees of vitriol, portray the West as the enemies of Islam. But they have no responsibility for Islamic terrorism.</p>
<p>In a sense, you have to feel sorry for the progressives here. One reason why they’re clearly grasping at straws is because what’s striking about the pro-life movement is how astonishingly little terrorism it produces. First, let’s be clear about one thing: every single mass movement, no matter how peaceful the aims and methods of its leadership, will have a violent fringe. That’s just how human nature works. There was the civil rights movement, and there were Black Panthers. Zionism. Arab nationalism. You name it. Under Apartheid South Africa, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_Street_bombing" type="external">the armed wing of the African National Congress</a> conducted acts of sabotage and bombings that killed people, including civilians. If you’re anything like me, you find it hard to feel too badly about black South Africans responding with force to Apartheid, which, of course, is precisely my point.</p>
<p>Can you name an organization that is to the pro-life movement as the Black Panthers were to the civil-rights movement, or as the IRA was to the cause of Irish independence? No, you can’t, because such an organization doesn’t exist.</p>
<p>Psychopaths are around 1 percent of the general population. Roughly half of Americans identify as pro-life, which means that if psychopaths are evenly spread among pro-lifers, there are about one million and a half pro-life psychopaths going around. Not even counting the countless “normal” people who surely have been turned into bloodthirsty maniacs by pro-life rhetoric.</p>
<p>So, how many people have these millions of pro-life psychos murdered over the past 40 years that the pro-life movement has been around? <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/29/us/siege-highlights-security-used-in-abortion-clinics.html" type="external">Eight</a>.</p>
<p>Eight people is not nothing. It’s also less people killed over forty years than Nidal Hasan killed in 10 minutes, less than were killed in Columbine High School over the span of an hour.</p>
<p>Aren’t progressives supposed to be constantly warning us to be rational about the risks of terrorism? One week ago, it was crazy to be concerned about terrorists sneaking into the West among Middle East refugees, even after terrorists snuck into the West among Middle East refugees. Because the odds of being killed by a terrorist are lower than the odds of being killed by falling <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/06/americans-are-as-likely-to-be-killed-by-their-own-furniture-as-by-terrorism/258156/" type="external">furniture</a>!</p>
<p>If anything, the dearth of pro-life terrorism is usually deployed as an argument against pro-lifers. I wish I’d had a nickel for every time a progressive told me that if pro-lifers really <a href="http://atheism.about.com/od/abortioncontraception/p/ProLifeRhetoric.htm" type="external">believed</a> fetuses are human beings, then they would <a href="http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=764670" type="external">rise up in arms</a>, because the current abortion regime would rival the Holocaust. In other words, we don’t believe what we say we believe — we’re hypocrites. (Of course, if we did condone killing abortionists, we would clearly be hypocrites, because that wouldn’t be very “pro-life.” Heads I win, tails you lose.)</p>
<p>But there are even more insane ideas at work here. It’s one thing to say that the Planned Parenthood videos might have inadvertently led to the shooting. It’s quite another to say that mainstream pro-lifers deliberatelyincite people to violence.</p>
<p>“How we talk about abortion matters. We know it, and anti-choice extremists and politicians know it,” pro-choice advocate Jessica Valenti intoned in <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/nov/29/planned-parenthood-colorado-springs-shooting-no-more-baby-parts" type="external">The Guardian</a>. We’re doing it on purpose.</p>
<p>And here, words simply fail. Because the problem isn’t just dealing with reality. It is a lack of basic empathy.</p>
<p>Trust me on this. Pro-lifers genuinely believe what they say they believe. They believe that life begins at conception, they believe that human life is valuable, and they want to defend it. To imply otherwise shows a total inability to see a different point of view.</p>
<p>For instance, I could believe that pro-choicers are evil baby-killers, but I like to think they are simply misguided. In fact, I force myself to, because I realize that it’s a part of citizenship — to look at one’s political opponents as human beings, engaged in the same endeavor as me, albeit disagreeing about means.</p>
<p>It’s called empathy. Trust me, it’s very useful to exercise it, especially in those cases when it doesn’t necessarily come naturally. Being pro-life taught me that.</p>
<p>Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry is a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p> | false | 1 | police still scrambling bodies still warm almost facts shooter event established already political operators pushing narrative wake fridays deadly shooting planned parenthood clinic colorado springs narrative media pushing insane utterly divorced reality deeply deeply saddening reveals profound inability understand people basic level first lets get obvious obvious way shooting suspect robert lewis dear likely insane insane sense anybody would shoot someone unprovoked insane insane thinking hes poached egg sense lived shack without indoor plumbing arrested peeping tom told anyone would listen conspiracy theories nobody able find link prolife organization church according law enforcement sources dear said something baby parts reference undercover videos planned parenthood center medical progress according nbc sources stressed dear said many things law enforcement extent baby parts remark played decision target planned parenthood office yet clear given picture idea main cause dears shooting planned parenthood videos prolife movement large dears utterly ruined psyche stretch put lightly despite disregard facts progressives want make claim ought careful sawing branch theyre sitting center medical progress responsible dears victims gay rights activists blamed death family research councils security guard since shooter instance said attacked frc antigay place richard dawkins arrest selfproclaimed antitheist goes postal muslims recall old debate didnt shut video game studios wake columbine shooting confront elephant room islamic terrorism jihadist terrorists always explicit motivates believe accomplishing one god chose muhammad prophet yet consistently informed true reason actions islamic world literally thousands preachers various ways varying degrees vitriol portray west enemies islam responsibility islamic terrorism sense feel sorry progressives one reason theyre clearly grasping straws whats striking prolife movement astonishingly little terrorism produces first lets clear one thing every single mass movement matter peaceful aims methods leadership violent fringe thats human nature works civil rights movement black panthers zionism arab nationalism name apartheid south africa armed wing african national congress conducted acts sabotage bombings killed people including civilians youre anything like find hard feel badly black south africans responding force apartheid course precisely point name organization prolife movement black panthers civilrights movement ira cause irish independence cant organization doesnt exist psychopaths around 1 percent general population roughly half americans identify prolife means psychopaths evenly spread among prolifers one million half prolife psychopaths going around even counting countless normal people surely turned bloodthirsty maniacs prolife rhetoric many people millions prolife psychos murdered past 40 years prolife movement around eight eight people nothing also less people killed forty years nidal hasan killed 10 minutes less killed columbine high school span hour arent progressives supposed constantly warning us rational risks terrorism one week ago crazy concerned terrorists sneaking west among middle east refugees even terrorists snuck west among middle east refugees odds killed terrorist lower odds killed falling furniture anything dearth prolife terrorism usually deployed argument prolifers wish id nickel every time progressive told prolifers really believed fetuses human beings would rise arms current abortion regime would rival holocaust words dont believe say believe hypocrites course condone killing abortionists would clearly hypocrites wouldnt prolife heads win tails lose even insane ideas work one thing say planned parenthood videos might inadvertently led shooting quite another say mainstream prolifers deliberatelyincite people violence talk abortion matters know antichoice extremists politicians know prochoice advocate jessica valenti intoned guardian purpose words simply fail problem isnt dealing reality lack basic empathy trust prolifers genuinely believe say believe believe life begins conception believe human life valuable want defend imply otherwise shows total inability see different point view instance could believe prochoicers evil babykillers like think simply misguided fact force realize part citizenship look ones political opponents human beings engaged endeavor albeit disagreeing means called empathy trust useful exercise especially cases doesnt necessarily come naturally prolife taught pascalemmanuel gobry fellow ethics public policy center | 613 |
<p>It's fascinating that even the bankers in whom Clinton confides her militarist mania ask her identical questions to those I get asked by peace activists.</p>
<p>At first glance, Hillary Clinton’s speeches to Goldman Sachs, which she refused to show us but WikiLeaks claims to have now produced the texts of, reveal less blatant hypocrisy or abuse than do the texts of various emails also recently revealed. But take a closer look.</p>
<p>Clinton has famously said that she believes in maintaining a public position on each issue that differs from her private position. Which did she provide to Goldman Sachs?</p>
<p>Yes, Clinton does profess her loyalty to corporate trade agreements, but at the time of her remarks she hadn’t yet started (publicly) claiming otherwise.</p>
<p>I think, in fact, that Clinton maintains numerous positions on various issues, and that those she provided to Goldman Sachs were in part her public stances, in part her confidences to co-conspirators, and in part her partisan Democratic case to a room of Republicans as to why they should donate more to her and less to the GOP. This was not the sort of talk she’d have given to labor union executives or human rights professionals or Bernie Sanders delegates. She has a position for every audience.</p>
<p>In the speech transcripts from June 4, 2013, October 29, 2013, and October 19, 2015, Clinton was apparently paid sufficiently to do something she denies most audiences. That is, she took questions that it appears likely she was not secretly briefed on or engaged in negotiations over ahead of time. In part this appears to be the case because some of the questions were lengthy speeches, and in part because her answers were not all the sort of meaningless platitudes that she produces if given time to prepare.</p>
<p>Much of the content of these speeches to U.S. bankers dealt with foreign policy, and virtually all of that with warfare, potential warfare, and opportunities for military-led domination of various regions of the globe. This stuff is more interesting and less insultingly presented than the idiocies spewed out at the public presidential debates. But it also fits an image of U.S. policy that Clinton might have preferred to keep private. Just as nobody advertised that, as emails now show, Wall Street bankers helped pick President Obama’s cabinet, we’re generally discouraged from thinking that wars and foreign bases are intended as services to financial overlords. “I’m representing all of you,” Clinton says to the bankers in reference to her efforts at a meeting in Asia. Sub-Saharan Africa has great potential for U.S. “businesses and entrepreneurs,” she says in reference to U.S. militarism there.</p>
<p>Yet, in these speeches, Clinton projects exactly that approach, accurately or not, on other nations and accuses China of just the sort of thing that her “far left” critics accuse her of all the time, albeit outside the censorship of U.S. corporate media. China, Clinton says, may use hatred of Japan as a means of distracting Chinese people from unpopular and harmful economic policies. China, Clinton says, struggles to maintain civilian control over its military. Hmm. Where else have we seen these problems?</p>
<p>“We’re going to ring China with missile ‘defense,'” Clinton tells Goldman Sachs. “We’re going to put more of our fleet in the area.”</p>
<p>On Syria, Clinton says it’s hard to figure out whom to arm—completely oblivious to any options other than arming somebody. It’s hard, she says, to predict at all what will happen. So, her advice, which she blurts out to a room of bankers, is to wage war in Syria very “covertly.”</p>
<p>In public debates, Clinton demands a “no fly zone” or “no bombing zone” or “safe zone” in Syria, from which to organize a war to overthrow the government. In a speech to Goldman Sachs, however, she blurts out that creating such a zone would require bombing a lot more populated areas than was required in Libya. “You’re going to kill a lot of Syrians,” she admits. She even tries to distance herself from the proposal by referring to “this intervention that people talk about so glibly”—although she, before and at the time of that speech and ever since has been the leading such person.</p>
<p>Clinton also makes clear that Syrian “jihadists” are being funded by Saudi Arabia, UAE, and Qatar. In October 2013, as the U.S. public had rejected bombing Syria, Blankfein asked if the public was now opposed to “interventions”—that clearly being understood as a hurdle to be overcome. Clinton said not to fear. “We’re in a time in Syria,” she said, “where they’re not finished killing each other . . . and maybe you just have to wait and watch it.”</p>
<p>That’s the view of many ill-meaning and many well-meaning people who have been persuaded that the only two choices in foreign policy are bombing people and doing nothing. That clearly is the understanding of the former Secretary of State, whose positions were more hawkish than those of her counterpart at the Pentagon. It’s also reminiscent of Harry Truman’s comment that if the Germans were winning you should help the Russians and vice versa, so that more people would die. That’s not exactly what Clinton said here, but it’s pretty close, and it’s something she would not say in a scripted joint-media-appearance masquerading as a debate. The possibility of disarmament, nonviolent peacework, actual aid on a massive scale, and respectful diplomacy that leaves U.S. influence out of the resulting states is just not on Clinton’s radar no matter who is in her audience.</p>
<p>On Iran, Clinton repeatedly hypes false claims about nuclear weapons and terrorism, even while admitting far more openly than we’re used to that Iran’s religious leader denounces and opposes nuclear weapons. She also admits that Saudi Arabia is already pursuing nuclear weapons and that UAE and Egypt are likely to do so, at least if Iran does. She also admits that the Saudi government is far from stable.</p>
<p>Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein asks Clinton at one point how a good war against Iran might go—he suggesting that an occupation (yes, they use that forbidden word) might not be the best move. Clinton replies that Iran can just be bombed. Blankfein, rather shockingly, appeals to reality—something Clinton goes on at obnoxious length about elsewhere in these speeches. Has bombing a population into submission ever worked, Blankfein asks. Clinton admits that it has not but suggests that it just might work on Iranians because they are not democratic.</p>
<p>Regarding Egypt, Clinton makes clear her opposition to popular change.</p>
<p>Regarding China again, Clinton claims to have told the Chinese that the United States could claim ownership of the entire Pacific as a result of having “liberated it.” She goes on to claim to have told them that “We discovered Japan for heaven’s sake.” And: “We have proof of having bought [Hawaii].” Really? From whom?</p>
<p>This is ugly stuff, at least as damaging to human lives as the filth coming from Donald Trump. Yet it’s fascinating that even the bankers in whom Clinton confides her militarist mania ask her identical questions to those I get asked by peace activists at speaking events: “Is the U.S. political system completely broken?” “Should we scrap this and go with a parliamentary system?” Et cetera. In part their concern is the supposed gridlock created by differences between the two big parties, whereas my biggest concern is the militarized destruction of people and the environment that never seems to encounter even a slight traffic slowdown in Congress. But if you imagine that the people Bernie Sanders always denounces as taking home all the profits are happy with the status quo, think again. They benefit in certain ways, but they don’t control their monster and it doesn’t make them feel fulfilled.</p>
<p>This article was originally published at <a href="http://davidswanson.org/node/5311" type="external">DavidSwanson.org</a>.</p> | false | 1 | fascinating even bankers clinton confides militarist mania ask identical questions get asked peace activists first glance hillary clintons speeches goldman sachs refused show us wikileaks claims produced texts reveal less blatant hypocrisy abuse texts various emails also recently revealed take closer look clinton famously said believes maintaining public position issue differs private position provide goldman sachs yes clinton profess loyalty corporate trade agreements time remarks hadnt yet started publicly claiming otherwise think fact clinton maintains numerous positions various issues provided goldman sachs part public stances part confidences coconspirators part partisan democratic case room republicans donate less gop sort talk shed given labor union executives human rights professionals bernie sanders delegates position every audience speech transcripts june 4 2013 october 29 2013 october 19 2015 clinton apparently paid sufficiently something denies audiences took questions appears likely secretly briefed engaged negotiations ahead time part appears case questions lengthy speeches part answers sort meaningless platitudes produces given time prepare much content speeches us bankers dealt foreign policy virtually warfare potential warfare opportunities militaryled domination various regions globe stuff interesting less insultingly presented idiocies spewed public presidential debates also fits image us policy clinton might preferred keep private nobody advertised emails show wall street bankers helped pick president obamas cabinet generally discouraged thinking wars foreign bases intended services financial overlords im representing clinton says bankers reference efforts meeting asia subsaharan africa great potential us businesses entrepreneurs says reference us militarism yet speeches clinton projects exactly approach accurately nations accuses china sort thing far left critics accuse time albeit outside censorship us corporate media china clinton says may use hatred japan means distracting chinese people unpopular harmful economic policies china clinton says struggles maintain civilian control military hmm else seen problems going ring china missile defense clinton tells goldman sachs going put fleet area syria clinton says hard figure armcompletely oblivious options arming somebody hard says predict happen advice blurts room bankers wage war syria covertly public debates clinton demands fly zone bombing zone safe zone syria organize war overthrow government speech goldman sachs however blurts creating zone would require bombing lot populated areas required libya youre going kill lot syrians admits even tries distance proposal referring intervention people talk gliblyalthough time speech ever since leading person clinton also makes clear syrian jihadists funded saudi arabia uae qatar october 2013 us public rejected bombing syria blankfein asked public opposed interventionsthat clearly understood hurdle overcome clinton said fear time syria said theyre finished killing maybe wait watch thats view many illmeaning many wellmeaning people persuaded two choices foreign policy bombing people nothing clearly understanding former secretary state whose positions hawkish counterpart pentagon also reminiscent harry trumans comment germans winning help russians vice versa people would die thats exactly clinton said pretty close something would say scripted jointmediaappearance masquerading debate possibility disarmament nonviolent peacework actual aid massive scale respectful diplomacy leaves us influence resulting states clintons radar matter audience iran clinton repeatedly hypes false claims nuclear weapons terrorism even admitting far openly used irans religious leader denounces opposes nuclear weapons also admits saudi arabia already pursuing nuclear weapons uae egypt likely least iran also admits saudi government far stable goldman sachs ceo lloyd blankfein asks clinton one point good war iran might gohe suggesting occupation yes use forbidden word might best move clinton replies iran bombed blankfein rather shockingly appeals realitysomething clinton goes obnoxious length elsewhere speeches bombing population submission ever worked blankfein asks clinton admits suggests might work iranians democratic regarding egypt clinton makes clear opposition popular change regarding china clinton claims told chinese united states could claim ownership entire pacific result liberated goes claim told discovered japan heavens sake proof bought hawaii really ugly stuff least damaging human lives filth coming donald trump yet fascinating even bankers clinton confides militarist mania ask identical questions get asked peace activists speaking events us political system completely broken scrap go parliamentary system et cetera part concern supposed gridlock created differences two big parties whereas biggest concern militarized destruction people environment never seems encounter even slight traffic slowdown congress imagine people bernie sanders always denounces taking home profits happy status quo think benefit certain ways dont control monster doesnt make feel fulfilled article originally published davidswansonorg | 697 |
<p />
<p>El Nubek, SYRIA — As two delegations, one representing the Government of the Syrian Arab Republic led by Bashar Assad and the other claiming to represent the popular opposition that is seeking its overthrow, arrived in Switzerland this morning to continue with Round Two of Geneva II, there is uncertainty over the agenda and whether to extend this weekend’s 36 hour “Humanitarian pause” to allow aid into the Old City of Homs.&#160;&#160;Such a deal, which could come at any time, would bolster confidence ahead of the Round Two of the peace talks.</p>
<p>Some observers, including this one, predict that the ceasefire will in fact be extended as a result of a meeting on February 10 being held between Syrian government officials here in Homs and UN representatives that will likely result in more civilians being allowed out of the old city later today or tomorrow.</p>
<p>But it is not certain. &#160;And meanwhile, on February 10, the meager amounts of aid trickling into Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp in Damascus was stopped due to &#160;yet another breach of a “humanitarian pause” that was agreed upon last week.</p>
<p>The governor of Homs, Talal al-Barazi, has advised journalists and observers gathered in his office yesterday that the ceasefire may be extended by a further three days; to allow all those who might want to leave the chance to do so. The operation to help trapped civilians in Homs was the one concrete agreement reached at recent peace talks in Geneva, which are due to resume on Monday.</p>
<p>There remains much mistrust and plenty of PR jockeying from both sides as the public awaits the sound of the gavel from UN envoy&#160;Lakhdar&#160;Brahimi&#160;to resume discussions to end the killing in Syria. The new opposition team, at press time, is not fully identified but has announced that it wants the focus of Round Two to be solely or how to transition ( it demands a&#160;&#160;clean slate in Damascus)&#160;&#160;and nothing else.</p>
<p>In contradistinction, Syrian government Presidential Political and Media Adviser Dr. Buthaina Shaaban argues that the continuing essential problem in the search for a political solution through the Geneva track lies in the fact that “we don’t know whom is representing those who came by the name of opposition, how many, and what is their relation to Syria.”&#160;&#160;She added that the coalition delegation came to Geneva for discussing one word in the December 12, 013 Geneva I Communiqué; transition. &#160;Whereas&#160;the Syrian official delegation wants initially to discuss the first item&#160;in the Communiqué, the halt of&#160;violence, combating terrorism and the preservation of state institutions.</p>
<p>Whether there will be an extension of the just competed “three-day humanitarian pause” cease-fire is not yet sure. In point of clarification, the&#160;&#160;so-called “three day” partial ceasefire to allow humanitarian aid to the area which for more than 600 days has experienced nearly daily bombardment of the city which is labeled by some as the “Birthplace of the Revolution” is a misnomer in the extreme. The so-called “Humanitarian Pause”, such as it was, never comprised three days. Rather, in reality it was for less than 36 hours given that aid deliveries and evacuations were strictly limited to 12 hours, from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. over three days.</p>
<p>One spokesman for a European aid organization, attempted to enlighten this observer on the ceasefire terms by claiming that&#160;“After 6 p.m. any aid distributors within a snipers scope is fair game and they are for warned. I told them it is kind of like caveat emptor after six or before six.”</p>
<p>Frankly, the gentleman could not be more mistaken and he should have known better given his job. His view constitutes a shocking and fundamentally flawed edict&#160;&#160;and misstatement of applicable binding international norms anchored in black letter public international humanitarian law, including but not limited to the Geneva Conventions and other principles, standards and rule of international humanitarian law requiring protection by all belligerents of aid workers&#160;whenever and wherever they perform their humanitarian work.&#160;&#160;Nor can International customary law and treaty law on this subject be abrogated bilaterally by warring parties who may choose not to kill aid workers or civilians only during a mutually declared 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. day shift.</p>
<p>The aid workers in Homs, as all civilians, are inviolate during military action.&#160;&#160;Nor is there any suggestion that either party has complied international law, which requires all warring factions to allow unconditional humanitarian access. It is no excuse, but there does appear, according to information given to these observers from local residents, that more than 30 different armed groups operate in the Old City, making any agreement among them unlikely.&#160;&#160;The &#160;Regional Advisor of UNICEF,&#160; Mr. Geoffrey Ijumba a reasonable sounding fellow, claims that “the main stumbling block is that the 30 plus militia groups inside Homs want guarantees that the aid will still be delivered to the Old City once the civilians are evacuated.” An extended ceasefire, given recent government military gains is, according to some observers monitoring developments in Homs, a rather tough precondition to expect from the Syrian government given the price it has paid for advancing militarily over the past two years in this area.</p>
<p>There is currently plenty of mistrust and much PR jockeying from both sides. The new opposition team, at press time not fully identified, wants the focus of Round Two to be solely transition and nothing else. Syrian government Presidential Political and Media Adviser Dr. Buthaina Shaaban strongly argues that an essential problem in the search for a political solution through the Geneva track lies in the fact that “we don’t know whom is representing those who came by the name of opposition, how many, and what is their relation to Syria.”&#160;&#160;She added that the coalition delegation came to Geneva for discussing one word in the Geneva I Communiqué; transition whereas&#160;&#160;the Syrian official delegation wants initially to discuss the first item&#160;&#160;in the Communiqué, the halt of&#160;&#160;violence, combating terrorism and the preservation of state institutions. For its part, Damascus has been keen to portray the humanitarian deal outside the framework of talks, with pundits and parliamentarians taking to the airwaves to tout the deal as evidence of the government’s ongoing efforts to aid civilians. It has come under pressure from its allies Russia and Iran to make humanitarian concessions.</p>
<p>Predictably perhaps, both sides accuse the other of violations of the claimed three-day humanitarian aid ceasefire as the Opposition team announced that its delegation to “Round Two” was being re-configured.&#160;&#160;Many observers of Genera II judged that the strong personalities and intellects of the Syrian delegation, including Foreign Minister Walid Mouallum, Dr. Bouthania Shaaban, and Minister of Information Omran Zoubi as well as Faisal Mekdad,&#160;among others, “won”&#160;Round I of the public relations challenge of Geneva II and that the Obama Administration via John Kerry advised the opposition to that, “It had better field a stronger team or risk losing ground”.</p>
<p>The first civilians were evacuated from a rebel-held area of the Syrian city of Homs on February 8 after more than a year and half of struggling to survive. Six buses arrived with three UN vehicles and six Red Crescent ambulances to pick up women, children, and elderly. Dina Elkassaby, a spokeswoman for the World Food Program, said its staff had reported that many of the evacuees were in “very, very bad shape,” with children showing signs of malnutrition.</p>
<p>Humanitarian workers braved mortar shells and gunfire on February 9 as they pushed forward with their mission to deliver aid into besieged parts of the Syrian city of Homs through Jouret al Shayah al Qoubaisi. 12 civilians came out on the first bus from the rebel enclave.</p>
<p>Syria state television said four members of the Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARCS) were wounded by&#160;&#160;“armed terrorist groups”,&#160;&#160;on February 9 as the aid workers tried to deliver humanitarian supplies to a besieged, rebel-held district of Homs city. At sunset, Abu Bilal, an activist trapped in the old city since June 2012, explained: “We hope more aid will come in, and we hope the civilians can be evacuated, but we don’t know whether that will happen. We are afraid that we will only see more of yesterday’s shelling.” The Syrian Red Crescent Society told observers that it has been “a challenge” to get its staff and the UN team out of the area. SARCS official Khaled Erksoussi said the convoy came under attack from mortars and gunfire as it was leaving the Qarabis neighborhood.</p>
<p>Many of those evacuated on February 7 looked frail and described extreme hardships inside the area, which has been under army siege for nearly a year-and-a-half. They said bread had not been available for months, and many residents were gathering weeds and leaves to eat. As the BBC’s Lyse Doucet reported: “The tide of people continued—elderly men and women on stretchers or crutches, exhausted mothers in tears, children who went straight into the arms of waiting aid officials from the UN and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent Society. Water, bread, even polio vaccinations were provided on the spot. Many residents who have finally escaped speak of having only grass and olives to eat.”</p>
<p>On Sunday, February 9,&#160;611&#160;civilians, an increase from 83 on February 7, who were besieged for more than 600 days in the old city of Homs were evacuated, the majority being women, children and elderly. According to one of the Governate of Homs officials responsible for monitoring their evacuation, their ages ranged between 16 and 54 years of age. It is not yet clear if the warring parties will agree to a three day (36 hour) extension of the aid mission and if so that it will be honored.&#160;&#160;The governor of Homs, Talal al-Barazi stated that his administration will cooperate if the UN mission and the Syrian Red Crescent are the ones delivering the aid.&#160;&#160;Food and hygiene kits and have also been distributed in the neighborhoods of Bustan al-Diwan and al-Hamidieh.</p>
<p>The humanitarian aid gesture in the Old City of Homs is modest, compared to the more than four million civilians living under siege across this great country, being war deprived of adequate food, water, or sanitation. In all, some 9.3 million people in Syria need some form of aid, according to the U.N.</p>
<p>This past week, the U.N. Security Council pushed for a resolution that would enable broad-based aid deliveries to Syria. So did France. On the morning of February 10, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said France and other countries would present a resolution at the UN calling for greater access for humanitarian aid. He told the media in Homs and internationally, “It is absolutely scandalous that there have been discussions for quite a while and that people are still being starved every day, and so along with a number of other countries, we will present a resolution at the UN along those lines.”&#160;&#160;Yet, many in Homs voice skepticism that Moscow would allow UN Security Council Chapter Seven action given its rivalry with Washington on this and other Syria related regional issues.</p>
<p>Some 3,000 people are slated to receive aid during the humanitarian pause. It appears certain that in the coming few days the intentions of both sides will become clearer with respect to the Geneva process and their willingness to allow full humanitarian aid into Homs and the evacuation of those who want to exit the Old City. Whichever side fails in its humanitarian duties will be harshly judged by history and quite possibly by a&#160;Special Tribunal for Syria, already being planned by some, to be held&#160;at The Hague.</p> | false | 1 | el nubek syria two delegations one representing government syrian arab republic led bashar assad claiming represent popular opposition seeking overthrow arrived switzerland morning continue round two geneva ii uncertainty agenda whether extend weekends 36 hour humanitarian pause allow aid old city homs160160such deal could come time would bolster confidence ahead round two peace talks observers including one predict ceasefire fact extended result meeting february 10 held syrian government officials homs un representatives likely result civilians allowed old city later today tomorrow certain 160and meanwhile february 10 meager amounts aid trickling yarmouk palestinian refugee camp damascus stopped due 160yet another breach humanitarian pause agreed upon last week governor homs talal albarazi advised journalists observers gathered office yesterday ceasefire may extended three days allow might want leave chance operation help trapped civilians homs one concrete agreement reached recent peace talks geneva due resume monday remains much mistrust plenty pr jockeying sides public awaits sound gavel un envoy160lakhdar160brahimi160to resume discussions end killing syria new opposition team press time fully identified announced wants focus round two solely transition demands a160160clean slate damascus160160and nothing else contradistinction syrian government presidential political media adviser dr buthaina shaaban argues continuing essential problem search political solution geneva track lies fact dont know representing came name opposition many relation syria160160she added coalition delegation came geneva discussing one word december 12 013 geneva communiqué transition 160whereas160the syrian official delegation wants initially discuss first item160in communiqué halt of160violence combating terrorism preservation state institutions whether extension competed threeday humanitarian pause ceasefire yet sure point clarification the160160socalled three day partial ceasefire allow humanitarian aid area 600 days experienced nearly daily bombardment city labeled birthplace revolution misnomer extreme socalled humanitarian pause never comprised three days rather reality less 36 hours given aid deliveries evacuations strictly limited 12 hours 6 6 pm three days one spokesman european aid organization attempted enlighten observer ceasefire terms claiming that160after 6 pm aid distributors within snipers scope fair game warned told kind like caveat emptor six six frankly gentleman could mistaken known better given job view constitutes shocking fundamentally flawed edict160160and misstatement applicable binding international norms anchored black letter public international humanitarian law including limited geneva conventions principles standards rule international humanitarian law requiring protection belligerents aid workers160whenever wherever perform humanitarian work160160nor international customary law treaty law subject abrogated bilaterally warring parties may choose kill aid workers civilians mutually declared 6 6 pm day shift aid workers homs civilians inviolate military action160160nor suggestion either party complied international law requires warring factions allow unconditional humanitarian access excuse appear according information given observers local residents 30 different armed groups operate old city making agreement among unlikely160160the 160regional advisor unicef160 mr geoffrey ijumba reasonable sounding fellow claims main stumbling block 30 plus militia groups inside homs want guarantees aid still delivered old city civilians evacuated extended ceasefire given recent government military gains according observers monitoring developments homs rather tough precondition expect syrian government given price paid advancing militarily past two years area currently plenty mistrust much pr jockeying sides new opposition team press time fully identified wants focus round two solely transition nothing else syrian government presidential political media adviser dr buthaina shaaban strongly argues essential problem search political solution geneva track lies fact dont know representing came name opposition many relation syria160160she added coalition delegation came geneva discussing one word geneva communiqué transition whereas160160the syrian official delegation wants initially discuss first item160160in communiqué halt of160160violence combating terrorism preservation state institutions part damascus keen portray humanitarian deal outside framework talks pundits parliamentarians taking airwaves tout deal evidence governments ongoing efforts aid civilians come pressure allies russia iran make humanitarian concessions predictably perhaps sides accuse violations claimed threeday humanitarian aid ceasefire opposition team announced delegation round two reconfigured160160many observers genera ii judged strong personalities intellects syrian delegation including foreign minister walid mouallum dr bouthania shaaban minister information omran zoubi well faisal mekdad160among others won160round public relations challenge geneva ii obama administration via john kerry advised opposition better field stronger team risk losing ground first civilians evacuated rebelheld area syrian city homs february 8 year half struggling survive six buses arrived three un vehicles six red crescent ambulances pick women children elderly dina elkassaby spokeswoman world food program said staff reported many evacuees bad shape children showing signs malnutrition humanitarian workers braved mortar shells gunfire february 9 pushed forward mission deliver aid besieged parts syrian city homs jouret al shayah al qoubaisi 12 civilians came first bus rebel enclave syria state television said four members syrian arab red crescent sarcs wounded by160160armed terrorist groups160160on february 9 aid workers tried deliver humanitarian supplies besieged rebelheld district homs city sunset abu bilal activist trapped old city since june 2012 explained hope aid come hope civilians evacuated dont know whether happen afraid see yesterdays shelling syrian red crescent society told observers challenge get staff un team area sarcs official khaled erksoussi said convoy came attack mortars gunfire leaving qarabis neighborhood many evacuated february 7 looked frail described extreme hardships inside area army siege nearly yearandahalf said bread available months many residents gathering weeds leaves eat bbcs lyse doucet reported tide people continuedelderly men women stretchers crutches exhausted mothers tears children went straight arms waiting aid officials un syrian arab red crescent society water bread even polio vaccinations provided spot many residents finally escaped speak grass olives eat sunday february 9160611160civilians increase 83 february 7 besieged 600 days old city homs evacuated majority women children elderly according one governate homs officials responsible monitoring evacuation ages ranged 16 54 years age yet clear warring parties agree three day 36 hour extension aid mission honored160160the governor homs talal albarazi stated administration cooperate un mission syrian red crescent ones delivering aid160160food hygiene kits also distributed neighborhoods bustan aldiwan alhamidieh humanitarian aid gesture old city homs modest compared four million civilians living siege across great country war deprived adequate food water sanitation 93 million people syria need form aid according un past week un security council pushed resolution would enable broadbased aid deliveries syria france morning february 10 french foreign minister laurent fabius said france countries would present resolution un calling greater access humanitarian aid told media homs internationally absolutely scandalous discussions quite people still starved every day along number countries present resolution un along lines160160yet many homs voice skepticism moscow would allow un security council chapter seven action given rivalry washington syria related regional issues 3000 people slated receive aid humanitarian pause appears certain coming days intentions sides become clearer respect geneva process willingness allow full humanitarian aid homs evacuation want exit old city whichever side fails humanitarian duties harshly judged history quite possibly a160special tribunal syria already planned held160at hague | 1,099 |
<p>As soon as the presidential election was over and the exit polling results began to pour in, some on the right (and many outside it) started arguing that the Republican party needed to change its tune on immigration. To avoid being left behind by the country’s changing demographics, the argument goes, the GOP must vastly improve its appeal to Hispanic voters, and the way to do this is to hop on the bandwagon of “comprehensive immigration reform,” which means a path to citizenship for the estimated 11 million immigrants now in our country illegally, greater openness to more legal immigration, and the promise of better border security in the future, all in one grand bill.</p>
<p>Advocates of this approach insist that it is what Hispanic voters want, and therefore what must be done to win them. But Republicans should be careful to avoid the lure of that argument. It is based on an overreading of exit polls, it proposes a cynical transactional relationship between policy and politics that is unbecoming of a serious political party, and like most “comprehensive” policy programs it manages simultaneously to offer too much and too little. America certainly needs immigration reform, but it doesn’t need another comprehensive liberal makeover.</p>
<p>To begin with, Mitt Romney did not lose this election because he failed to win enough Hispanic voters. He did perform inadequately with that group, earning only 27 percent of their vote–a modest decline from the 31 percent won by John McCain. But this election did not suggest that demographic trends are overtaking the Republican party. The electorate was slightly more Hispanic (10 percent as opposed to 9 percent in 2008 and 8 percent in 2004), but far more significant was a decline in voter participation among working-class white voters, to whom Romney clearly had trouble appealing. It appears to have been Romney’s economic message, not his immigration views, that accounted for his margin of loss.</p>
<p>And this appears to have been the case with voters of all races. Hispanic voters told exit pollsters that the economy mattered to them most of all–60 percent of them put it first, essentially identical to the 59 percent of all voters who did. And their views on economic issues suggest they are a liberal voting bloc at this point, quite apart from immigration.</p>
<p>Republicans should certainly strive to address Hispanic voters with open arms and a welcoming tone, as any party should address all voters. But what they offer them should be the same thing they offer to voters of any other background: a conservative message of economic growth and social mobility, traditional moral values, and a strong national defense.</p>
<p>A political party is not just a vehicle for getting elected but a vehicle for enacting a certain vision of the common good. The Republican party will stand or fall on the strength of its vision, and on the appeal of that vision to voters. It could never compete with the Democrats on the field of transactional politics–delivering favors to interest groups who then deliver voters in return. It can only win by translating conservative principles into policy ideas that address public problems and reinforce America’s strengths.</p>
<p>Such ideas are certainly much needed in the arena of immigration. Our legal immigration system has grown aimless and counterproductive and is increasingly disconnected from both America’s economic interests and its -ideals. And although illegal immigration has slowed significantly in recent years (thanks to both a weaker economy and greater enforcement), truly stemming the flow and deciding how to address the 11 million who are here without legal permission is a daunting challenge.</p>
<p>If they approach the immigration question not as an electoral emergency demanding swift capitulation to the Democrats’ agenda but as a national challenge requiring an application of conservative principles to reform a set of critical public institutions, Republicans will find their way to a far superior set of immigration reforms–reforms that are each rather modest and discrete, that need not be pursued all at once in a single huge package, and that are therefore also better suited to providing real solutions than yet another “comprehensive” policy adventure.</p>
<p>Our approach to immigration must be grounded in an idea of citizenship. After all, our immigration system is how we elevate foreign newcomers into Americans. Yet civic formation and assimilation are entirely missing from the left’s “comprehensive” immigration program. They should be central to any conservative immigration reform.</p>
<p>The security of national borders is an essential component of modern sovereignty, and all the more important in the age of terrorism. Getting the southern border under control should not be a bargaining chip but rather an end in itself–and a crucial one.</p>
<p>Our immigration system must also serve rather than undermine our economic interests, which means we cannot ignore the fact that a glut of low-skill immigrants is hurting the economic chances of the most hardpressed Americans while a shortage of high-skill immigrants leaves our most productive sectors understaffed. A basic reordering of legal immigration in light of economic priorities is necessary for our future prosperity, quite apart from any political implications.</p>
<p>The challenge of handling the 11 million immigrants present here without authorization is an immense legal, social, and moral dilemma. It, too, cannot simply be treated as a bargaining chip but must be considered on its own terms. Mass deportation is neither desirable nor possible, but a ready path to citizenship without consequences is not appropriate either. We will need to find a series of middling options that mix compassion with prudence, humanitarianism with a respect for the law, in a variety of ways suited to the varying circumstances of this enormous population. It would certainly be much easier to begin that work once the border is under control, rather than holding America’s sovereignty and security hostage to the progressive desire for a comprehensive transformation of American immigration.</p>
<p>Skepticism about comprehensive transformations should apply well beyond immigration. Indeed, it is one of the great contributions of conservatism to American political thought, and its wisdom is well demonstrated by the assorted comprehensive transformations already wrought in the Obama years–most notably the transformations of health care and financial regulation. In each case, a gargantuan new statute seeks to do far too many things at once and yet (or rather, therefore) manages to leave the most basic problems unaddressed. Hidden in the greasy creases of these corpulent bills are loads of imperious and often contradictory directives, comically specific injunctions and rules alongside appallingly vague grants of executive discretion, unprecedented expansions of government power, and unavoidable technical errors magnified into fiascos–but no means for slowing the growth of health costs and no end to the “too big to fail” regime.</p>
<p>These comprehensive laws aim to transform American government, rather than address discrete problems. They are the epitome of progressive policy-making. And a similar approach to immigration would be no less harmful or misguided. What our immigration system requires is not a transformation in the mold of the welfare state but an application of American constitutional principles to address specific problems through targeted reforms. It requires an approach that builds on what is best to improve what is worst.</p>
<p>In other words, it requires an applied conservatism. If the Republican party offered that to the public, it would surely find itself in better stead with voters, whatever their race, creed, or color.</p>
<p>Yuval Levin is Hertog fellow at the&#160;Ethics and Public Policy Center&#160;and editor of National Affairs.</p> | false | 1 | soon presidential election exit polling results began pour right many outside started arguing republican party needed change tune immigration avoid left behind countrys changing demographics argument goes gop must vastly improve appeal hispanic voters way hop bandwagon comprehensive immigration reform means path citizenship estimated 11 million immigrants country illegally greater openness legal immigration promise better border security future one grand bill advocates approach insist hispanic voters want therefore must done win republicans careful avoid lure argument based overreading exit polls proposes cynical transactional relationship policy politics unbecoming serious political party like comprehensive policy programs manages simultaneously offer much little america certainly needs immigration reform doesnt need another comprehensive liberal makeover begin mitt romney lose election failed win enough hispanic voters perform inadequately group earning 27 percent votea modest decline 31 percent john mccain election suggest demographic trends overtaking republican party electorate slightly hispanic 10 percent opposed 9 percent 2008 8 percent 2004 far significant decline voter participation among workingclass white voters romney clearly trouble appealing appears romneys economic message immigration views accounted margin loss appears case voters races hispanic voters told exit pollsters economy mattered all60 percent put first essentially identical 59 percent voters views economic issues suggest liberal voting bloc point quite apart immigration republicans certainly strive address hispanic voters open arms welcoming tone party address voters offer thing offer voters background conservative message economic growth social mobility traditional moral values strong national defense political party vehicle getting elected vehicle enacting certain vision common good republican party stand fall strength vision appeal vision voters could never compete democrats field transactional politicsdelivering favors interest groups deliver voters return win translating conservative principles policy ideas address public problems reinforce americas strengths ideas certainly much needed arena immigration legal immigration system grown aimless counterproductive increasingly disconnected americas economic interests ideals although illegal immigration slowed significantly recent years thanks weaker economy greater enforcement truly stemming flow deciding address 11 million without legal permission daunting challenge approach immigration question electoral emergency demanding swift capitulation democrats agenda national challenge requiring application conservative principles reform set critical public institutions republicans find way far superior set immigration reformsreforms rather modest discrete need pursued single huge package therefore also better suited providing real solutions yet another comprehensive policy adventure approach immigration must grounded idea citizenship immigration system elevate foreign newcomers americans yet civic formation assimilation entirely missing lefts comprehensive immigration program central conservative immigration reform security national borders essential component modern sovereignty important age terrorism getting southern border control bargaining chip rather end itselfand crucial one immigration system must also serve rather undermine economic interests means ignore fact glut lowskill immigrants hurting economic chances hardpressed americans shortage highskill immigrants leaves productive sectors understaffed basic reordering legal immigration light economic priorities necessary future prosperity quite apart political implications challenge handling 11 million immigrants present without authorization immense legal social moral dilemma simply treated bargaining chip must considered terms mass deportation neither desirable possible ready path citizenship without consequences appropriate either need find series middling options mix compassion prudence humanitarianism respect law variety ways suited varying circumstances enormous population would certainly much easier begin work border control rather holding americas sovereignty security hostage progressive desire comprehensive transformation american immigration skepticism comprehensive transformations apply well beyond immigration indeed one great contributions conservatism american political thought wisdom well demonstrated assorted comprehensive transformations already wrought obama yearsmost notably transformations health care financial regulation case gargantuan new statute seeks far many things yet rather therefore manages leave basic problems unaddressed hidden greasy creases corpulent bills loads imperious often contradictory directives comically specific injunctions rules alongside appallingly vague grants executive discretion unprecedented expansions government power unavoidable technical errors magnified fiascosbut means slowing growth health costs end big fail regime comprehensive laws aim transform american government rather address discrete problems epitome progressive policymaking similar approach immigration would less harmful misguided immigration system requires transformation mold welfare state application american constitutional principles address specific problems targeted reforms requires approach builds best improve worst words requires applied conservatism republican party offered public would surely find better stead voters whatever race creed color yuval levin hertog fellow the160ethics public policy center160and editor national affairs | 685 |
<p>TEMPE, Ariz. — There is a simple explanation as to why <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Blaine_Gabbert/" type="external">Blaine Gabbert</a> has not enjoyed any real success during his seven seasons in the NFL, according to <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Arizona-Cardinals/" type="external">Arizona Cardinals</a> head coach <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Bruce-Arians/" type="external">Bruce Arians</a>.</p>
<p>“He was on really (expletive) teams,” Arians said matter-of-factly on Wednesday. “He’s on seven head coaches, eight coordinators. That ain’t a recipe for success.”</p>
<p>No, it isn’t. But Arians has seen a ton of progress and positives in Gabbert since the Cardinals signed him to a one-year contract prior to the start of this season. And he’s seen even more in the past two weeks — enough to say he would feel completely comfortable letting Gabbert direct Arizona’s offense on Sunday against the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Houston-Texans/" type="external">Houston Texans</a> if <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Drew_Stanton/" type="external">Drew Stanton</a> can’t start because of a sprained right knee.</p>
<p>“He can flat throw the ball and how fast he picked up (the offense) was amazing to me,” Arians said. “He makes throws against our defense and scout team that makes you go ‘wow’ every day. And within our offense, he’s not making blatant mistakes. The ball is going where it’s supposed to go, so he has a chance to be successful.”</p>
<p>Gabbert’s experience also is a major plus in Arians’ mind.</p>
<p>“Oh yeah. He’s played in so many offenses, so it’s not like you’re throwing a rookie out there or a guy that’s never played before,” Arians said. “I can honestly say this is the best feeling I’ve had about playing a third quarterback. If he plays, I feel really good about it.”</p>
<p>Gabbert said he will be ready if called upon. The final decision as to who starts at quarterback, Arians said, will likely be made after practice on Friday.</p>
<p>“Anytime you can go out on the football field and play in the regular season, it’s something we hold dear as an athlete,” Gabbert said. “The opportunities don’t come very often and you’ve just got to make the most of them.”</p>
<p>Stanton, who has started the past two games in place of the injured <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Carson_Palmer/" type="external">Carson Palmer</a>, said he’s been making progress with his knee each of the past two days. He was injured during the first quarter of Thursday night’s loss to the Seahawks, but managed to stay in and finish the game.</p>
<p>“I think adrenaline was obviously in full effect,” Stanton said. “But I wanted to be out there, realizing I don’t take a single snap for granted. So I wanted to be out there and do stuff. If I ever felt like I was going to be a detriment to the team, you also have to be wise in that sense.”</p>
<p>Stanton said he feels encouraged about his chances of being able to play on Sunday.</p>
<p>“I’m not going to count myself out,” Stanton said. “I think that with the help of this training staff and everybody around here, if that’s in the team’s best interest and I can go out there and help, then I want to do that. If it’s not, then Blaine will go out there and do a great job.”</p>
<p>Would Arians be willing to start Stanton even if the quarterback is not at 100 percent health?</p>
<p>“It depends on what not 100 percent means,” Arians said. “If he’s mobile enough to protect himself and everything, yes.”</p>
<p>SERIES HISTORY: 4th regular-season meeting. Cardinals lead series, 2-1. Houston won the first and only meeting at home in the series in 2005. Arizona has played at least one road game against every other NFL team since the last time it played a game in Houston. The Cardinals won narrow victories in the most recent meetings, including a 27-24 win at University of Phoenix Stadium in 2013 in which then-defensive coordinator <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Wade_Phillips/" type="external">Wade Phillips</a> subbed in for then-head coach <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Gary-Kubiak/" type="external">Gary Kubiak</a>, who had suffered a mini-stroke the week before against the Colts.</p>
<p>–There have been no decisions made regarding who will or won’t be activated off the injured reserve list, although a handful of players are and will be eligible.</p>
<p>“There’s no doubt it’s fluid,” general manager <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Steve-Keim/" type="external">Steve Keim</a> said. “There are probably anywhere from four to five guys, whether it’s <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/David_Johnson/" type="external">David Johnson</a>, T.J. Logan, Mike Iupati, Aaron Brewer or even Carson Palmer that could potentially come back as the two designated-to-return players.</p>
<p>“We’ll determine that, again, in a fluid process of which guys are healing at a faster rate and what makes sense moving forward at that time of the year.”</p>
<p>–“At the top of the chart. This isn’t the first time I’ve seen him gut it up like that. But, yeah, he’s off the charts. That’s why his teammates love him.” — Head coach Bruce Arians when asked about backup quarterback Drew Stanton’s toughness.</p>
<p>–Entering Sunday’s game at Houston, the Cardinals were tied for the fourth-fewest takeaways in the league with nine. Eight of them were by interceptions and their one fumble recovery is the fewest.</p>
<p>“I don’t really know,” safety Tyrann Mathieu said when asked to explain the low number of takeaways. “I guess other teams are taking care of the football. A few balls haven’t been bouncing our way. A few tipped passes are going over our heads. We’ve just got to stay within the moment and those turnovers will come in bunches for us.</p>
<p>“Hopefully this week is the week that we have a five- or six-turnover game. We’ve just got to be ready for the opportunity.”</p>
<p>–With a win Sunday against the Texans, the Cardinals would improve to 6-0 against teams from the AFC South under head coach Bruce Arians.</p>
<p>–When the Cardinals won the coin flip to open last Thursday night’s game against the visiting Seahawks, it was shocking to see Cardinals head coach Bruce Arians defer and send his defense out to start the game at University of Phoenix Stadium.</p>
<p>Apparently, the decision was made because members of the Cardinals’ defense lobbied Arians to change things up and let them set the tone instead of the offense.</p>
<p>“Our defense has been bugging the (expletive)out of me to put them out there first,” Arians said.</p>
<p>Safety Tyrann Mathieu said the lobbying didn’t come from him.</p>
<p>“I think that came from (cornerback) Patrick (Peterson),” Mathieu said. “I don’t really care, obviously. The way things have been going this year, you kind of want to switch things up and see what works and doesn’t work.”</p>
<p>NOTES: NT Corey Peters is dealing with a high-ankle sprain and is expected to miss not only Sunday’s game at Houston, but perhaps an additional week or two. Head coach Bruce Arians said Xavier Williams and Rodney Gunter will take turns replacing him in the lineup. … QB Drew Stanton (knee) was one of four players who were listed as limited in practice on Wednesday. The others were wide receiver <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/John_Brown/" type="external">John Brown</a> (back), center A.Q. Shipley (shoulder) and right tackle John Wetzel (back). … T John Wetzel is moving from backup left tackle to be the team’s starting right tackle now that Jared Veldheer will be moving back to left tackle in place of the injured D.J. Humphries, who was placed on season-ending injured reserve with a knee injury. … S Budda Baker has been making his mark as a rookie this season by starring on special teams as the Cardinals’ best gunner on kickoff and punt coverage. But with the season-ending knee injury to starting strong safety Tyvon Branch, Baker is about to get a huge extra dose of playing time in Arizona’s base 4-3 defense. … WR <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Larry_Fitzgerald/" type="external">Larry Fitzgerald</a> needs 62 receiving yards to pass tight end <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Tony_Gonzalez/" type="external">Tony Gonzalez</a> (15,127) for fifth place on the NFL’s all-time list for career receiving yards. Fitzgerald is 143 yards from passing <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Isaac_Bruce/" type="external">Isaac Bruce</a> (15,208) for fourth place. … RB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Adrian_Peterson/" type="external">Adrian Peterson</a> is 73 rushing yards from surpassing Hall of Famer <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Marcus_Allen/" type="external">Marcus Allen</a> (12,243) for 13th place on the NFL’s all-time rushing yardage list and 76 yards from passing <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Edgerrin_James/" type="external">Edgerrin James</a> (12,246) for 12th place. With 109 yards against the Texans, Peterson would also move ahead of Hall of Famer <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Marshall_Faulk/" type="external">Marshall Faulk</a> (12,279) for 11th place. … CB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Patrick-Peterson/" type="external">Patrick Peterson</a> has been nominated for the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Art_Rooney/" type="external">Art Rooney</a> Sportsmanship Award, which was established in 2014 and recognizes players who demonstrate good qualities such as sportsmanship, fair play, integrity and respect for the game.</p> | false | 1 | tempe ariz simple explanation blaine gabbert enjoyed real success seven seasons nfl according arizona cardinals head coach bruce arians really expletive teams arians said matteroffactly wednesday hes seven head coaches eight coordinators aint recipe success isnt arians seen ton progress positives gabbert since cardinals signed oneyear contract prior start season hes seen even past two weeks enough say would feel completely comfortable letting gabbert direct arizonas offense sunday houston texans drew stanton cant start sprained right knee flat throw ball fast picked offense amazing arians said makes throws defense scout team makes go wow every day within offense hes making blatant mistakes ball going supposed go chance successful gabberts experience also major plus arians mind oh yeah hes played many offenses like youre throwing rookie guy thats never played arians said honestly say best feeling ive playing third quarterback plays feel really good gabbert said ready called upon final decision starts quarterback arians said likely made practice friday anytime go football field play regular season something hold dear athlete gabbert said opportunities dont come often youve got make stanton started past two games place injured carson palmer said hes making progress knee past two days injured first quarter thursday nights loss seahawks managed stay finish game think adrenaline obviously full effect stanton said wanted realizing dont take single snap granted wanted stuff ever felt like going detriment team also wise sense stanton said feels encouraged chances able play sunday im going count stanton said think help training staff everybody around thats teams best interest go help want blaine go great job would arians willing start stanton even quarterback 100 percent health depends 100 percent means arians said hes mobile enough protect everything yes series history 4th regularseason meeting cardinals lead series 21 houston first meeting home series 2005 arizona played least one road game every nfl team since last time played game houston cardinals narrow victories recent meetings including 2724 win university phoenix stadium 2013 thendefensive coordinator wade phillips subbed thenhead coach gary kubiak suffered ministroke week colts decisions made regarding wont activated injured reserve list although handful players eligible theres doubt fluid general manager steve keim said probably anywhere four five guys whether david johnson tj logan mike iupati aaron brewer even carson palmer could potentially come back two designatedtoreturn players well determine fluid process guys healing faster rate makes sense moving forward time year top chart isnt first time ive seen gut like yeah hes charts thats teammates love head coach bruce arians asked backup quarterback drew stantons toughness entering sundays game houston cardinals tied fourthfewest takeaways league nine eight interceptions one fumble recovery fewest dont really know safety tyrann mathieu said asked explain low number takeaways guess teams taking care football balls havent bouncing way tipped passes going heads weve got stay within moment turnovers come bunches us hopefully week week five sixturnover game weve got ready opportunity win sunday texans cardinals would improve 60 teams afc south head coach bruce arians cardinals coin flip open last thursday nights game visiting seahawks shocking see cardinals head coach bruce arians defer send defense start game university phoenix stadium apparently decision made members cardinals defense lobbied arians change things let set tone instead offense defense bugging expletiveout put first arians said safety tyrann mathieu said lobbying didnt come think came cornerback patrick peterson mathieu said dont really care obviously way things going year kind want switch things see works doesnt work notes nt corey peters dealing highankle sprain expected miss sundays game houston perhaps additional week two head coach bruce arians said xavier williams rodney gunter take turns replacing lineup qb drew stanton knee one four players listed limited practice wednesday others wide receiver john brown back center aq shipley shoulder right tackle john wetzel back john wetzel moving backup left tackle teams starting right tackle jared veldheer moving back left tackle place injured dj humphries placed seasonending injured reserve knee injury budda baker making mark rookie season starring special teams cardinals best gunner kickoff punt coverage seasonending knee injury starting strong safety tyvon branch baker get huge extra dose playing time arizonas base 43 defense wr larry fitzgerald needs 62 receiving yards pass tight end tony gonzalez 15127 fifth place nfls alltime list career receiving yards fitzgerald 143 yards passing isaac bruce 15208 fourth place rb adrian peterson 73 rushing yards surpassing hall famer marcus allen 12243 13th place nfls alltime rushing yardage list 76 yards passing edgerrin james 12246 12th place 109 yards texans peterson would also move ahead hall famer marshall faulk 12279 11th place cb patrick peterson nominated art rooney sportsmanship award established 2014 recognizes players demonstrate good qualities sportsmanship fair play integrity respect game | 780 |
<p />
<p>Long before the Boycott, Sanctions and Divestment campaign inched slowly from the fringes of global solidarity with Palestinians to take center stage, Tony Benn had been advocating a boycott of Israel with unrestricted conviction, for years.</p>
<p>“Britain should offer its support for this strategy by stopping all arms sales to Israel, introducing trade sanctions and a ban on all investment there together with a boycott of Israeli goods here and make it a condition for the lifting of these measures that Israel complies with these demands at once,” Benn wrote in his blog on April 19, 2002, under the title “A STATE OF PALESTINE NOW”. The ‘strategy’ of which Ben spoke was for Arafat to declare a state, and for ‘friendly nations’ to recognize it.</p>
<p>Yes, the title was all in caps. It was as if Benn, a principled British left wing politician, had wanted to loudly accentuate his insistence that the Palestinian people deserved their rights, freedom and sovereignty. He was as bold and courageous as any man or woman of true values and principles should always be. He remained uncompromising in matters of human rights and justice. This international warrior left a challenging space to fill when he passed away at the age of 88, on Thursday, March 13.</p>
<p>Following the news of his death, British media was awash of reports about Benn and his long legacy of being a stubborn politician and uncompromising advocate for human rights. Frankly, there was less emphasis on the latter and much more on the former, despite the fact that Benn understood politics was a platform to quarrel with moral dilemmas. The parliament was a platform to serve the people, not to conspire with other politicians for the sake of one’s party. For some politicians, it is all about winning elections, not using office to carry out a morally-grounded mandate to serve the people. Benn was different, thus there was the love-hate relationship Britain had with him.</p>
<p>True to form, British media immediately conjured up a few buzzwords by which it attempted to define Benn’s legacy. He had ‘immatured with age,” was one of them. It was a remark made by Benn’s fiercest rival in the Labor Party, Harold Wilson in reference to Benn’s becoming more of a radical left-winger as he grew older. Some in the media simply love axioms and catch phrases, for it spares journalists the pain of exhaustive research. Wilson and his camp invested heavily in assigning Benn the responsibility of the successive defeats experienced by the Labor Party at the hands of the Conservatives. Indeed, Margaret Thatcher and then John Major had won four elections in a row, and between them changed the face of British economy and quashed major labor unions. But blaming Benn for splitting the party is unfair to say the least.</p>
<p>Compare Tony Benn’s legacy with that of Tony Blair. The first was principled to the core, boldly challenged US hegemony in the world, and fought hard for Britain’s poor, working class and against unhindered globalization that made states vulnerable to the inherent disparity of the global economic system.</p>
<p>Blair stood for the exact opposite: a self-serving politician, devoid of any morality, and was rightly dubbed Bush’s poodle for heeding to the US military adventurism, mainly in Afghanistan and Iraq.</p>
<p>Benn, even from the point of view of those who disagreed with him, was always seen, and shall always be remembered as a man of high values. Blair had been districted by his own peers even before he was forced to concede office. One can imagine that Israeli media is the one likely to remember Blair with much fondness.</p>
<p>Although Benn seemed guided by the same high moral values that accompanied him throughout the over 50 years in which he served as an MP in the British parliament, when he retired in 2001, he seemed ready to take on even bigger challenges. His task morphed from that of a fierce politician at home, fighting for the very definition of the Labor Party, to an internationalist, taking on the most difficult of subjects, and never bowing down.</p>
<p>Following the US-British so-called ‘war on terror’ – designed around economic and strategic interests – Benn rose to greater prominence,&#160;&#160;not as another TV celebrity ‘expert’, but as a fierce opponent to the US and his own government’s wholesale slaughter of hundreds of thousands of innocent people. Since then, the man never stayed away from the streets. He spoke with passion and mesmerized audiences in his beautiful, immaculate English. Most important about the timing of Benn’s courageous stances was the fact that back then, all public discourses related to the wars were saturated with fear. But, whenever Benn spoke, he pushed the narrative up to higher degrees of audacity.</p>
<p>I listened to him once speak at Trafalgar Square in London. He wore a Kuffiya, the traditional Palestinian headscarf. He spoke of Iraq, Lebanon and Palestine, as if their peoples were his own. Thousands of us applauded with so much enthusiasm. It was as if his words alone were the salvation that would free Arab nations from the bondage of military occupation and war. But at times, words live in a sphere of their own where they multiply, and when repeated often enough, can change the world.</p>
<p>“The main responsibility for the appalling crimes being perpetrated against the Palestinians must be equally shared between Jerusalem and Washington for successive American governments have funded Israel, armed Israel and used their veto at the Security Council to protect Israel from being forced to comply with what world opinion wanted,” he said in 2003, in an interview with Egypt-based Al Ahram.</p>
<p>True, Benn was not the only British politician who spoke with such candor about the shared responsibility of crimes committed against Palestinians, but few went as far as he did.</p>
<p>The next time there is a rally for Palestine, there ought to be an empty chair with a Palestinian Kuffiya, and the name of Tony Benn. It is a Palestinian tradition to honor its heroes, even those with a splendidly beautiful British accent.</p>
<p>[Correction: this article originally misstated that Harold Wilson was still alive. He died in 1995 at 79 years of age.]</p> | false | 1 | long boycott sanctions divestment campaign inched slowly fringes global solidarity palestinians take center stage tony benn advocating boycott israel unrestricted conviction years britain offer support strategy stopping arms sales israel introducing trade sanctions ban investment together boycott israeli goods make condition lifting measures israel complies demands benn wrote blog april 19 2002 title state palestine strategy ben spoke arafat declare state friendly nations recognize yes title caps benn principled british left wing politician wanted loudly accentuate insistence palestinian people deserved rights freedom sovereignty bold courageous man woman true values principles always remained uncompromising matters human rights justice international warrior left challenging space fill passed away age 88 thursday march 13 following news death british media awash reports benn long legacy stubborn politician uncompromising advocate human rights frankly less emphasis latter much former despite fact benn understood politics platform quarrel moral dilemmas parliament platform serve people conspire politicians sake ones party politicians winning elections using office carry morallygrounded mandate serve people benn different thus lovehate relationship britain true form british media immediately conjured buzzwords attempted define benns legacy immatured age one remark made benns fiercest rival labor party harold wilson reference benns becoming radical leftwinger grew older media simply love axioms catch phrases spares journalists pain exhaustive research wilson camp invested heavily assigning benn responsibility successive defeats experienced labor party hands conservatives indeed margaret thatcher john major four elections row changed face british economy quashed major labor unions blaming benn splitting party unfair say least compare tony benns legacy tony blair first principled core boldly challenged us hegemony world fought hard britains poor working class unhindered globalization made states vulnerable inherent disparity global economic system blair stood exact opposite selfserving politician devoid morality rightly dubbed bushs poodle heeding us military adventurism mainly afghanistan iraq benn even point view disagreed always seen shall always remembered man high values blair districted peers even forced concede office one imagine israeli media one likely remember blair much fondness although benn seemed guided high moral values accompanied throughout 50 years served mp british parliament retired 2001 seemed ready take even bigger challenges task morphed fierce politician home fighting definition labor party internationalist taking difficult subjects never bowing following usbritish socalled war terror designed around economic strategic interests benn rose greater prominence160160not another tv celebrity expert fierce opponent us governments wholesale slaughter hundreds thousands innocent people since man never stayed away streets spoke passion mesmerized audiences beautiful immaculate english important timing benns courageous stances fact back public discourses related wars saturated fear whenever benn spoke pushed narrative higher degrees audacity listened speak trafalgar square london wore kuffiya traditional palestinian headscarf spoke iraq lebanon palestine peoples thousands us applauded much enthusiasm words alone salvation would free arab nations bondage military occupation war times words live sphere multiply repeated often enough change world main responsibility appalling crimes perpetrated palestinians must equally shared jerusalem washington successive american governments funded israel armed israel used veto security council protect israel forced comply world opinion wanted said 2003 interview egyptbased al ahram true benn british politician spoke candor shared responsibility crimes committed palestinians went far next time rally palestine ought empty chair palestinian kuffiya name tony benn palestinian tradition honor heroes even splendidly beautiful british accent correction article originally misstated harold wilson still alive died 1995 79 years age | 546 |
<p>It is my pleasure to introduce Elizabeth Altham, an AP U.S. history (APUSH) teacher who has courageously come forward to take issue with the College Board’s revised and supposedly transformed American history framework. Altham’s story shows how the College Board’s creation of a de facto national high school curriculum continues to hamper traditional and conservative educators across the nation, despite recent claims that the APUSH problem has been solved.</p>
<p>In the debate over the College Board’s controversial 2014 and 2015 APUSH frameworks, one voice has so far been absent—arguably the most important voice. If the College Board’s left-leaning and highly directive new curriculum frameworks hurt anyone (beyond America’s next generation, of course), it is the teachers who elect a more traditional approach—a history that duly considers our founding principles, the virtues and vices of our leaders, America’s wars, and its religious heritage. The sort of APUSH teacher who assigns Howard Zinn’s Marxist take on America (and there are plenty of them) isn’t going to raise hell over the College Board’s stress on identity groups, migration, gender, environmentalism, and such. The problem comes when traditional or conservative educators are forced to choose between the curriculum they want, and their students’ performance on the test.</p>
<p>This is what is happening to Elizabeth Altham, an award-winning teacher of both AP U.S. and AP European history at Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Academy, a private, Catholic K–12 college-preparatory school in Rockford, Ill. In 2006, the Acton Institute named Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Academy one of the Top Fifty Catholic High Schools in the nation. In 2009, Altham herself received the Salvatori Award for Excellence in Teaching, an award presented by Hillsdale College each year to recognize teachers and schools that provide a superior liberal-arts education. Sacred Heart boasts that its mission is: “Passing on our Catholic and Western Heritage through the classical liberal arts.” It’s a mission the College Board has made more difficult to fulfill, says Altham.</p>
<p>The reason we haven’t yet heard from teachers who object to the College Board’s newly imposed left-leaning curricula is that open criticism entails serious risks.&#160;The College Board certifies AP teachers, approves their syllabi, and pays many of them to grade the essay portions of its exams. So it’s rare when one of the teachers who quietly opposes the College Board’s current direction can risk coming forward. Fortunately for us, Altham has decided to do so.</p>
<p>Elizabeth Altham is the sort of high-school history teacher most people wish they’d had — passionate and charismatic, with a powerful sense of the stakes in history and its relevance for our time. She is also a living example of a way of teaching that is fast disappearing—where history turns on the motives, decisions, and moral characters of individual men. Both Altham and her students understand that in studying history this way, they are standing against the tide.</p>
<p>One of Altham’s favorite stories is that of a Captain Preston who stood and risked British fire at Lexington in 1775. More than sixty years later, a young Massachusetts judge asked him why the farmers fought. “Young man,” he said, “we had always governed ourselves. They meant we shouldn’t. We meant we should.” Taking a leaf from the Founders, Altham sees herself as “educating for liberty,” knowing full-well how powerfully today’s fashionable social-history cuts against traditional civic education. Altham refuses to “neglect the personal choices of individual men” in favor of what she calls the College Board’s “bias in favor of impersonal forces.”</p>
<p>Altham had no idea that history was interesting or important until she heard her classmates at Yale draw historical examples into political discussion. She began to feel that her ignorance of history had cut her off from “nearly the entire body of human experience.” Then a course on classical Greece with renowned historian Donald Kagan (a recent signatory of the APUSH <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/419192/55-scholars-protest-ap-us-history-changes-stanley-kurtz" type="external">protest letter</a>), determined her life-course. Years later, as she began to teach at Sacred Heart, Altham continued to consult with Kagan. “What is Herodotus’ theme,” she asked him, “that the deeds of great men should not be forgotten?” “Or that free men fight better,” Kagan replied. That free men fight better has become a guiding principle of Altham’s teaching.</p>
<p>At its most basic, Altham’s approach to the classroom is this: “I must meet each student on his own ground, and draw him into ‘the ongoing conversation,’ that is, the great questions of what is good and true and right.” Her favorite teaching trick: “We get our kids addicted to Marcus Aurelius, Dante, Shakespeare and Eliot; thus, they develop an antipathy to garbage.” Altham’s proudest boast: “During the past couple of years, whenever a current public official has done or said something especially wrong, one of our students has expostulated, “What would John Adams say?” As I said, Altham is a living example of a type of teacher being driven to extinction. And our country is the poorer for it.</p>
<p>Altham believes that even before the introduction of the controversial controlling 2014 APUSH curriculum framework, the College Board’s directions betrayed an ideological tilt. The pre-2014 directions, she says, “placed inordinate emphasis upon the bad behavior of European invaders and colonists, and upon ‘trends and processes,’ while neglecting the good behavior of many of those men, and the importance of the characters and choices of individuals; also, it neglected the philosophy of government the colonists brought with them.”</p>
<p>So have the recent APUSH revisions addressed Altham’s concerns? After looking at both the 2015-16 APUSH framework and the newly introduced AP European history framework, Altham concludes that her major concerns are “not allayed.” She complains of the College Board’s “minimization, if not the outright ignoring, of the characters and decisions of great men.” Altham continues: “Today, the notion has entered the water supply that the characters and decisions of individuals do not matter; too many of our young consider debunking a marker for intelligence and sophistication. The notion underlying that notion is even more pernicious: that individuals are not responsible for outcomes, either as a matter of simple causation or as a matter of ethics. I see these two notions embodied in the College Board’s emphasis on processes and groups (classes, races, genders).”</p>
<p>Altham believes that the heavy tilt of the new APUSH and AP European history frameworks toward social history and away from politics, war, and diplomacy has made it tougher for her to present history in the way that both she and her students find most compelling. Increasingly she is being forced to choose between doing what she does best, and meeting the requirements of a framework whose underlying assumptions she rejects.</p>
<p>Having read over the College Board’s thoroughly biased new AP European history framework, I can well understand the concerns Altham voiced to me about its treatment of religion. Essentially, the AP European history framework presents religion as something to evolve away from. Altham complains that the framework implicitly marks a Thomist point of view as immature in comparison to a skeptical secularism. She’s right. With the class-based analysis built into the AP European history framework, Altham wonders why the College Board seems to have joined Marx in demoting religion to an epiphenomenon at best.</p>
<p>Obviously, high-school history teachers will vary in their approach. Before the College Board began to introduce its lengthy history frameworks in 2014, enough flexibility remained in the program for educators like Altham to coexist with the most neo-Marxist, Zinn-loving APUSH teachers. Now, however, the Zinnites are fine, while an extraordinary teacher like Altham is under pressure to discard not only her teaching techniques, but the deeply-held beliefs that animate them — or risk her students’ performance on the exam.</p>
<p>That is wrong. And notwithstanding its heated denials, the de facto national curriculum the College Board is busily creating is handing over this country’s culture and future to the left side of the political spectrum. This baleful situation will not change until the College Board has a bona fide competitor able to make life safe for teachers like Elizabeth Altham and the students who are lucky enough to know them.</p>
<p>Addendum: I have been consulting with a number of AP teachers dissatisfied with the College Board’s new curriculum frameworks. If you are an AP teacher who shares such concerns, feel free to contact me at the email address below. You will not be publicly quoted or named without your explicit permission.</p>
<p>— Stanley Kurtz is a senior fellow at the <a href="" type="internal">Ethics and Public Policy Center</a>. He can be reached at <a href="mailto:[email protected]" type="external">[email protected]</a></p> | false | 1 | pleasure introduce elizabeth altham ap us history apush teacher courageously come forward take issue college boards revised supposedly transformed american history framework althams story shows college boards creation de facto national high school curriculum continues hamper traditional conservative educators across nation despite recent claims apush problem solved debate college boards controversial 2014 2015 apush frameworks one voice far absentarguably important voice college boards leftleaning highly directive new curriculum frameworks hurt anyone beyond americas next generation course teachers elect traditional approacha history duly considers founding principles virtues vices leaders americas wars religious heritage sort apush teacher assigns howard zinns marxist take america plenty isnt going raise hell college boards stress identity groups migration gender environmentalism problem comes traditional conservative educators forced choose curriculum want students performance test happening elizabeth altham awardwinning teacher ap us ap european history lady sacred heart academy private catholic k12 collegepreparatory school rockford ill 2006 acton institute named lady sacred heart academy one top fifty catholic high schools nation 2009 altham received salvatori award excellence teaching award presented hillsdale college year recognize teachers schools provide superior liberalarts education sacred heart boasts mission passing catholic western heritage classical liberal arts mission college board made difficult fulfill says altham reason havent yet heard teachers object college boards newly imposed leftleaning curricula open criticism entails serious risks160the college board certifies ap teachers approves syllabi pays many grade essay portions exams rare one teachers quietly opposes college boards current direction risk coming forward fortunately us altham decided elizabeth altham sort highschool history teacher people wish theyd passionate charismatic powerful sense stakes history relevance time also living example way teaching fast disappearingwhere history turns motives decisions moral characters individual men altham students understand studying history way standing tide one althams favorite stories captain preston stood risked british fire lexington 1775 sixty years later young massachusetts judge asked farmers fought young man said always governed meant shouldnt meant taking leaf founders altham sees educating liberty knowing fullwell powerfully todays fashionable socialhistory cuts traditional civic education altham refuses neglect personal choices individual men favor calls college boards bias favor impersonal forces altham idea history interesting important heard classmates yale draw historical examples political discussion began feel ignorance history cut nearly entire body human experience course classical greece renowned historian donald kagan recent signatory apush protest letter determined lifecourse years later began teach sacred heart altham continued consult kagan herodotus theme asked deeds great men forgotten free men fight better kagan replied free men fight better become guiding principle althams teaching basic althams approach classroom must meet student ground draw ongoing conversation great questions good true right favorite teaching trick get kids addicted marcus aurelius dante shakespeare eliot thus develop antipathy garbage althams proudest boast past couple years whenever current public official done said something especially wrong one students expostulated would john adams say said altham living example type teacher driven extinction country poorer altham believes even introduction controversial controlling 2014 apush curriculum framework college boards directions betrayed ideological tilt pre2014 directions says placed inordinate emphasis upon bad behavior european invaders colonists upon trends processes neglecting good behavior many men importance characters choices individuals also neglected philosophy government colonists brought recent apush revisions addressed althams concerns looking 201516 apush framework newly introduced ap european history framework altham concludes major concerns allayed complains college boards minimization outright ignoring characters decisions great men altham continues today notion entered water supply characters decisions individuals matter many young consider debunking marker intelligence sophistication notion underlying notion even pernicious individuals responsible outcomes either matter simple causation matter ethics see two notions embodied college boards emphasis processes groups classes races genders altham believes heavy tilt new apush ap european history frameworks toward social history away politics war diplomacy made tougher present history way students find compelling increasingly forced choose best meeting requirements framework whose underlying assumptions rejects read college boards thoroughly biased new ap european history framework well understand concerns altham voiced treatment religion essentially ap european history framework presents religion something evolve away altham complains framework implicitly marks thomist point view immature comparison skeptical secularism shes right classbased analysis built ap european history framework altham wonders college board seems joined marx demoting religion epiphenomenon best obviously highschool history teachers vary approach college board began introduce lengthy history frameworks 2014 enough flexibility remained program educators like altham coexist neomarxist zinnloving apush teachers however zinnites fine extraordinary teacher like altham pressure discard teaching techniques deeplyheld beliefs animate risk students performance exam wrong notwithstanding heated denials de facto national curriculum college board busily creating handing countrys culture future left side political spectrum baleful situation change college board bona fide competitor able make life safe teachers like elizabeth altham students lucky enough know addendum consulting number ap teachers dissatisfied college boards new curriculum frameworks ap teacher shares concerns feel free contact email address publicly quoted named without explicit permission stanley kurtz senior fellow ethics public policy center reached commentskurtznationalreviewcom | 815 |
<p>Yoshikazu Sakamoto graciously embodied a combination of qualities not only greatly valued and desired, but extremely rare.</p>
<p>Prefatory Note: This post is dedicated to my remembrance of Yoshi Sakamoto, who died recently. Yoshi was a deeply valued friend and an important public intellectual in Japan who exerted a strong influence on the post-war generation. His political orientation, rejecting extremes of right and left, while questioning the militarist premises of the Cold War and Japan’s willingness to become America’s Asian poodle, gave him a distinctive political profile. I am sharing these words of appreciation, and hope that anyone from Japan who comes across this text will contact me, especially if they have a way of putting me in touch with either Yoshi’s family or Japanese media. I would like to believe that ‘an American appreciation’ of Professor Sakamoto would be of interest to those who knew and admired him.</p>
<p>I first met Yoshi in the mid-1960s when he came to visit me at Princeton, expressing his concern about the Vietnam War and knowing of my anti-war activism. We bonded quickly and marched in a peaceful demonstration in New York City a few days later, and somehow managed to keep in fairly consistent contact until Yoshi’s death on October 2.</p>
<p>It was through our participation in the World Order Models Project (WOMP) over a period of about twenty years that we came to know each other best, meeting in different parts of the world every few months, and discussing the weighty issues of the day from time to time.</p>
<p>Yoshi was one of the most principled and serious persons I have ever known, subjecting himself (and others) to the highest standards of performance and character from which he never deviated. His work exhibited a perfectionist dedication to excellence that was very challenging to those of us who worked within the ambit of his influence.</p>
<p>The majority of his publications were written in Japanese, meaning that the non-Japanese speaking world is so far deprived of much of his scholarship and is not aware of his sustained productivity over the years. His Japanese writings have been collected in six volumes published a few years ago.</p>
<p>The golden thread that was woven into the fabric of Yoshi’s life was his commitment to a peaceful world. He was highly critical of and affected by Japanese militarism of the 1930s and World War II that had shadowed his childhood, which he viewed as a betrayal of the Japanese people by the state, and its supportive established order.</p>
<p>When I first knew Yoshi he was struggling hard to find firm ground in Japanese political culture for a peaceful future, and was a strong believer in the peace constitution imposed upon the country after World War II, especially Article 9.</p>
<p>He was, in the same spirit, opposed to Japanese complicity with American militarism during the Cold War period, and opposed having permanent American military bases on Japanese territory, including Okinawa.</p>
<p>Yoshi also favored what might be called peace diplomacy, especially in the Asian setting, working with progressive Japanese intellectuals to promote positive relations with both China and North Korea.</p>
<p>In the Japanese discourse, Yoshi was often referred to as the leading ‘pacifist’ of ‘the post-war generation’—and so he was, if pacifist is understood as essentially a synonym for ‘peace’ rather than as an affirmation of unconditional nonviolence in the Gandhi mode. Yoshi supported strongly efforts to achieve disarmament, especially nuclear disarmament, encouraged adherence to international law and respect for the United Nations, and endorsed what I have called ‘nonviolent geopolitics,’ but he was also a believer in human rights and could support ‘humanitarian intervention’ under exceptional circumstances, such as to prevent genocide, ethnic cleansing, and severe crimes against humanity.</p>
<p>In this regard, Yoshi tempered his quest for peace with the realization that under some circumstances oppressive violence must be countered by the enforcement of international criminal law. He was sophisticated about the risks entailed, well aware of the capacity of hegemonic actors to manipulate the language of intervention to serve their strategic purposes by hypocritically invoking humanitarianism.</p>
<p>Yoshi was critical of the way the superpowers behaved in the decades following the Second World War, and his sympathies clearly supported the struggles of Third World peoples to rid their countries of colonial rule in the spirit of self-determination. He favored reforms that would level the economic playing field, and facilitate the democratic development of the Third World. Apparently a legacy of Hans Morgenthau’s mentorship (as PhD advisor and friend), Yoshi tempered his ethical stance toward world politics with a keen awareness of the way sovereign states pursued their national interests as the expense of the public good.</p>
<p>I was struck also in the WOMP context by Yoshi’s emphasis on ‘identity’ as a crucial, often neglected, world order value. (See especially his seminal essay, “Toward Global Identity” in Saul H. Mendlovitz, ed., On the Creation of a Just World Order, 189-210 [1975]). Yoshi affirmed that “[t]he need for a global coordinating body is unquestionable.” (193) And yet he was keenly aware that the need by itself was insufficient to what he called “the organizational lag.” From this vantage point, he tried to think through why such a dysfunctional lag persisted in the age of scientific rationality, and how it might be overcome.</p>
<p>In seeking understanding, Yoshi emphasized two factors: attachment by individuals to the nation-state as the political actor commanding loyalty unto death for most of its citizens, and existing as the outer limit of political community; the consequent need to construct identities that transcend nationalist boundaries if there ever was to emerge the political will required to support a stronger globalist institutional capacity.</p>
<p>With intellectual rigor, and a passion for practical theorizing (and a dislike of wishful thinking), Yoshi offered some guidelines: he expected to witness the growing transnationalization of international life amid increasing interdependence that would over time weaken nationalist attachments, especially as he foresaw the weakening of the geopolitical rivalries that were at the core of the Cold War.</p>
<p>He also affirmed the community-building potential of the United Nations, which he believed could be activated through the establishment of a UN Consultative Assembly “composed of representatives of the major political parties of each country.” (207) To ensure diversity and contestation, any party with 10% or more electoral support would be eligible to send delegates. The underlying idea was to create a feeling for global community that would produce a greater appreciation of the need for a stronger global institutional presence.</p>
<p>The animating idea was well articulated: “The crucial point here is that the UN system should act as a nucleus of community-building by serving as a vehicle for the creation of small-scale but open communities throughout the world, worldwide adoption of nondiscriminatory practices by the UN and related agencies would serve as a model for national and private organizations.”</p>
<p>It is worth observing that Yoshi, true to his training in international relations at the University of Chicago, insisted upon careful diagnosis of the existing situation, believing that the way forward in human affairs at this stage of history was to extend the domain of the feasible by stressing the social prerequisites of globally and ethically oriented political behavior.</p>
<p>He was institutionally cautious, and decidedly anti-utopian, and as such avoided the terminology of ‘world government,’ being content with the far more modest attainment of ‘a global coordinating body.’</p>
<p>And when it came to advocating a UN Consultative Assembly, he deliberately held back from proposing a ‘global parliament’ or even ‘a global peoples assembly,’ presumably to discipline his normative imagination by adhering to the optic of ‘politics as the art of the possible.’</p>
<p>I confess that as I have grown older I do my best to heed the counter-wisdom of ‘politics as the art of the impossible.’ This reflects my judgment that the domain of the feasible, even if extended to the maximum, cannot address such global challenges as climate change and nuclear weapons in a sufficiently timely fashion.</p>
<p>In the WOMP experience, this kind of disciplined imagination clashed with the more idealized ambitions and beliefs of Saul Mendlovitz, outspokenly convinced that world government in some form was not only desirable, but well on its way to realization. And yet both listened to one another, and the rest of us positioned ourselves in the debate, siding in one way or another with Yoshi on the bottom line issue of what to expect, as well as what kind of process we should be encouraging and what sort of goals we should affirm.</p>
<p>Beyond WOMP, Yoshi was extremely influential on the progressive, anti-totalitarian side of the Japanese political spectrum. He was a chief advisor to the governor of the Kanagawa prefecture within which the city of Yokohama was located, and helped organize annual conferences on the theme of ‘Yokohama and the World’ for several years in the 1980s.</p>
<p>The intriguing sub-text, consistent with Yoshi’s call for the formation of new positive identities, was the premise that Tokyo and the national government were not necessarily speaking on behalf of the people of Yokohama (or for people in general), and that for this sub-state more cosmopolitan perspective to be properly shaped it was necessary to incorporate views from people outside of Japan.</p>
<p>Yoshi was especially affirmed the need of First World leaders to listen sympathetically to authentic Third World voices. I took part in these stimulating sessions, which were highlighted by the governor’s eagerness to normalize relations between the peoples of Japan and China through the vehicle of Yokohama’s initiative. This wish for reconciliation cut against the grain of the Japanese government’s disinclination at that time to take any foreign policy initiative that might displease its masters in Washington.</p>
<p>Yoshi was a loyal and attentive friend, but he was also formal in the traditional Japanese manner. I am guessing that he wished that he had been culturally endowed with more lightness of being, and not quite as beholden to the strong constraints imposed of Japanese tradition.</p>
<p>Observing Yoshi through the years, he functioned both as a sort of ‘conscience’ for WOMP and a deterrent to sloppy, sentimental thinking on the part of the rest of us. As such Yoshi could be a rather intimidating presence, although his humanistic sensibility would not have considered this a compliment. I for one feared displeasing or disappointing him, and felt that Yoshi regarded me as somewhat ‘flaky’ at times, despite sharing my political activist stances. As his devoted students confirmed over the years, Yoshi was a stern taskmaster, although the kindest and most loyal professor in their experience.</p>
<p>To remember Yoshikazu Sakamoto is to take note of a loss of someone that has made a lasting difference in my experience, and that of many others whose path he crossed. It was through Yoshi that I met with the venerable editor of Sekai and with Kenzaburo Oe, the winner of the 1994 Nobel Prize in Literature. Both of these extraordinary individuals regarded Yoshi as their political guru, which is hardly surprising given his capacity to combine knowledge and wisdom, and to be totally trustworthy, beyond reproach on matters of character large and small.</p>
<p>Writing this essay has made me realize how much I miss Yoshi, and his grounded cosmopolitanism, and how much the world we live in could benefit from his humane vision of how we on this planet should live together and also from his insistence that we must not indulge our desires without knowing how to navigate the treacherous course that leads from the precarious and unjust present to a more sustainable and just future.</p>
<p>Such a combination of qualities is not only greatly valued and desired, but it is extremely rare, especially as so graciously embodied as it was in the person of Yoshikazu Sakamoto. RIP.</p>
<p>This article was originally published at <a href="https://richardfalk.wordpress.com/2014/11/30/remembering-yoshikazu-sakamoto-1927-2014/" type="external">Citizen Pilgrimage</a> and has been used here with permission.</p> | false | 1 | yoshikazu sakamoto graciously embodied combination qualities greatly valued desired extremely rare prefatory note post dedicated remembrance yoshi sakamoto died recently yoshi deeply valued friend important public intellectual japan exerted strong influence postwar generation political orientation rejecting extremes right left questioning militarist premises cold war japans willingness become americas asian poodle gave distinctive political profile sharing words appreciation hope anyone japan comes across text contact especially way putting touch either yoshis family japanese media would like believe american appreciation professor sakamoto would interest knew admired first met yoshi mid1960s came visit princeton expressing concern vietnam war knowing antiwar activism bonded quickly marched peaceful demonstration new york city days later somehow managed keep fairly consistent contact yoshis death october 2 participation world order models project womp period twenty years came know best meeting different parts world every months discussing weighty issues day time time yoshi one principled serious persons ever known subjecting others highest standards performance character never deviated work exhibited perfectionist dedication excellence challenging us worked within ambit influence majority publications written japanese meaning nonjapanese speaking world far deprived much scholarship aware sustained productivity years japanese writings collected six volumes published years ago golden thread woven fabric yoshis life commitment peaceful world highly critical affected japanese militarism 1930s world war ii shadowed childhood viewed betrayal japanese people state supportive established order first knew yoshi struggling hard find firm ground japanese political culture peaceful future strong believer peace constitution imposed upon country world war ii especially article 9 spirit opposed japanese complicity american militarism cold war period opposed permanent american military bases japanese territory including okinawa yoshi also favored might called peace diplomacy especially asian setting working progressive japanese intellectuals promote positive relations china north korea japanese discourse yoshi often referred leading pacifist postwar generationand pacifist understood essentially synonym peace rather affirmation unconditional nonviolence gandhi mode yoshi supported strongly efforts achieve disarmament especially nuclear disarmament encouraged adherence international law respect united nations endorsed called nonviolent geopolitics also believer human rights could support humanitarian intervention exceptional circumstances prevent genocide ethnic cleansing severe crimes humanity regard yoshi tempered quest peace realization circumstances oppressive violence must countered enforcement international criminal law sophisticated risks entailed well aware capacity hegemonic actors manipulate language intervention serve strategic purposes hypocritically invoking humanitarianism yoshi critical way superpowers behaved decades following second world war sympathies clearly supported struggles third world peoples rid countries colonial rule spirit selfdetermination favored reforms would level economic playing field facilitate democratic development third world apparently legacy hans morgenthaus mentorship phd advisor friend yoshi tempered ethical stance toward world politics keen awareness way sovereign states pursued national interests expense public good struck also womp context yoshis emphasis identity crucial often neglected world order value see especially seminal essay toward global identity saul h mendlovitz ed creation world order 189210 1975 yoshi affirmed need global coordinating body unquestionable 193 yet keenly aware need insufficient called organizational lag vantage point tried think dysfunctional lag persisted age scientific rationality might overcome seeking understanding yoshi emphasized two factors attachment individuals nationstate political actor commanding loyalty unto death citizens existing outer limit political community consequent need construct identities transcend nationalist boundaries ever emerge political required support stronger globalist institutional capacity intellectual rigor passion practical theorizing dislike wishful thinking yoshi offered guidelines expected witness growing transnationalization international life amid increasing interdependence would time weaken nationalist attachments especially foresaw weakening geopolitical rivalries core cold war also affirmed communitybuilding potential united nations believed could activated establishment un consultative assembly composed representatives major political parties country 207 ensure diversity contestation party 10 electoral support would eligible send delegates underlying idea create feeling global community would produce greater appreciation need stronger global institutional presence animating idea well articulated crucial point un system act nucleus communitybuilding serving vehicle creation smallscale open communities throughout world worldwide adoption nondiscriminatory practices un related agencies would serve model national private organizations worth observing yoshi true training international relations university chicago insisted upon careful diagnosis existing situation believing way forward human affairs stage history extend domain feasible stressing social prerequisites globally ethically oriented political behavior institutionally cautious decidedly antiutopian avoided terminology world government content far modest attainment global coordinating body came advocating un consultative assembly deliberately held back proposing global parliament even global peoples assembly presumably discipline normative imagination adhering optic politics art possible confess grown older best heed counterwisdom politics art impossible reflects judgment domain feasible even extended maximum address global challenges climate change nuclear weapons sufficiently timely fashion womp experience kind disciplined imagination clashed idealized ambitions beliefs saul mendlovitz outspokenly convinced world government form desirable well way realization yet listened one another rest us positioned debate siding one way another yoshi bottom line issue expect well kind process encouraging sort goals affirm beyond womp yoshi extremely influential progressive antitotalitarian side japanese political spectrum chief advisor governor kanagawa prefecture within city yokohama located helped organize annual conferences theme yokohama world several years 1980s intriguing subtext consistent yoshis call formation new positive identities premise tokyo national government necessarily speaking behalf people yokohama people general substate cosmopolitan perspective properly shaped necessary incorporate views people outside japan yoshi especially affirmed need first world leaders listen sympathetically authentic third world voices took part stimulating sessions highlighted governors eagerness normalize relations peoples japan china vehicle yokohamas initiative wish reconciliation cut grain japanese governments disinclination time take foreign policy initiative might displease masters washington yoshi loyal attentive friend also formal traditional japanese manner guessing wished culturally endowed lightness quite beholden strong constraints imposed japanese tradition observing yoshi years functioned sort conscience womp deterrent sloppy sentimental thinking part rest us yoshi could rather intimidating presence although humanistic sensibility would considered compliment one feared displeasing disappointing felt yoshi regarded somewhat flaky times despite sharing political activist stances devoted students confirmed years yoshi stern taskmaster although kindest loyal professor experience remember yoshikazu sakamoto take note loss someone made lasting difference experience many others whose path crossed yoshi met venerable editor sekai kenzaburo oe winner 1994 nobel prize literature extraordinary individuals regarded yoshi political guru hardly surprising given capacity combine knowledge wisdom totally trustworthy beyond reproach matters character large small writing essay made realize much miss yoshi grounded cosmopolitanism much world live could benefit humane vision planet live together also insistence must indulge desires without knowing navigate treacherous course leads precarious unjust present sustainable future combination qualities greatly valued desired extremely rare especially graciously embodied person yoshikazu sakamoto rip article originally published citizen pilgrimage used permission | 1,064 |
<p>Last February, a few days after a man from Indiana had fired several shots at the White House, I found myself driving a group of black fourth and fifth graders to the U.S. Capitol for a private tour. George W. Bush had just been inaugurated, so I asked the kids what they thought about their new president.</p>
<p>“When I heard about the shooting I was pretty happy,” said one of the boys with a laugh. “I thought Bush might have got shot.” Other comments were just as bitter, though the kids were too young really to know what they were saying:</p>
<p>“President Bush is going to put us all back in slavery.”</p>
<p>“He’s going to round up all the black people and kill them.”</p>
<p>The kids were part of a reading and art program at a housing project in Northeast Washington, D.C. — a part of town long known to residents and local reporters as “Little Beirut.” They were, for the most part, nice kids — affectionate and brash, used to hardship at home and mayhem on the streets, with little real experience of the “white” world that lies outside their all-black neighborhood.</p>
<p>President Bush spoke of these separate worlds in his inaugural address: “While many of our citizens prosper,” he said, “others doubt the promise — even the justice — of our own country. . . . And sometimes our differences run so deep, it seems we share a continent, but not a country.” Bush’s commitment to “healing” the racial divide is by now beyond question. But so is the fear and loathing of Republicans among most blacks, young and old, rich and poor, religious and secular.</p>
<p>To be sure, Democrats and the civil rights establishment have had their own problems of late: Jesse Jackson’s personal and financial scandals; Sen. Robert Byrd’s use of the term “white nigger”; the bloodfight between Terry McAuliffe (the white choice) and Maynard Jackson (the black choice) for the chairmanship of the Democratic National Committee, followed by McAuliffe’s use of the term “colored people” in one of his speeches; and, most significantly, the quandary over President Bush’s faith-based initiative, which threatens to drive a wedge between the black civil rights establishment (allied as it is with the secular Left) and the black churches and church leaders with whom Bush hopes to work.</p>
<p>But none of these contretemps has changed anything politically. There has been virtually no backlash against Democrats for their insensitivities; even Democratic mayor Charlie Luken of riot-torn Cincinnati seems to be getting a political pass — by contrast with, say, mayor Rudolph Giuliani of New York after the Amadou Diallo shooting — while the Cincinnati police force comes under heavy fire from black leaders for the fatal shooting of a black suspect.</p>
<p>It is far too early to tell whether President Bush’s “compassionate conservative” agenda — his vigorous support for black churches, his talk of reforming inner-city schools, his deliberate sensitivity to issues like racial profiling, and (though he would never openly admit it) his race-conscious appointments to the highest posts in his administration — will break this political stalemate in the long run, defusing black animosity towards Republicans and even garnering black support. Four months does not a realignment make; the record in Texas, however, is not encouraging. After six years as governor, Bush won a paltry 5 percent of Texas blacks in the presidential race. Despite all of Bush’s efforts at “inclusion,” the dominant symbol of his young presidency for most blacks remains John Ashcroft, whose interview with Southern Partisan magazine and appearance at Bob Jones University were easily exploited by Democrats to reinforce many blacks in the belief that Republicans are the moral equivalents of slaveholders.</p>
<p>Undaunted, Bush and his compassionate conservatives are determined to win the confidence of black Americans. They insist that religious, socially conservative blacks living in overtaxed cities are a natural Republican constituency. They believe that decades of liberal failure, especially in the public schools, make it possible to break black voters’ near unanimous loyalty to the Democratic party. This is no mere political gambit, as civil rights leaders smugly claim; it is not the inverse of Nixon’s “Southern Strategy.” It reflects, rather, two decades of reflection on how to make Republicans the party of urban renewal, and it springs from the conviction that core conservative principles can address the problems of the black community — while decades of liberal policies and grievance politics have only made them worse.</p>
<p>Whatever promise it may hold for the future, Bush’s overture to blacks faces two obstacles in the here and now. The first is Republicans’ mistaken willingness to tolerate old forms of southern pride that border on bigotry. President Bush, to his credit, has made an effort to confront America’s slaveholding past without giving in to “the soft bigotry of low expectations.” But to his detriment, Bush, like most of his fellow candidates for the Republican nomination in 2000, remained agnostic about the Confederate flag — thus seeming to put calculation before principle and giving the Left a symbolic victory on race (which it tirelessly replayed during the Ashcroft fight).</p>
<p>The second is more fundamental: Republicans haven’t decided whether or not race matters. They are torn between their philosophical commitment to color-blindness and the necessity they feel for deliberate outreach to blacks. They believe that race-based hiring and college admissions are wrong, yet they feel compelled to make sure that minorities are included in numerous and key positions in the administration. (For Democrats, there is no such ambivalence: They defend race-conscious policies like affirmative action, diversity hiring, and the racial gerrymandering of congressional districts in the name of fairness, suspending the principle of color-blindness in order to make up for past prejudice and ongoing discrimination.) The Republicans only compound their political problems when they tell the truth about the high incidence of black-on-black crime and illegitimacy and the racial achievement gap in school. They are left, in the end, with a whole repertoire of losing strategies: maintaining that race does not matter, when to most black Americans it does; equating blackness with social pathology; or trying to out-pander Democrats. Compassionate conservatives must find a way out of this maze if they are ever to win more than George W. Bush’s dismal 9 percent of the national black vote.</p>
<p>A good starting point would be to admit that conservatives have been right to criticize the excesses and destructiveness of race-based thinking, but wrong to underestimate the enduring significance of being black in America. For the fact is that black America — with its history of slavery and freedom, segregation and civil rights, bigotry and courage — retains a special moral authority in the nation at large, even if militants and demagogues have so often abused this claim. America’s greatest black leaders, from Frederick Douglass to Martin Luther King Jr., spoke not just as Americans but as black Americans — with a long history of injustice behind their challenge to the nation’s conscience. Even today, the most independent black thinkers, from Thomas Sowell to Shelby Steele, speak with a special courage, special voice, and special authority.</p>
<p>If compassionate conservatism could engage this black voice in the service of just ends — a role for religion in public life; school choice as a civil right; human rights, including the right to life of the unborn; families complete with fathers — it could significantly change American politics. Such a black-white compassionate-conservative alliance would not only address black problems with new vigor; it would invite blacks to address America’s problems. It would treat blacks not just as the needy but as the needed. It would connect black identity with the moral life of America — and in the process expose the moral bankruptcy of the current black political establishment.</p>
<p>To advance this ambitious agenda, compassionate conservatism must be informed by a deeper grasp than most conservatives now have of how blacks understand themselves, of how race does matter, for better and worse. The church, as President Bush has realized, is a good place to start.</p>
<p>The Reverend Willie T. Lawson is the minister of Mount Paran Baptist Church, a black congregation in Southeast Washington, D.C. For two and a half hours one recent morning, he told me stories — about the sack he used for picking cotton when he was 5 years old, about his turn to God as a teenager, about his time in the army, about his views on abortion, the family, and the black crisis — each of which turned into a boom ing mini-sermon followed by an apology. Then Lawson said this:</p>
<p>“I think a lot of the problems of the inner city have to do with not knowing about our past, our real past, our struggles. I don’t mean this in a racist way — we should not hate because we were oppressed. But we need to know. We need to know about the courage we once had. We need to get God back into our lives. I want to see our people fly with the eagles, not scratch with the chickens. And we can’t do it with our pants hanging down around our hips on the street corner selling drugs. Government can’t solve our problems, because if government could, God would be obsolete. The kids aren’t going to do it themselves. We have to enlighten them, and that’s where the church comes in.”</p>
<p>That Sunday, Rev. Lawson preached a sermon entitled “Too Blessed to Be Depressed.” It built like a volcano, punctuated every 30 seconds with “Amens” from the overwhelmingly female congregation: “God knew Jeremiah in the womb. He already loved him. And here we are talking about allowing partial-birth abortion.” Amen. “Look at the blessings God has bestowed on us. He’s taken us out of our own Egypt right here in America.” Amen. “And we’ve got the nerve to shoot one another, to sell drugs to one another, to destroy one another.” Amen. Amen. Amen.</p>
<p>What becomes clear is that if the conservative problem is the failure to take adequate account of how race matters, the potential problem for liberals is their failure to reflect the moral outlook of many of their loyal black constituents. The black America that dominates our national dialogue, it seems, has two cultures but one politics. One culture was represented at Mount Paran Baptist Church that Sunday. It is the culture of Rev. Lawson, deeply religious, largely female, pro-life, pro-school prayer, and pro-abstinence. The other culture is self-destructive, largely male, plagued by violence, drugs, rage, death, misogyny, and illegitimacy. It is the culture of Puffy Combs and Allen Iverson, of BET music videos and Al Sharpton riots.</p>
<p>The black political establishment appeals to the former’s sense of justice, while justifying the latter’s sins. It translates the personal morality of its churchgoing constituents into a political morality of grievances and payoffs. It denies, ignores, or deemphasizes grave problems of the black inner city, to preserve an undiluted politics of oppressor and oppressed — when in truth the present tragedy of many blacks has neither so obvious nor so intentional a cause as racism. But when it comes to voting, most blacks of all classes, however conservative on certain issues, still affirm this politics, perhaps because they see in it the only available affirmation of their black identity.</p>
<p>No issue better illustrates the corrupting legacy of this unprincipled politics than abortion. Consider the example of Jesse Jackson, circa 1977, articulating how the defenders of abortion end up adopting the slaveholder’s logic:</p>
<p>There are those who argue that the right to privacy is of [a] higher order than the right to life. . . . That was the premise of slavery. You could not protest the existence or treatment of slaves on the plantation because that was private and therefore outside your right to be concerned. . . . What happens to the mind of a person, and the moral fabric of a nation, that accepts the aborting of the life of a baby without a pang of conscience? What kind of a person and what kind of a society will we have 20 years hence if life can be taken so casually? It is that question, the question of our attitude, our value system, and our mindset with regard to the nature and worth of life itself that is the central question confronting mankind. Failure to answer that question affirmatively may leave us with a hell right here on earth.</p>
<p>But Jackson and the civil rights establishment abandoned this larger idea of justice a long time ago. In February 2001, Jackson issued his personal “10-point civil-rights agenda.” Point No. 8 was: “A Woman’s Right to Self-Determination. Women must be secure in their control of their own bodies. . . . ” Of the 36 voting members of the Congressional Black Caucus, 29 had perfect pro-choice voting records in the 106th Congress; the other 7 had pro-choice records of 80 percent, 82 percent, 90 percent, 94 percent, 95 percent, 95 percent, and 95 percent.</p>
<p>And so here is the problem, in a nutshell: On this issue of great moral seriousness, where liberationist values conflict with Christian values, and political power conflicts with moral principle, the black establishment chooses autonomy and power. It enters a pan-liberal alliance with secular feminists and rejects the majority beliefs of the black community, which are Christian and pro-life. In so doing, black establishment leaders reveal the hollowness of their idea of justice — since justice depends on honoring principles higher than power, duties higher than choice. Instead, they become the very thing they supposedly exist to oppose: people who put self-interest and convenience before what is right. That is what slaveholders did; that is what abortion is. And the person who consents to either of these evils — as Jesse Jackson once knew — consents to the slaveholder’s creed of power, not principle.</p>
<p>On issue after issue, the black establishment has followed this pattern. On school choice, religion in public life, sexual morality, and the nature of the family, the black establishment has embraced power over principle, easy grandstanding over hard truths. And so, in the end, it betrays the best of its community and justifies the worst. It leads blacks nowhere.</p>
<p>A conservative alternative is just beginning to take shape — one that combines realism about black problems with a new idea of compassion and an offer of alliance with black churches. But it cannot succeed unless Republicans can overcome the animosity with which much of the black community still regards them.</p>
<p>To this end, Republicans must do more than diagnose black problems and formulate conservative policies to address them. They must also find a way to connect black identity with conservatism’s highest principles. They must make the case not simply that blacks need conservatives, but also that conservatives need blacks. This is not primarily a matter of winning votes — Republicans, after all, win elections with few black votes. It is a matter of enlisting blacks’ unique moral authority on the social issues. Until conservatives understand this — and until more black leaders and citizens accept the burden of self-criticism where it is warranted, and the challenge of leading the nation as a whole, not just black America against white America — the racial stalemate will likely continue, with little gain to blacks, conservatives, or the country they share.</p>
<p>Source Notes Copyright: 2001 The Weekly Standard</p> | false | 1 | last february days man indiana fired several shots white house found driving group black fourth fifth graders us capitol private tour george w bush inaugurated asked kids thought new president heard shooting pretty happy said one boys laugh thought bush might got shot comments bitter though kids young really know saying president bush going put us back slavery hes going round black people kill kids part reading art program housing project northeast washington dc part town long known residents local reporters little beirut part nice kids affectionate brash used hardship home mayhem streets little real experience white world lies outside allblack neighborhood president bush spoke separate worlds inaugural address many citizens prosper said others doubt promise even justice country sometimes differences run deep seems share continent country bushs commitment healing racial divide beyond question fear loathing republicans among blacks young old rich poor religious secular sure democrats civil rights establishment problems late jesse jacksons personal financial scandals sen robert byrds use term white nigger bloodfight terry mcauliffe white choice maynard jackson black choice chairmanship democratic national committee followed mcauliffes use term colored people one speeches significantly quandary president bushs faithbased initiative threatens drive wedge black civil rights establishment allied secular left black churches church leaders bush hopes work none contretemps changed anything politically virtually backlash democrats insensitivities even democratic mayor charlie luken riottorn cincinnati seems getting political pass contrast say mayor rudolph giuliani new york amadou diallo shooting cincinnati police force comes heavy fire black leaders fatal shooting black suspect far early tell whether president bushs compassionate conservative agenda vigorous support black churches talk reforming innercity schools deliberate sensitivity issues like racial profiling though would never openly admit raceconscious appointments highest posts administration break political stalemate long run defusing black animosity towards republicans even garnering black support four months realignment make record texas however encouraging six years governor bush paltry 5 percent texas blacks presidential race despite bushs efforts inclusion dominant symbol young presidency blacks remains john ashcroft whose interview southern partisan magazine appearance bob jones university easily exploited democrats reinforce many blacks belief republicans moral equivalents slaveholders undaunted bush compassionate conservatives determined win confidence black americans insist religious socially conservative blacks living overtaxed cities natural republican constituency believe decades liberal failure especially public schools make possible break black voters near unanimous loyalty democratic party mere political gambit civil rights leaders smugly claim inverse nixons southern strategy reflects rather two decades reflection make republicans party urban renewal springs conviction core conservative principles address problems black community decades liberal policies grievance politics made worse whatever promise may hold future bushs overture blacks faces two obstacles first republicans mistaken willingness tolerate old forms southern pride border bigotry president bush credit made effort confront americas slaveholding past without giving soft bigotry low expectations detriment bush like fellow candidates republican nomination 2000 remained agnostic confederate flag thus seeming put calculation principle giving left symbolic victory race tirelessly replayed ashcroft fight second fundamental republicans havent decided whether race matters torn philosophical commitment colorblindness necessity feel deliberate outreach blacks believe racebased hiring college admissions wrong yet feel compelled make sure minorities included numerous key positions administration democrats ambivalence defend raceconscious policies like affirmative action diversity hiring racial gerrymandering congressional districts name fairness suspending principle colorblindness order make past prejudice ongoing discrimination republicans compound political problems tell truth high incidence blackonblack crime illegitimacy racial achievement gap school left end whole repertoire losing strategies maintaining race matter black americans equating blackness social pathology trying outpander democrats compassionate conservatives must find way maze ever win george w bushs dismal 9 percent national black vote good starting point would admit conservatives right criticize excesses destructiveness racebased thinking wrong underestimate enduring significance black america fact black america history slavery freedom segregation civil rights bigotry courage retains special moral authority nation large even militants demagogues often abused claim americas greatest black leaders frederick douglass martin luther king jr spoke americans black americans long history injustice behind challenge nations conscience even today independent black thinkers thomas sowell shelby steele speak special courage special voice special authority compassionate conservatism could engage black voice service ends role religion public life school choice civil right human rights including right life unborn families complete fathers could significantly change american politics blackwhite compassionateconservative alliance would address black problems new vigor would invite blacks address americas problems would treat blacks needy needed would connect black identity moral life america process expose moral bankruptcy current black political establishment advance ambitious agenda compassionate conservatism must informed deeper grasp conservatives blacks understand race matter better worse church president bush realized good place start reverend willie lawson minister mount paran baptist church black congregation southeast washington dc two half hours one recent morning told stories sack used picking cotton 5 years old turn god teenager time army views abortion family black crisis turned boom ing minisermon followed apology lawson said think lot problems inner city knowing past real past struggles dont mean racist way hate oppressed need know need know courage need get god back lives want see people fly eagles scratch chickens cant pants hanging around hips street corner selling drugs government cant solve problems government could god would obsolete kids arent going enlighten thats church comes sunday rev lawson preached sermon entitled blessed depressed built like volcano punctuated every 30 seconds amens overwhelmingly female congregation god knew jeremiah womb already loved talking allowing partialbirth abortion amen look blessings god bestowed us hes taken us egypt right america amen weve got nerve shoot one another sell drugs one another destroy one another amen amen amen becomes clear conservative problem failure take adequate account race matters potential problem liberals failure reflect moral outlook many loyal black constituents black america dominates national dialogue seems two cultures one politics one culture represented mount paran baptist church sunday culture rev lawson deeply religious largely female prolife proschool prayer proabstinence culture selfdestructive largely male plagued violence drugs rage death misogyny illegitimacy culture puffy combs allen iverson bet music videos al sharpton riots black political establishment appeals formers sense justice justifying latters sins translates personal morality churchgoing constituents political morality grievances payoffs denies ignores deemphasizes grave problems black inner city preserve undiluted politics oppressor oppressed truth present tragedy many blacks neither obvious intentional cause racism comes voting blacks classes however conservative certain issues still affirm politics perhaps see available affirmation black identity issue better illustrates corrupting legacy unprincipled politics abortion consider example jesse jackson circa 1977 articulating defenders abortion end adopting slaveholders logic argue right privacy higher order right life premise slavery could protest existence treatment slaves plantation private therefore outside right concerned happens mind person moral fabric nation accepts aborting life baby without pang conscience kind person kind society 20 years hence life taken casually question question attitude value system mindset regard nature worth life central question confronting mankind failure answer question affirmatively may leave us hell right earth jackson civil rights establishment abandoned larger idea justice long time ago february 2001 jackson issued personal 10point civilrights agenda point 8 womans right selfdetermination women must secure control bodies 36 voting members congressional black caucus 29 perfect prochoice voting records 106th congress 7 prochoice records 80 percent 82 percent 90 percent 94 percent 95 percent 95 percent 95 percent problem nutshell issue great moral seriousness liberationist values conflict christian values political power conflicts moral principle black establishment chooses autonomy power enters panliberal alliance secular feminists rejects majority beliefs black community christian prolife black establishment leaders reveal hollowness idea justice since justice depends honoring principles higher power duties higher choice instead become thing supposedly exist oppose people put selfinterest convenience right slaveholders abortion person consents either evils jesse jackson knew consents slaveholders creed power principle issue issue black establishment followed pattern school choice religion public life sexual morality nature family black establishment embraced power principle easy grandstanding hard truths end betrays best community justifies worst leads blacks nowhere conservative alternative beginning take shape one combines realism black problems new idea compassion offer alliance black churches succeed unless republicans overcome animosity much black community still regards end republicans must diagnose black problems formulate conservative policies address must also find way connect black identity conservatisms highest principles must make case simply blacks need conservatives also conservatives need blacks primarily matter winning votes republicans win elections black votes matter enlisting blacks unique moral authority social issues conservatives understand black leaders citizens accept burden selfcriticism warranted challenge leading nation whole black america white america racial stalemate likely continue little gain blacks conservatives country share source notes copyright 2001 weekly standard | 1,417 |
<p>In may, ABC News’ Lincoln Square Prods. decided against submitting John Ridley’s “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/let-it-fall-1982-1992/" type="external">Let It Fall: 1982-1992</a>” for Primetime Emmy consideration. The reason? The television company hoped that the 140-minute docu, which tackles the 1992 Los Angeles riots, would receive feature film recognition via the Academy Awards. Oscar consultants concluded that a pre-existing Emmy profile could potentially hurt the doc’s chances at a little gold man.</p>
<p>ABC’s decision to forgo a possible Primetime Emmy in favor of Oscar glory wasn’t exactly surprising.</p>
<p>Oscar is the entertainment industry’s most esteemed accolade, and AMPAS recognition represents a coveted chance for not only the highest form of industry peer recognition, but also mainstream audience attention — a feat rarely achieved in the nonfiction film world.</p>
<p>“The feature doc business has never been so vibrant and, in part, that’s because there is the perception of the possibility of real Academy Award glory down the road in the life of a feature doc,” says Passion Pictures’ John Battsek, the producer behind Oscar-winning docus “One Day in September” and “Searching for Sugarman.” “That’s very seductive for financiers and producers alike.”</p>
<p>Oscar’s allure has made the Primetime Emmys a nice afterthought, a kudofest that re-celebrates Oscar-nominated docus.</p>
<p>Case in point: last year’s Oscar-winning docu, ESPN Film’s “O.J.: Made in America,” nabbed six Primetime Emmy noms and took home two statues. Netflix’s “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/13th/" type="external">13th</a>,” which received an Academy Award nom alongside “O.J.,” went on to score nine Primetime Emmy noms and four wins.</p>
<p>In the past decade alone, half of all Academy Award-nominated docs garnered a Primetime, News and Doc or Intl. Emmy nomination. Along with “O.J.: Made in America,” Oscar winners including “Citizenfour,” “Taxi to the Dark Side” and “Born Into Brothels” can also tout Emmy wins. But Emmys’ sheer abundance makes them less desirable than an Academy Award, so despite technically being in the small-screen business, streamers such as Netflix and Amazon, as well as veteran TV distributors including HBO and PBS, put in a great deal of time and money to obtain the hard-to-get Oscar.</p>
<p>It’s a cutthroat campaign that involves screenings, Q&amp;As, boozy lunches, cocktail hours, billboards, celebrities and plenty of ads. It’s also a long race that begins as early as January’s Sundance Film Festival and, this awards season, concludes 14 months later. For the docu community, it’s a relatively new race that can be demanding, overwhelming and, for some, morally compromising.</p>
<p>While the Academy has been honoring documentaries since 1941, it wasn’t until 2001 that an official documentary branch was formed. Prior to that a small, anonymous committee system determined the shortlist and the subsequent five nominees, making a large campaign pre-nomination impractical. After the formation of the doc branch, all members of the branch could vote on the final five nominees. This marked the beginning of the nonfiction feature Oscar campaign.</p>
<p>Marshall Curry was nominated for an Academy Award in 2006 for “Street Fight” and in 2012 for “If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front.” He lost to “March of the Penguins” and the football doc “Undefeated,” respectively. He remembers money, or lack thereof, being a deciding factor in both campaigns. While he could only afford to buy a small advertisement in the trades, “March of the Penguins” bought cover ads. Then in 2012 the Weinstein Co. invited him to a fancy lunch in Manhattan to celebrate the New York Giants. Curry quickly realized that ads had become quaint.</p>
<p>“I’m not really a football fan, so I wasn’t sure why I’d been invited, but when I go to the lunch, Harvey was slapping backs of all these celebrities, and I realized it was an under-the-radar campaign event for ‘Undefeated,’” Curry says. “I realized then that when it comes to the Oscars, there were some people playing checkers and other people playing chess.”</p>
<p>Things got increasingly competitive in 2013 when all active doc branch members were provided access to all the eligible entries. Their votes determined the 15-title shortlist and, in a second round of balloting, the five nominees. Another new rule that year allowed the Academy’s entire voting membership to determine the category winner.</p>
<p>“Today, the entire branch votes to pick the shortlist, which is more democratic, but it also means that every film starts lobbying voters to get on the shortlist from the day it premieres,” Curry points out. “So instead of 15 films lobbying for a couple months, you have 170 eligible films lobbying year-round. That’s a real problem because it means that tons of films are wasting huge amounts of money targeting 260 Academy voters when they could be using that money to build real audiences for their films.”</p>
<p>Netflix has a real audience via the company’s 53 million domestic subscribers, but it is still hungry for Oscar gold. Four years ago the streamer started pouring money into Oscar campaigns for docs. Films such as “Virunga” (in 2015) and “What Happened, Miss Simone?” (in 2016) nabbed noms.</p>
<p>Liz Garbus, who directed “Simone” was also nominated in 1999 for “The Farm: Angola, USA.” She remembers that before “The Farm” was nominated there was no lobbying, nor parties or outreach.</p>
<p>“We didn’t have the money to do it, nor the know-how,” Garbus recalls. “Once the films were nominated, that changed a bit. One of our competitors, ‘The Last Days,’ which ultimately won, had a larger P&amp;A budget and Steven Spielberg was an executive producer. That did make a difference, of course.”</p>
<p>Her second time around the Oscar bandwagon, Netflix held plenty of Academy voter-targeted soirees, and plastered billboards and building-sized ads across Los Angeles. Despite losing to Asif Kapadia’s “Amy,” Garbus was happy with the campaign and views the current Oscar docu climate positively.</p>
<p>“It’s a reflection of the increased visibility of and appreciation for docs in the marketplace,” Garbus says. “It makes more people want to get into the field — both creatively and financially, and that’s good for the industry as a whole.”</p>
<p>While Battsek agrees, he also sees a downside. “The real reward of making feature docs is that we are working in a medium that is all about authenticity, integrity and honesty. However, the nature of the campaigning that we as the filmmakers are asked, encouraged and sometimes demanded to do sits extremely uncomfortably with that set of values,” he says. “It can often feel like the actual merit of the film is secondary to the spend and the PR push. Try as we may to stick to our core values, it is really very hard not to get caught up in it all if you have a film in the mix. This doesn’t sit well with me and many of my like-minded colleagues at all.”</p> | false | 1 | may abc news lincoln square prods decided submitting john ridleys let fall 19821992 primetime emmy consideration reason television company hoped 140minute docu tackles 1992 los angeles riots would receive feature film recognition via academy awards oscar consultants concluded preexisting emmy profile could potentially hurt docs chances little gold man abcs decision forgo possible primetime emmy favor oscar glory wasnt exactly surprising oscar entertainment industrys esteemed accolade ampas recognition represents coveted chance highest form industry peer recognition also mainstream audience attention feat rarely achieved nonfiction film world feature doc business never vibrant part thats perception possibility real academy award glory road life feature doc says passion pictures john battsek producer behind oscarwinning docus one day september searching sugarman thats seductive financiers producers alike oscars allure made primetime emmys nice afterthought kudofest recelebrates oscarnominated docus case point last years oscarwinning docu espn films oj made america nabbed six primetime emmy noms took home two statues netflixs 13th received academy award nom alongside oj went score nine primetime emmy noms four wins past decade alone half academy awardnominated docs garnered primetime news doc intl emmy nomination along oj made america oscar winners including citizenfour taxi dark side born brothels also tout emmy wins emmys sheer abundance makes less desirable academy award despite technically smallscreen business streamers netflix amazon well veteran tv distributors including hbo pbs put great deal time money obtain hardtoget oscar cutthroat campaign involves screenings qampas boozy lunches cocktail hours billboards celebrities plenty ads also long race begins early januarys sundance film festival awards season concludes 14 months later docu community relatively new race demanding overwhelming morally compromising academy honoring documentaries since 1941 wasnt 2001 official documentary branch formed prior small anonymous committee system determined shortlist subsequent five nominees making large campaign prenomination impractical formation doc branch members branch could vote final five nominees marked beginning nonfiction feature oscar campaign marshall curry nominated academy award 2006 street fight 2012 tree falls story earth liberation front lost march penguins football doc undefeated respectively remembers money lack thereof deciding factor campaigns could afford buy small advertisement trades march penguins bought cover ads 2012 weinstein co invited fancy lunch manhattan celebrate new york giants curry quickly realized ads become quaint im really football fan wasnt sure id invited go lunch harvey slapping backs celebrities realized undertheradar campaign event undefeated curry says realized comes oscars people playing checkers people playing chess things got increasingly competitive 2013 active doc branch members provided access eligible entries votes determined 15title shortlist second round balloting five nominees another new rule year allowed academys entire voting membership determine category winner today entire branch votes pick shortlist democratic also means every film starts lobbying voters get shortlist day premieres curry points instead 15 films lobbying couple months 170 eligible films lobbying yearround thats real problem means tons films wasting huge amounts money targeting 260 academy voters could using money build real audiences films netflix real audience via companys 53 million domestic subscribers still hungry oscar gold four years ago streamer started pouring money oscar campaigns docs films virunga 2015 happened miss simone 2016 nabbed noms liz garbus directed simone also nominated 1999 farm angola usa remembers farm nominated lobbying parties outreach didnt money knowhow garbus recalls films nominated changed bit one competitors last days ultimately larger pampa budget steven spielberg executive producer make difference course second time around oscar bandwagon netflix held plenty academy votertargeted soirees plastered billboards buildingsized ads across los angeles despite losing asif kapadias amy garbus happy campaign views current oscar docu climate positively reflection increased visibility appreciation docs marketplace garbus says makes people want get field creatively financially thats good industry whole battsek agrees also sees downside real reward making feature docs working medium authenticity integrity honesty however nature campaigning filmmakers asked encouraged sometimes demanded sits extremely uncomfortably set values says often feel like actual merit film secondary spend pr push try may stick core values really hard get caught film mix doesnt sit well many likeminded colleagues | 661 |
<p>Bloated with visual effects, martial artists combat and amorous shenanigans, the one thing missing in “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/the-thousand-faces-of-dunjia/" type="external">The Thousand Faces of Dunjia</a>” is a comedic touch, which might have made this elaborate blockbuster more appealing. Written and produced by <a href="http://variety.com/t/tsui-hark/" type="external">Tsui Hark</a>, and directed by <a href="http://variety.com/t/yuen-woo-ping/" type="external">Yuen Woo-ping</a>, this action fantasy about a secret society of fighters with magic powers seems to lend itself to the cheeky tone of American blockbusters like “Guardians of the Galaxy” or “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them,” albeit with a Chinese makeover. However, as Yuen’s soulless sequel “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny” made clear,&#160;he may be a top martial arts choreographer, but he’s a strictly mechanical director.</p>
<p>Tsui’s script, though not without entertaining elements, lacks the intellectual grounding or cinematic oomph that made better works like “The Taking of Tiger Mountain” more than mere spectacles. Nor does his contribution to the editing and music significantly heighten his personal style. The first locally produced tentpole to open in China this Christmas season, the film lags behind Feng Xiaogang’s “Youth,” as “Dunjia” met with unfavorable critical response and weaker box office in its first five days. Opening in the U.S. on the same date, the film should be able to tap into both Tsui and Yuen’s genre fanbase overseas.</p>
<p>The film’s Chinese title “Qimen Dunjia” refers to a hermetic school of war strategy combining sorcery, alchemy, I-ching, fengshui and other occult arts. Legend has it that China’s first emperor Huang Di used it to defeat the goblin tribe of Chiyou to unify the kingdom. In 1982, Yuen directed “The Miracle Fighters” which shared the same Chinese title, a cheesy but nonetheless pioneering hybrid of kung fu and comic hocus-pocus. The current work has almost nothing in common in plot or era, playing it safe by keeping within the state-sanctioned monster genre, while avoiding any associations with Chinese folk magic or ghosts.</p>
<p>The story kicks off with a nod to — or rip-off — of Stephen Chow’s “Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons” with a goldfish demon wreaking havoc in the ancient city of Kaifeng. The Wuyin Clan, a secret society whose seven members inherited the magical skills of “Qimen” try to capture it, contributing to the film’s most engaging action scenes in its vibrant combination of classical Chinese art tropes and Hong Kong-style martial arts.</p>
<p>However, it is soon revealed that the monster was just a red herring, functioning only as bait to pull the clan toward an evil force that craves world domination (what else?). The clan’s Big Brother (Taiwanese rocker Wu Bai) takes off to find (or stop others from finding — it’s not clear which) an unsubtly-named device called the Destroyer of Worlds.&#160;</p>
<p>On a separate mission to discover Wuyin’s anointed clan leader, who can activate the Dunjia, second-in-command Zhuge Fengyun (actor-director-comedian Da Peng) bluffs his way into a clinic for strange maladies to rescue Circle ( <a href="http://variety.com/t/zhou-dongyu/" type="external">Zhou Dongyu</a>, “Soul Mate”). Though a birthmark on her wrist suggests she might be their leader, the frail young ingenue doesn’t seem fit for the job.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, Zhuge’s junior Iron Dragonfly (Ni Ni, “The Flowers of War”) leads the rest of the gang to penetrate Wuyin’s long submerged headquarters, unleashing a dormant power. Amidst the mayhem, a greenhorn constable named Dao Yichang (Aarif Lee Rahman, “Kungfu Yoga”) who has fallen in with their lot becomes an accidental hero. Up to this point, the unpredictable mix of goofy humor and mystery offers a racy hook. However, as with so many of Tsui’s works, subplots and characters multiply out of control after the first act.</p>
<p>A showdown between the five top martial arts schools looks like a contest for weird hairdos. An attempt to graft a sci-fi element onto the apochryphal history of Emperor Huang’s battle against Chiyou 4,500 years ago doesn’t convince. So little exposition goes into “Dunjia” that few can figure out what it really is; nor does the oft-mentioned Destroyer achieve any real cataclysmic impact. And gags built around ancient equivalents of GPS and Facetime don’t quite work in context.</p>
<p>This leaves the principal cast to rally around and infuse some lighthearted romance to an otherwise rote plot. Providing most of the laughs as a cuddle monster, Zhou walks a fine line between being an infantile doll and parodying the lily-white image of her early career, but comes out on the side of cute. Ni, who hasn’t found a project that’s done justice to her tremendous emotional potential since “The Flowers of War,” again pours more passion than her role deserves, making Dragonfly’s fickle and jealous nature credible and touching. Unfortunately, neither actress has much chemistry with her male co-star. Da Peng, who directed sleeper superhero sendup “Jianbing Man” and a runaway comic web series, is especially wooden and charmless.</p>
<p>Rendered in stereoscopic 3D, visual effects supplied by a host of Korean VFX companies allude to the five elements that govern “Qimen Dunjia” but are still too generic to convey a unique visual universe. As in “Journey to the West: The Demons Strike Back,” Tsui’s recent collaboration with Stephen Chow, the undisciplined outpour of futuristic CGI becomes a eyesore, robbing the combat of any sense of real peril. Unlike the vivid creature-like demon in the prologue, Wuyin Clan’s real foes take glaringly computerized shape not unlike the laser-eyed, rubbery kaiju that frequent Ultraman shows.</p> | false | 1 | bloated visual effects martial artists combat amorous shenanigans one thing missing thousand faces dunjia comedic touch might made elaborate blockbuster appealing written produced tsui hark directed yuen wooping action fantasy secret society fighters magic powers seems lend cheeky tone american blockbusters like guardians galaxy fantastic beasts find albeit chinese makeover however yuens soulless sequel crouching tiger hidden dragon sword destiny made clear160he may top martial arts choreographer hes strictly mechanical director tsuis script though without entertaining elements lacks intellectual grounding cinematic oomph made better works like taking tiger mountain mere spectacles contribution editing music significantly heighten personal style first locally produced tentpole open china christmas season film lags behind feng xiaogangs youth dunjia met unfavorable critical response weaker box office first five days opening us date film able tap tsui yuens genre fanbase overseas films chinese title qimen dunjia refers hermetic school war strategy combining sorcery alchemy iching fengshui occult arts legend chinas first emperor huang di used defeat goblin tribe chiyou unify kingdom 1982 yuen directed miracle fighters shared chinese title cheesy nonetheless pioneering hybrid kung fu comic hocuspocus current work almost nothing common plot era playing safe keeping within statesanctioned monster genre avoiding associations chinese folk magic ghosts story kicks nod ripoff stephen chows journey west conquering demons goldfish demon wreaking havoc ancient city kaifeng wuyin clan secret society whose seven members inherited magical skills qimen try capture contributing films engaging action scenes vibrant combination classical chinese art tropes hong kongstyle martial arts however soon revealed monster red herring functioning bait pull clan toward evil force craves world domination else clans big brother taiwanese rocker wu bai takes find stop others finding clear unsubtlynamed device called destroyer worlds160 separate mission discover wuyins anointed clan leader activate dunjia secondincommand zhuge fengyun actordirectorcomedian da peng bluffs way clinic strange maladies rescue circle zhou dongyu soul mate though birthmark wrist suggests might leader frail young ingenue doesnt seem fit job meanwhile zhuges junior iron dragonfly ni ni flowers war leads rest gang penetrate wuyins long submerged headquarters unleashing dormant power amidst mayhem greenhorn constable named dao yichang aarif lee rahman kungfu yoga fallen lot becomes accidental hero point unpredictable mix goofy humor mystery offers racy hook however many tsuis works subplots characters multiply control first act showdown five top martial arts schools looks like contest weird hairdos attempt graft scifi element onto apochryphal history emperor huangs battle chiyou 4500 years ago doesnt convince little exposition goes dunjia figure really oftmentioned destroyer achieve real cataclysmic impact gags built around ancient equivalents gps facetime dont quite work context leaves principal cast rally around infuse lighthearted romance otherwise rote plot providing laughs cuddle monster zhou walks fine line infantile doll parodying lilywhite image early career comes side cute ni hasnt found project thats done justice tremendous emotional potential since flowers war pours passion role deserves making dragonflys fickle jealous nature credible touching unfortunately neither actress much chemistry male costar da peng directed sleeper superhero sendup jianbing man runaway comic web series especially wooden charmless rendered stereoscopic 3d visual effects supplied host korean vfx companies allude five elements govern qimen dunjia still generic convey unique visual universe journey west demons strike back tsuis recent collaboration stephen chow undisciplined outpour futuristic cgi becomes eyesore robbing combat sense real peril unlike vivid creaturelike demon prologue wuyin clans real foes take glaringly computerized shape unlike lasereyed rubbery kaiju frequent ultraman shows | 563 |
<p>Less than two weeks before Donald Trump accepted the Republican presidential nomination, <a href="" type="internal">his campaign chairman</a> offered to provide briefings on the race to a Russian billionaire closely aligned with the Kremlin, according to people familiar with the discussions.</p>
<p>Paul Manafort made the offer in an email to an overseas intermediary, asking that a message be sent to Oleg Deripaska, an aluminum magnate with whom Manafort had done business in the past, these people said.</p>
<p>“If he needs private briefings we can accommodate,” Manafort wrote in the July 7, 2016, email, portions of which were read to The Washington Post along with other Manafort correspondence from that time.</p>
<p>The emails are among tens of thousands of documents that have been turned over to congressional investigators and Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s team <a href="" type="internal">as they probe whether Trump associates coordinated with Russia</a> as part of Moscow’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 U.S. election.</p>
<p>There is no evidence in the documents showing that Deripaska received Manafort’s offer or that any briefings took place. And a spokeswoman for Deripaska dismissed the email exchanges as scheming by “consultants in the notorious ‘beltway bandit’ industry.”</p>
<p>Nonetheless, investigators believe that the exchanges, which reflect Manafort’s willingness to profit from his prominent role alongside Trump, created a potential opening for Russian interests at the highest level of a U.S. presidential campaign, according to people familiar with the probe.</p>
<p>Several of the exchanges, which took place between Manafort and a Kiev-based employee of his international political consulting practice, focused on money that Manafort believed he was owed by Eastern European clients.</p>
<p>The notes appear to be written in deliberately vague terms, with Manafort and his employee, Konstantin Kilimnik, never explicitly mentioning Deripaska by name.</p>
<p>Investigators believe that key passages refer to Deripaska. The billionaire is referenced in some places by his initials, “OVD,” and one email invokes an expensive Russian delicacy in what investigators believe is a veiled reference to Manafort’s past work with Deripaska.</p>
<p>In one April exchange days after Trump named Manafort as a campaign strategist, Manafort referred to his positive press and growing reputation and asked, “How do we use to get whole?”</p>
<p>Manafort spokesman Jason Maloni said Wednesday that the email exchanges reflected an “innocuous” effort to collect past debts.</p>
<p>“It’s no secret Mr. Manafort was owed money by past clients,” Maloni said.</p>
<p>Maloni said no briefings with Deripaska ever took place, but that, in his email, Manafort was offering what would have been a “routine” briefing on the state of the campaign.</p>
<p>Vera Kurochkina, a spokeswoman for Rusal, the company led by Deripaska, on Wednesday derided inquiries from The Washington Post that she said “veer into manufactured questions so grossly false and insinuating that I am concerned even responding to these fake connotations provides them the patina of reality.”</p>
<p>The email exchanges add to an already perilous legal situation for Manafort, whose real estate dealings and overseas bank accounts are of intense interest for Mueller and congressional investigators as part of their examination of Russia’s 2016 efforts. People close to Manafort believe Mueller’s goal is to force the former campaign chairman to flip on his former Trump associates and provide information.</p>
<p>In August, Mueller’s office executed a search warrant <a href="" type="internal">during an early morning raid</a> of Manafort’s Alexandria, Virginia, condominium, an unusually aggressive step in a white collar criminal matter.</p>
<p>Mueller has also summoned Maloni, the Manafort spokesman, and Manafort’s former lawyer to answer questions in front of a grand jury. Last month, Mueller’s team told Manafort and his lawyers they believed they could pursue criminal charges against him and urged him to cooperate in the probe, providing information about other members of the campaign. The New York Times reported this week that Manafort had been threatened with indictment by prosecutors.</p>
<p>The emails now under review by investigators and described to The Post could provide prosecutors with additional leverage.</p>
<p>Kilimnik did not respond to requests for comment. A spokesman for Mueller declined to comment.</p>
<p>Deripaska, one of Russia’s richest men, is widely seen as an important ally of that country’s president, Vladimir Putin. A U.S. diplomatic cable from 2006, published by WikiLeaks, referred to Deripaska as “among the 2-3 oligarchs Putin turns to on a regular basis.”</p>
<p>The billionaire has struggled to get visas to travel to the United States due to concerns he might have organized crime ties in Russia, according to the Wall Street Journal. He has vigorously denied any criminal ties.</p>
<p>Russian officials have frequently raised the matter over the years with U.S. diplomats, according to former U.S. officials familiar with the appeals.</p>
<p>In 2008, one of Manafort’s business partners, Rick Davis, arranged for Deripaska to meet then-presidential candidate John McCain at an international economic conference in Switzerland.</p>
<p>At the time, Davis was on leave from Manafort’s firm and was serving as McCain’s campaign manager. The meeting caused a stir, given McCain’s longtime criticism of Putin’s leadership.</p>
<p>The Washington Post reported in 2008 that Deripaska jointly emailed Davis and Manafort following the meeting to thank them for setting it up. Davis did not respond Wednesday to a request for comment.</p>
<p>At the time of the McCain meeting, Manafort was working in Ukraine, advising a Russia-friendly political party. He ultimately helped to elect Viktor Yanukovych as president in 2010. In 2014, Yanukovych was ousted from office during street protests and fled to Moscow.</p>
<p>Manafort and Deripaska have both confirmed they had a business relationship in which Manafort was paid as an investment consultant. In 2014, Deripaska accused Manafort in a Cayman Islands court of taking nearly $19 million intended for investments, then failing to account for the funds, return them or respond to numerous inquiries about exactly how the money was used. There are no signs in court documents that the case has been closed.</p>
<p>The emails under review by investigators also show that Manafort waved off questions within the campaign about his international dealings, according to people familiar with the correspondence.</p>
<p>Manafort wrote in an April 2016 email to Trump press aide Hope Hicks that she should disregard a list of questions from The Post about his relationships with Deripaska and a Ukrainian businessman, according to people familiar with the email.</p>
<p>When another news organization asked questions in June, Manafort wrote Hicks that he never had any ties to the Russian government, according to people familiar with the email.</p>
<p>Hicks, now the White House communications director, declined to comment.</p>
<p>Former campaign officials said that Manafort frequently told his campaign colleagues that assertions made about him by the press were specious. Hicks, however, told colleagues she was uncomfortable with Manafort’s style and concerned he was not always putting the candidate’s interests first.</p>
<p>The emails turned over to investigators show that Manafort remained in regular contact with Kilimnik, his longtime employee in Kiev, throughout his five-month tenure at the Trump campaign.</p>
<p>Kilimnik, a Soviet army veteran, had worked for Manafort in his Kiev political consulting operation since 2005. Kilimnik began as an office manager and translator and attained a larger role with Manafort, working as a liaison to Deripaska and others, people familiar with his work have said.</p>
<p>People close to Manafort told The Post that he and Kilimnik used coded language as a precaution because they were transmitting sensitive information internationally.</p>
<p>In late July, eight days after Trump delivered his GOP nomination acceptance speech in Cleveland, Kilimnik wrote Manafort with an update, according to people familiar with the email exchange.</p>
<p>Kilimnik wrote in the July 29 email that he had met that day with the person “who gave you the biggest black caviar jar several years ago,” according to the people familiar with the exchange Kilimnik said it would take some time to discuss the “long caviar story,” and the two agreed to meet in New York.</p>
<p>Investigators believe that the reference to the pricey Russian luxury item may have been a reference to Manafort’s past lucrative relationship with Deripaska, according to people familiar with the probe.</p>
<p>Kilimnik and Manafort have previously confirmed that they were in contact during the campaign, including meeting twice in person — once in May 2016, as Manafort’s role in Trump’s campaign was expanding, and again in August, about two weeks before Manafort resigned amid questions about his work in Ukraine.</p>
<p>The August meeting is the one the two men arranged during the emails now under examination by investigators.</p>
<p>That encounter took place at the Grand Havana Club, an upscale cigar bar in Manhattan. Kilimnik has said the two discussed “unpaid bills” and “current news.” But he said the sessions were “”private visits” that were “in no way related to politics or the presidential campaign in the U.S.”</p>
<p>manafort</p> | false | 1 | less two weeks donald trump accepted republican presidential nomination campaign chairman offered provide briefings race russian billionaire closely aligned kremlin according people familiar discussions paul manafort made offer email overseas intermediary asking message sent oleg deripaska aluminum magnate manafort done business past people said needs private briefings accommodate manafort wrote july 7 2016 email portions read washington post along manafort correspondence time emails among tens thousands documents turned congressional investigators special counsel robert muellers team probe whether trump associates coordinated russia part moscows efforts interfere 2016 us election evidence documents showing deripaska received manaforts offer briefings took place spokeswoman deripaska dismissed email exchanges scheming consultants notorious beltway bandit industry nonetheless investigators believe exchanges reflect manaforts willingness profit prominent role alongside trump created potential opening russian interests highest level us presidential campaign according people familiar probe several exchanges took place manafort kievbased employee international political consulting practice focused money manafort believed owed eastern european clients notes appear written deliberately vague terms manafort employee konstantin kilimnik never explicitly mentioning deripaska name investigators believe key passages refer deripaska billionaire referenced places initials ovd one email invokes expensive russian delicacy investigators believe veiled reference manaforts past work deripaska one april exchange days trump named manafort campaign strategist manafort referred positive press growing reputation asked use get whole manafort spokesman jason maloni said wednesday email exchanges reflected innocuous effort collect past debts secret mr manafort owed money past clients maloni said maloni said briefings deripaska ever took place email manafort offering would routine briefing state campaign vera kurochkina spokeswoman rusal company led deripaska wednesday derided inquiries washington post said veer manufactured questions grossly false insinuating concerned even responding fake connotations provides patina reality email exchanges add already perilous legal situation manafort whose real estate dealings overseas bank accounts intense interest mueller congressional investigators part examination russias 2016 efforts people close manafort believe muellers goal force former campaign chairman flip former trump associates provide information august muellers office executed search warrant early morning raid manaforts alexandria virginia condominium unusually aggressive step white collar criminal matter mueller also summoned maloni manafort spokesman manaforts former lawyer answer questions front grand jury last month muellers team told manafort lawyers believed could pursue criminal charges urged cooperate probe providing information members campaign new york times reported week manafort threatened indictment prosecutors emails review investigators described post could provide prosecutors additional leverage kilimnik respond requests comment spokesman mueller declined comment deripaska one russias richest men widely seen important ally countrys president vladimir putin us diplomatic cable 2006 published wikileaks referred deripaska among 23 oligarchs putin turns regular basis billionaire struggled get visas travel united states due concerns might organized crime ties russia according wall street journal vigorously denied criminal ties russian officials frequently raised matter years us diplomats according former us officials familiar appeals 2008 one manaforts business partners rick davis arranged deripaska meet thenpresidential candidate john mccain international economic conference switzerland time davis leave manaforts firm serving mccains campaign manager meeting caused stir given mccains longtime criticism putins leadership washington post reported 2008 deripaska jointly emailed davis manafort following meeting thank setting davis respond wednesday request comment time mccain meeting manafort working ukraine advising russiafriendly political party ultimately helped elect viktor yanukovych president 2010 2014 yanukovych ousted office street protests fled moscow manafort deripaska confirmed business relationship manafort paid investment consultant 2014 deripaska accused manafort cayman islands court taking nearly 19 million intended investments failing account funds return respond numerous inquiries exactly money used signs court documents case closed emails review investigators also show manafort waved questions within campaign international dealings according people familiar correspondence manafort wrote april 2016 email trump press aide hope hicks disregard list questions post relationships deripaska ukrainian businessman according people familiar email another news organization asked questions june manafort wrote hicks never ties russian government according people familiar email hicks white house communications director declined comment former campaign officials said manafort frequently told campaign colleagues assertions made press specious hicks however told colleagues uncomfortable manaforts style concerned always putting candidates interests first emails turned investigators show manafort remained regular contact kilimnik longtime employee kiev throughout fivemonth tenure trump campaign kilimnik soviet army veteran worked manafort kiev political consulting operation since 2005 kilimnik began office manager translator attained larger role manafort working liaison deripaska others people familiar work said people close manafort told post kilimnik used coded language precaution transmitting sensitive information internationally late july eight days trump delivered gop nomination acceptance speech cleveland kilimnik wrote manafort update according people familiar email exchange kilimnik wrote july 29 email met day person gave biggest black caviar jar several years ago according people familiar exchange kilimnik said would take time discuss long caviar story two agreed meet new york investigators believe reference pricey russian luxury item may reference manaforts past lucrative relationship deripaska according people familiar probe kilimnik manafort previously confirmed contact campaign including meeting twice person may 2016 manaforts role trumps campaign expanding august two weeks manafort resigned amid questions work ukraine august meeting one two men arranged emails examination investigators encounter took place grand havana club upscale cigar bar manhattan kilimnik said two discussed unpaid bills current news said sessions private visits way related politics presidential campaign us manafort | 863 |
<p>When it was announced in the late ’90s that <a href="http://variety.com/t/jim-carrey/" type="external">Jim Carrey</a> had been chosen to play <a href="http://variety.com/t/andy-kaufman/" type="external">Andy Kaufman</a> in a major Hollywood biopic, my gut reaction was skepticism. Carrey, then at the height of his star power, was a brilliant comedian who had more than proved his acting chops (in “The Truman Show”), yet both temperamentally and ethnically he seemed wrong for the part: Kaufman was a doughy nerdy Jewish space cadet, Carrey a hypomanic string-bean WASP. I knew that Carrey had the talent to “impersonate” anyone, but could he really merge with Kaufman’s antic yet morose there-but-not-quite-there quality?</p>
<p>When I saw the film, I became one of its greatest champions (it wound up being my movie of the year for 1999), and Carrey’s extraordinary performance vaulted over all my doubts. In “Man on the Moon,” he nailed every nuance of Andy Kaufman’s spirit, and he used his own mercurial quality as a comic to tease out the secret of Kaufman’s genius, which is that he wasn’t just some dada TV art prankster crafting stunts to mess with your head. And he didn’t just want to make you laugh, either. He wanted to leave you amazed. He was, in that way, the very soul of showbiz.</p>
<p>Carrey, a jaw-dropping comic trailblazer of his own, grasped all that; that’s why he captured Kaufman so profoundly. But it wasn’t until I saw <a href="http://variety.com/t/chris-smith/" type="external">Chris Smith</a>’s ticklish and captivating documentary “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/jim-andy-the-great-beyond/" type="external">Jim &amp; Andy: The Great Beyond</a> — featuring a very special, contractually obligated mention of Tony Clifton,” that I realized what the two comedic visionaries actually had in common. Andy Kaufman’s comedy emerged from his pathological role-playing, which was built around his weak sense of identity and his consuming need to create one. It turns out that Jim Carrey overlapped him in that department quite a bit.</p>
<p>Carrey’s comedy, too, erupted out of him like an alternate personality, and he grew up riddled with insecurities (like a lot of performers). But once he got famous, something inside him snapped. Nice, grinning, friendly Canadian Jim divided off from dark, weird, troubled, who-am-I? Jim. Channeling Andy Kaufman was a catharsis for him, because it put him in touch with his inner split personality.</p>
<p>“Jim &amp; Andy: The Great Beyond” is built around 20 hours of candid footage of Carrey on the “Man on the Moon” set that was shot, originally, for use in an electronic press kit, then placed in the vault by Universal Pictures. Smith, the director of “American Movie,” “Collapse,” “The Yes Men,” and other maverick documentaries (or maybe I should say documentaries about mavericks), got access to the footage, which he combines with an extensive present-day interview with Carrey, in which the actor-comedian, with laughing eyes and a graying beard as thick and Santa Clausy as David Letterman’s (though Carrey’s gives him a slight Mansonite aura), looks back, with candor and eloquence, over not just the Kaufman film but the tangled ins and outs of his own career.</p>
<p>On the set of “Man on the Moon,” he went full Daniel Day-Lewis, staying in character when the cameras were turned off. This meant, much of the time, that he was sweet, mild, tentative Andy and therefore easy to deal with. But it also meant that when the salty-tempered professional wrestler Jerry Lawler showed up to do his scenes, Carrey-as-Andy would harass him in the same way that Kaufman used to — except that as we see, the mockery was even more scathing. In the ’80s, Kaufman and Lawler went at each other like a blue red/red state nuclear meltdown, but Lawler was in on the joke; off camera, as he explains on the set, Kaufman was nice as pie. That’s what he expected from Carrey, but instead Carrey would push Lawler’s buttons, asking him if he’d stolen his bejeweled cape from Elvis or saying “Once again, proving Darwin’s theory…” He kept pushing them, even after he’d crossed the line, provoking Lawler to fits of rage. To stay in character, Carrey, as Kaufman, became a Method pest.</p>
<p>Then, of course, there’s Tony Clifton. The portly, grunting, stupendously coarse and vulgar lounge lizard, in his pastel tuxedos and sunglasses he never took off, with his lips jutting out, his whole coiffed head bent forward like a broken telescope, was Kaufman’s greatest creation. He was an “entertainer” with the personality of a Bronx cab driver, an insult comic who hurled insults at people that barely rose to the level of comedy. But that become a loose-cannon id for Kaufman, who was liberated by the disguise. There was something so authentic about Tony — he was every fourth-rate Vegas nightclub host of the ’60s rolled into one seedy ball of non-talent — that he literally took on an identity of his own. Kaufman and his partner Bob Zmuda would take turns putting on the elaborate jowly makeup and playing him, so that Tony was more than a walking bad joke about a guy who told bad jokes. He simply…existed. (Which just heightened the joke.)</p>
<p>In “Jim &amp; Andy,” we watch Carrey submerge himself in the cantankerous, growly Clifton mystique. On the days when they’re shooting Tony Clifton scenes, he refuses to break character, forcing Miloš Forman to give direction to this stunted, exhausting man who will not listen to a thing he says. Carrey, like Andy, revels in taking the joke too far. We see priceless footage of the night that Tony showed up at the Playboy Mansion and partied with Hugh Hefner, who thought that he was in on the joke; he presumed that he was hosting Jim Carrey. And then, after two hours, into the party walks…Jim Carrey! Hef turns white as a sheet, and Tony Clifton gets booted out of the party. But at that moment, he lives.</p>
<p>“Jim &amp; Andy” is fleetly edited and engrossing, animated by a sense of discovery. Chris Smith, an intensely personal filmmaker, has never worked in this sprawling mode of multi-media, celebrity-centered documentary classicism, and he turns out to be a natural at it. In 90 minutes, he tells Jim Carrey’s story, tells Andy Kaufman’s story, and meditates on the resonant way that they interfaced. We see startling clips of Carrey when he was high school, trying out impersonations of Steve Martin, Jimmy Carter, and James Dean (his face literally becomes Dean’s), plus the “Saturday Night Live” audition he did in 1980 (Carrey tells a great story about how he knew it was doomed) and the one that Kaufman did for “SNL” in 1975. (He just sat there and tried to think of something to say.)</p>
<p>Smith interviews Carrey the same way that he did the dystopian journalist Michael Ruppert in “Collapse” — one direct shot, never varying, a kind of Errol Morris approach — and it works beautifully, since Carrey is a hypnotic talker who opens himself up to the camera. He has a stoned Zen view of life that’s easy to mock but is, in fact, quite reality-based, and he’s up front about what an immersive toll the Kaufman movie took on him. After it wrapped, R.E.M. tried to get Carrey to go back into his Kaufman guise to shoot the video for “The Great Beyond,” and he refused. Once he’d disentangled himself from Andy, he couldn’t take going back.</p>
<p>“Man on the Moon” remains one of the most misunderstood great movies of the ’90s (a lot of people just saw it as Carrey doing Kaufman’s greatest hits), because it’s really about how Andy Kaufman sacrificed his identity to showbiz — and, in doing so, became a herald for the age when entertainment would consume everything in its path, from our dreams to our&#160;identities. When Kaufman wrestled women, coming on like Bobby Riggs on steroids and taunting the redneck crowds who turned out to see him, was it a put-on or was it a deep-down reflection of “the real Andy”? Actually, it was the real Andy pretending to be what he hated, and realizing that he loved being that way, but mostly because of the reaction it provoked.</p>
<p>Except that he cherished that reaction more than anything, so maybe it was the real him. Or maybe there was no real him. In what may be the greatest scene in “Man on the Moon,” Carrey, as Kaufman, as Tony Clifton gets up on stage and does his unspeakable rendition of “I’ve Gotta Be Me.” It’s bottom-of-the-barrel sentimental showbiz hooey, but it’s all built around a conundrum: Who, exactly, is me? “Jim &amp; Andy: The Great Beyond” shows you that the answer is a grand illusion.</p> | false | 1 | announced late 90s jim carrey chosen play andy kaufman major hollywood biopic gut reaction skepticism carrey height star power brilliant comedian proved acting chops truman show yet temperamentally ethnically seemed wrong part kaufman doughy nerdy jewish space cadet carrey hypomanic stringbean wasp knew carrey talent impersonate anyone could really merge kaufmans antic yet morose therebutnotquitethere quality saw film became one greatest champions wound movie year 1999 carreys extraordinary performance vaulted doubts man moon nailed every nuance andy kaufmans spirit used mercurial quality comic tease secret kaufmans genius wasnt dada tv art prankster crafting stunts mess head didnt want make laugh either wanted leave amazed way soul showbiz carrey jawdropping comic trailblazer grasped thats captured kaufman profoundly wasnt saw chris smiths ticklish captivating documentary jim amp andy great beyond featuring special contractually obligated mention tony clifton realized two comedic visionaries actually common andy kaufmans comedy emerged pathological roleplaying built around weak sense identity consuming need create one turns jim carrey overlapped department quite bit carreys comedy erupted like alternate personality grew riddled insecurities like lot performers got famous something inside snapped nice grinning friendly canadian jim divided dark weird troubled whoami jim channeling andy kaufman catharsis put touch inner split personality jim amp andy great beyond built around 20 hours candid footage carrey man moon set shot originally use electronic press kit placed vault universal pictures smith director american movie collapse yes men maverick documentaries maybe say documentaries mavericks got access footage combines extensive presentday interview carrey actorcomedian laughing eyes graying beard thick santa clausy david lettermans though carreys gives slight mansonite aura looks back candor eloquence kaufman film tangled ins outs career set man moon went full daniel daylewis staying character cameras turned meant much time sweet mild tentative andy therefore easy deal also meant saltytempered professional wrestler jerry lawler showed scenes carreyasandy would harass way kaufman used except see mockery even scathing 80s kaufman lawler went like blue redred state nuclear meltdown lawler joke camera explains set kaufman nice pie thats expected carrey instead carrey would push lawlers buttons asking hed stolen bejeweled cape elvis saying proving darwins theory kept pushing even hed crossed line provoking lawler fits rage stay character carrey kaufman became method pest course theres tony clifton portly grunting stupendously coarse vulgar lounge lizard pastel tuxedos sunglasses never took lips jutting whole coiffed head bent forward like broken telescope kaufmans greatest creation entertainer personality bronx cab driver insult comic hurled insults people barely rose level comedy become loosecannon id kaufman liberated disguise something authentic tony every fourthrate vegas nightclub host 60s rolled one seedy ball nontalent literally took identity kaufman partner bob zmuda would take turns putting elaborate jowly makeup playing tony walking bad joke guy told bad jokes simplyexisted heightened joke jim amp andy watch carrey submerge cantankerous growly clifton mystique days theyre shooting tony clifton scenes refuses break character forcing miloš forman give direction stunted exhausting man listen thing says carrey like andy revels taking joke far see priceless footage night tony showed playboy mansion partied hugh hefner thought joke presumed hosting jim carrey two hours party walksjim carrey hef turns white sheet tony clifton gets booted party moment lives jim amp andy fleetly edited engrossing animated sense discovery chris smith intensely personal filmmaker never worked sprawling mode multimedia celebritycentered documentary classicism turns natural 90 minutes tells jim carreys story tells andy kaufmans story meditates resonant way interfaced see startling clips carrey high school trying impersonations steve martin jimmy carter james dean face literally becomes deans plus saturday night live audition 1980 carrey tells great story knew doomed one kaufman snl 1975 sat tried think something say smith interviews carrey way dystopian journalist michael ruppert collapse one direct shot never varying kind errol morris approach works beautifully since carrey hypnotic talker opens camera stoned zen view life thats easy mock fact quite realitybased hes front immersive toll kaufman movie took wrapped rem tried get carrey go back kaufman guise shoot video great beyond refused hed disentangled andy couldnt take going back man moon remains one misunderstood great movies 90s lot people saw carrey kaufmans greatest hits really andy kaufman sacrificed identity showbiz became herald age entertainment would consume everything path dreams our160identities kaufman wrestled women coming like bobby riggs steroids taunting redneck crowds turned see puton deepdown reflection real andy actually real andy pretending hated realizing loved way mostly reaction provoked except cherished reaction anything maybe real maybe real may greatest scene man moon carrey kaufman tony clifton gets stage unspeakable rendition ive got ta bottomofthebarrel sentimental showbiz hooey built around conundrum exactly jim amp andy great beyond shows answer grand illusion | 768 |
<p>Mexican rescuers on Wednesday labored for a second night amid the rubble to save possible survivors of the country’s most lethal earthquake in a generation, including a girl trapped under a school in Mexico City, as the death toll exceeded 230.</p>
<p>Television stations broadcast live the painstaking, hours-long attempt to rescue the girl after crews at the school in the south of the city reported seeing her hand move. They threaded a hose through debris to get her water.</p>
<p>The girl’s name was not made public, but her family waited in anguish nearby.</p>
<p>Rescuers moved slowly, erecting makeshift wooden scaffolding to prevent rubble from crumbling further and seeking a path to the child through the unstable ruins. They implored bystanders to be quiet to better hear calls for help.</p>
<p>It was part of the careful search for dozens of victims feared buried beneath the Enrique Rebsamen school, where officials reported 21 children and four adults dead after Tuesday’s quake. Hundreds of buildings were destroyed.</p>
<p>“We have a lot of hope that some will still be rescued,” said David Porras, one of scores of volunteers helping the search at the school for children aged 3 to 14.</p>
<p>“But we’re slow, like turtles,” he said.</p>
<p>By Wednesday morning, the workers said a teacher and two students had sent text messages from within the rubble. Parents clung to hope that their children were alive.</p>
<p>The magnitude 7.1 quake, which killed at least 93 people in the capital, struck 32 years to the day after a 1985 earthquake that killed thousands. Mexico is also still reeling from a powerful tremor that killed nearly 100 people in the south of the country less than two weeks ago.</p>
<p>On Wednesday afternoon, officials told bystanders to move back from the Plaza Condesa building which houses a well-known concert hall frequented by famous international acts and a popular bar in the upscale Condesa neighborhood.</p>
<p>The order sparked fears the massive building could collapse, just like an apartment block about 100 meters (yards) away where emergency crews spent Wednesday sifting though rubble.</p>
<p>Throughout the capital, crews were joined by volunteers and bystanders who used dogs, cameras, motion detectors and heat-seeking equipment to detect victims who may still be alive.</p>
<p>Reinforcements began to arrive from countries including Panama, Israel and Chile, local media reported.</p>
<p>In a statement, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) said it was sending a Disaster Assistance Response Team to help, at the request of the Mexican government.</p>
<p>“The United States remains committed to helping our neighbors during this difficult time,” the statement said.</p>
<p>U.S. President Donald Trump spoke at length with Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto on Wednesday, the White House said. On Tuesday, Trump had tweeted: “God bless the people of Mexico City. We are with you and will be there for you.”</p>
<p>VISIBLE RESPONSE</p>
<p>Pena Nieto declared three days of mourning.</p>
<p>“The priority continues to be rescuing people from collapsed buildings and taking care of the injured,” he said. “Every minute counts.”</p>
<p>The president has been unusually visible since the two earthquakes, a sign of the political sensitivity of disaster relief less than a year before the next presidential election.</p>
<p>The government’s widely panned response to the 1985 quake caused upheaval in Mexico, which some credited with weakening the 71-year rule of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). Pena Nieto, the PRI’s first president since it lost power in 2000, hopes to elect a party successor next year.</p>
<p>On Wednesday, the president traveled to the state of Morelos, just south of the capital, where 71 people died, to survey damage. In Puebla State, site of the earthquake’s epicenter, at least 43 died.</p>
<p>The earthquake toppled dozens of buildings, tore gas mains and sparked fires across the city and other towns in central Mexico. Falling rubble and billboards crushed cars, and nearly 5 million homes, businesses and other facilities were without power at one point.</p>
<p>Although authorities and property owners will need time to fully assess the damage, initial reports suggest that collapses were limited mostly to buildings that predated the 1985 quake, after which stricter building codes were enacted.</p>
<p>But even wealthier parts of the capital, including the central Condesa and Roma neighborhoods, were badly damaged as older buildings buckled. Because bedrock is uneven in a city built on a drained lake bed, some districts weather quakes better than others.</p>
<p>“The central part of Mexico City, in the lake bed, is always going to be a complicated place to build,” said Rodrigo Suarez, chief operating officer at Mexico City-based apartment developer Hasta Capital. “These old buildings (may) survive an earthquake or two or three, but since they weren’t built to modern code, there’s always going to be a risk in major earthquakes.”</p>
<p>In Puebla, some 100 miles (158 km) southwest of the capital, parts of colonial-era churches crumbled. In the town of Atzala, a row of coffins lined the street outside a church where the roof collapsed, killing 11 worshipers inside.</p> | false | 1 | mexican rescuers wednesday labored second night amid rubble save possible survivors countrys lethal earthquake generation including girl trapped school mexico city death toll exceeded 230 television stations broadcast live painstaking hourslong attempt rescue girl crews school south city reported seeing hand move threaded hose debris get water girls name made public family waited anguish nearby rescuers moved slowly erecting makeshift wooden scaffolding prevent rubble crumbling seeking path child unstable ruins implored bystanders quiet better hear calls help part careful search dozens victims feared buried beneath enrique rebsamen school officials reported 21 children four adults dead tuesdays quake hundreds buildings destroyed lot hope still rescued said david porras one scores volunteers helping search school children aged 3 14 slow like turtles said wednesday morning workers said teacher two students sent text messages within rubble parents clung hope children alive magnitude 71 quake killed least 93 people capital struck 32 years day 1985 earthquake killed thousands mexico also still reeling powerful tremor killed nearly 100 people south country less two weeks ago wednesday afternoon officials told bystanders move back plaza condesa building houses wellknown concert hall frequented famous international acts popular bar upscale condesa neighborhood order sparked fears massive building could collapse like apartment block 100 meters yards away emergency crews spent wednesday sifting though rubble throughout capital crews joined volunteers bystanders used dogs cameras motion detectors heatseeking equipment detect victims may still alive reinforcements began arrive countries including panama israel chile local media reported statement us agency international development usaid said sending disaster assistance response team help request mexican government united states remains committed helping neighbors difficult time statement said us president donald trump spoke length mexican president enrique pena nieto wednesday white house said tuesday trump tweeted god bless people mexico city visible response pena nieto declared three days mourning priority continues rescuing people collapsed buildings taking care injured said every minute counts president unusually visible since two earthquakes sign political sensitivity disaster relief less year next presidential election governments widely panned response 1985 quake caused upheaval mexico credited weakening 71year rule institutional revolutionary party pri pena nieto pris first president since lost power 2000 hopes elect party successor next year wednesday president traveled state morelos south capital 71 people died survey damage puebla state site earthquakes epicenter least 43 died earthquake toppled dozens buildings tore gas mains sparked fires across city towns central mexico falling rubble billboards crushed cars nearly 5 million homes businesses facilities without power one point although authorities property owners need time fully assess damage initial reports suggest collapses limited mostly buildings predated 1985 quake stricter building codes enacted even wealthier parts capital including central condesa roma neighborhoods badly damaged older buildings buckled bedrock uneven city built drained lake bed districts weather quakes better others central part mexico city lake bed always going complicated place build said rodrigo suarez chief operating officer mexico citybased apartment developer hasta capital old buildings may survive earthquake two three since werent built modern code theres always going risk major earthquakes puebla 100 miles 158 km southwest capital parts colonialera churches crumbled town atzala row coffins lined street outside church roof collapsed killing 11 worshipers inside | 525 |
<p />
<p>My friend Hanna is Syrian and also happens to be Christian. The latter fact was rarely of consequence, except whenever he wished to boast about the contributions of Arab Christians to Middle Eastern cultures. Of course, he is right. The modern Arab identity has been formulated through a fascinating mix of religions, sects and races. Christianity, as well as Islam, is deeply-rooted in many aspects of Arab life. Needless to say, the bond between Islam and Christianity is simply unbreakable.</p>
<p>“I am Christian, but, in terms of culture, I am equally a Muslim,” he told me by way of introduction to a daunting realization. “But now, I am very worried.”</p>
<p>Hanna’s list of worries is long. Lead amongst them is the fact that Christian Arabs in some Arab societies are increasingly viewed as ‘foreigners’ or ‘guests’ in their own countries. At times, as was the case in Iraq, they are punished by one extremist group or another for embracing the same religion that US-western zealots claim to represent. Churches were blown up in brutal retribution for a savage war that President George W. Bush and many of his ilk maintained to be between good and evil, using the most brazen religious references as they savaged Iraq, sparing neither Muslims nor Christians.</p>
<p>During the early years of the war, many Arab intellectuals seemed wary of the sinister divide that the US was erecting between religions, sects, and communities. Many in Arab media referenced past historical experiences when other imperial powers – namely Britain and France – resorted to the ‘divide and conquer’ stratagem. Those attempts in the first half of the 20th century resulted in much bloodshed and lasting scars in many communities. Lebanon is the obvious example with Iraq prevailing.</p>
<p>In response to the colonial attempts at busying the Arabs with internal conflicts, Arab nationalists had then wrangled with a discourse that proved of immense value to modern Arab identity. To escape the pitfalls of religious and sectarian divides, and to unleash the untapped energies of Arab societies, there was an urgent need to articulate a new language expressing a unifying pan-Arab political discourse. In post-World War II, the rise of Arab nationalism was the force to be contended with, from Egypt, to Iraq and to Syria. It was a battle of wills involving imperialist powers, later joined by the United States. It was also local, tribal elites fighting for their own survival. The nationalists’ discourse was meant to inspire, from Gamal Abdel Nasser’s thundering speeches in Egypt, to Michel Aflaq’s eloquent thoughts in Syria, Iraq and elsewhere. At least then, it seemed to matter little that Nasser was an Egyptian Sunni Muslim, and that Aflaq was a Greek Orthodox Christian.</p>
<p>Aflaq was profound, and his insistence on the vitality of the Muslim character to Arabs was a testament to a generation of nationalists that since then, has all but completely faded. He spoke of Arab unity, not as a distant dream, but a practical mechanism to snatch liberty from many sinister hands. “What liberty could be wider and greater than binding oneself to the renaissance of one’s nation and its revolution?” he said during a speech. “It is a new and strict liberty which stands against pressure and confusion. Dictatorship is a precarious, unsuitable and self-contradictory system which does not allow the consciousness of the people to grow.”</p>
<p>Many voices echoed that sentiment in Arab nations near and far. Poets recited the will of freedom fighters and artists rendered the language of philosophers. While Arab nationalist movements eventually fragmented, were weakened or defeated, an Arab identity survived. Long after Nasser died, and even Anwar Saddat signed the Camp David accords, thus breaking with Arab consensus, school children continued to sing “Arab homelands are my home, from the Levant to Baghdad, from Najd to Yemen and from Egypt to Morocco.”</p>
<p>The war over Arab identify however never ceased, as it continued to manifest itself in actual and figurative ways. Israel and western powers, vying for military dominance, regional influence and ultimately resources, did the best they could to shatter the few semblances that sustained a sense of unity among Arab nations that survived despite numerous and perhaps insurmountable odds.</p>
<p>The Lebanese civil war (1975-1990) left deep wounds that continue to fester. The Iraq war was particularly painful. While Lebanon civil strife involved well-demarcated sects, the alliances were in constant influx. But Iraq’s civil war, encouraged and sustained with direct American involvement to weaken Iraqi resistance to US-British occupation, was well-defined and brutal. Muslim Shia and Sunni engaged in a bitter struggle as US troops wreaked havoc in Baghdad. Members of all sects paid a heavy price for the fighting, which also damaged the national identity of Iraq and made a mockery of its flag and national anthem. The sociopolitical impact of that war was so severe, it resuscitated a reactionary discourse that forced many communities to see themselves as members of one group or another, each fighting for its own being.</p>
<p>Soon after the Egyptian revolution, I walked the streets of Cairo, reminiscing, with much giddiness, about the past and the encouraging future. A ‘new Egypt’ was being born, one with ample room for all of its children. An Egypt where the poor are giving their fair share, and where Muslims and Christians and the rest would march forward, hand in hand, as equals, compelled by the vision of a new generation and the hopes and dreams of many more. It was not a romantic idea, but thoughts inspired by millions of Egyptians, by bearded Muslim men protecting churches in Cairo against government plots to stir religious tensions, by Christian youth guarding the Tahrir square as Muslim youth prayed, before they all resumed their fight for freedom.</p>
<p>Despite my insistence on optimism, I find the current political discourse hateful, polarizing and unprecedentedly defeatist. While Muslim political elites are sharply divided between Shia and Sunni, assigning layers of meaning to the fact that one is born this way or that, this wrangling has been weaved into a power play that has destroyed Syria, awakened past animosities in Lebanon and revitalized existing conflict in Iraq, further devastating the very Arab identity.</p>
<p>Iraq’s historical dilemma, exploited by the US for immediate gains, has now become a pan-Arab dilemma. Arab and Middle Eastern media is fomenting that conflict using terminology loaded with sectarianism and obsessed with erecting the kind of divides that will bring nothing but mistrust, misery and war.</p>
<p>Resurrecting Nasser’s and Aflaq’s Arab nationalism might no longer be possible, but there is a compelling need for an alternative discourse to the type of intellectual extremism that justifies with disturbing lucidity the butchering of the inhabitants of an entire village in Syria because of their sect or religion. My friend Hanna has every reason to worry, as all Arabs should.</p> | false | 1 | friend hanna syrian also happens christian latter fact rarely consequence except whenever wished boast contributions arab christians middle eastern cultures course right modern arab identity formulated fascinating mix religions sects races christianity well islam deeplyrooted many aspects arab life needless say bond islam christianity simply unbreakable christian terms culture equally muslim told way introduction daunting realization worried hannas list worries long lead amongst fact christian arabs arab societies increasingly viewed foreigners guests countries times case iraq punished one extremist group another embracing religion uswestern zealots claim represent churches blown brutal retribution savage war president george w bush many ilk maintained good evil using brazen religious references savaged iraq sparing neither muslims christians early years war many arab intellectuals seemed wary sinister divide us erecting religions sects communities many arab media referenced past historical experiences imperial powers namely britain france resorted divide conquer stratagem attempts first half 20th century resulted much bloodshed lasting scars many communities lebanon obvious example iraq prevailing response colonial attempts busying arabs internal conflicts arab nationalists wrangled discourse proved immense value modern arab identity escape pitfalls religious sectarian divides unleash untapped energies arab societies urgent need articulate new language expressing unifying panarab political discourse postworld war ii rise arab nationalism force contended egypt iraq syria battle wills involving imperialist powers later joined united states also local tribal elites fighting survival nationalists discourse meant inspire gamal abdel nassers thundering speeches egypt michel aflaqs eloquent thoughts syria iraq elsewhere least seemed matter little nasser egyptian sunni muslim aflaq greek orthodox christian aflaq profound insistence vitality muslim character arabs testament generation nationalists since completely faded spoke arab unity distant dream practical mechanism snatch liberty many sinister hands liberty could wider greater binding oneself renaissance ones nation revolution said speech new strict liberty stands pressure confusion dictatorship precarious unsuitable selfcontradictory system allow consciousness people grow many voices echoed sentiment arab nations near far poets recited freedom fighters artists rendered language philosophers arab nationalist movements eventually fragmented weakened defeated arab identity survived long nasser died even anwar saddat signed camp david accords thus breaking arab consensus school children continued sing arab homelands home levant baghdad najd yemen egypt morocco war arab identify however never ceased continued manifest actual figurative ways israel western powers vying military dominance regional influence ultimately resources best could shatter semblances sustained sense unity among arab nations survived despite numerous perhaps insurmountable odds lebanese civil war 19751990 left deep wounds continue fester iraq war particularly painful lebanon civil strife involved welldemarcated sects alliances constant influx iraqs civil war encouraged sustained direct american involvement weaken iraqi resistance usbritish occupation welldefined brutal muslim shia sunni engaged bitter struggle us troops wreaked havoc baghdad members sects paid heavy price fighting also damaged national identity iraq made mockery flag national anthem sociopolitical impact war severe resuscitated reactionary discourse forced many communities see members one group another fighting soon egyptian revolution walked streets cairo reminiscing much giddiness past encouraging future new egypt born one ample room children egypt poor giving fair share muslims christians rest would march forward hand hand equals compelled vision new generation hopes dreams many romantic idea thoughts inspired millions egyptians bearded muslim men protecting churches cairo government plots stir religious tensions christian youth guarding tahrir square muslim youth prayed resumed fight freedom despite insistence optimism find current political discourse hateful polarizing unprecedentedly defeatist muslim political elites sharply divided shia sunni assigning layers meaning fact one born way wrangling weaved power play destroyed syria awakened past animosities lebanon revitalized existing conflict iraq devastating arab identity iraqs historical dilemma exploited us immediate gains become panarab dilemma arab middle eastern media fomenting conflict using terminology loaded sectarianism obsessed erecting kind divides bring nothing mistrust misery war resurrecting nassers aflaqs arab nationalism might longer possible compelling need alternative discourse type intellectual extremism justifies disturbing lucidity butchering inhabitants entire village syria sect religion friend hanna every reason worry arabs | 644 |
<p>July 18 (UPI) — Hundreds of thousands of fishing vessels. Millions of square miles of ocean. Billions of radio transmissions. The constant stream of data can overwhelm even the most dedicated fisheries managers trying to combat the $23 billion illegal fishing industry. In economically underdeveloped countries, a small team of analysts must pore over the surveillance profiles of thousands of fishing enterprises; often the environmental cops can be as much as six months behind. By the time they see that a vessel in their jurisdiction is acting suspiciously, the ship has sailed.</p>
<p>That’s according to Chris Wilcox, principal research scientist in the oceans and atmosphere business unit for Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), the Australian government’s main research arm.</p>
<p>So he and colleagues are deploying algorithms to help authorities make better and faster decisions about which vessels to pursue or inspect. “We want to help port inspectors and fisheries managers make quick, informed decisions and target high-risk vessels,” Wilcox told Oceans Deeply.</p>
<p>International maritime law requires that large ships use an automated identification system (AIS), which transmits the vessel’s identity, direction, speed and sometimes other data as a means of avoiding collisions. Around 15 years ago, someone discovered that these signals are detectable by satellite. Wilcox’s team leverages this data, which is virtually free.</p>
<p>“We designed a bunch of statistical algorithms that look for suspicious patterns in how vessels move around,” he explained. The formulas look for three things: Whether the vessel moves in an unusual way given the type of vessel it is and its location, whether it seems to be shutting off its I.D. transponder, which there is really no good reason to be doing, and whether the vessel has a history of sailing in waters of countries with high levels of crime or corruption, or in areas with high levels of illegal fishing.</p>
<p>“A cargo vessel sitting just outside the maritime border of a country – that’s weird,” Wilcox said. Such ships are expensive to operate and ought to be moving from port to port as quickly as possible. Staying put might indicate it’s taking on cargo from other vessels trying to avoid catch limits.</p>
<p>According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, illegal fishing costs nations billions of dollars a year and contributes to the collapse of fish populations around the world. “We have to find a way to get the reins on that problem,” said Jackie Savitz, a senior vice president at the environmental nonprofit Oceana. “Otherwise we will not be able to provide a fish meal every day to the 1.5 billion people around the world” who rely on the ocean for protein. Successful management of depleted fisheries in the United States has led to their recovery, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “These are tools that can help us,” Savitz said of CSIRO’s new system.</p>
<p>Based on the AIS data, vessels are assigned a risk score. Authorities can register an area of interest – where in their territorial waters they suspect illegal fishing may be occurring, for instance, or an area they don’t have the capacity to patrol. Whenever a vessel identified as suspicious enters that area, the authorities receive an alert. They can also query CSIRO’s database with a specific vessel and receive a risk report. Port inspectors can use the information to help decide which of the many vessels entering port they ought to board. The system, called Monitoring, Control and Surveillance Analytics for Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated Fishing, launches in October. It was developed in collaboration with Vulcan, the Seattle-based company owned by Microsoft cofounder Paul G. Allen.</p>
<p>“This valuable tool will enable enforcement agencies to identify and locate suspicious vessels all over the world,” Mark Powell, illegal fishing program officer for Vulcan, said in a statement released by CSIRO.</p>
<p>Wilcox’s algorithms build on Global Fishing Watch, a free online tool Oceana helped develop with Google and SkyTruth to enable anyone with an Internet connection to monitor fishing activity anywhere on Earth. “The value add [with CSIRO’s system] is the risk report, which a really good idea,” Savitz said. “Scoring based on suspicious behavior and allowing port authorities to prioritize their attention is a good strategy.”</p>
<p>Global Fishing Watch and CSIRO’s tool are just the first of several new weapons to come in the fight against high crimes on the high seas. The first international agreement against illegal fishing, the international Port State Measures Agreement, became law last year, encouraging the development of such tools. CSIRO is focused on repurposing low-cost, widely available data not designed for surveillance. AIS is one such data set; another comes from the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite, a sensor on a NOAA satellite that looks for visible light. It was conceived as a means of tracking human development, but it turns out that VIIRS can also see large ships.</p>
<p>“If you’re a fisheries manager looking for noncompliant vessels over a large area, VIIRS is something you can use and it doesn’t cost anything,” Wilcox said. “But they need someone to set up the infrastructure to process the data.”</p>
<p>His team also hopes to deploy hydrophones to listen for coral reef-destroying dynamite fishing, one of the most ecologically destructive methods of harvesting the ocean. Scientists use hydrophones to track behavior of marine life and underwater volcanic activity, and the US military uses them to listen for submarines. CSIRO hopes to develop a system that listens for sounds that might indicate dynamite fishing and automatically alerts the local maritime authority.</p>
<p>Vulcan last month committed, as part of the U.N.’s Sustainable Development Goal 14, to develop a detection system to give law enforcement evidence of illegal fishing activity in near-real time. Together with its cofunding of CSIRO’s system, the company is working both the surveillance approach and the analytics approach to combat illegal fishing.</p>
<p>“There’s really no such thing as too much work in this space,” Savitz said. “It’s a planet-sized problem, and we need planet-sized solutions. If we lay off these depleted fish populations, they will start to rebuild.”</p>
<p>This article originally appeared on Oceans Deeply, and you can find the original <a href="https://www.newsdeeply.com/oceans/articles/2017/07/17/the-new-technology-that-promises-to-blow-up-illegal-fishing" type="external">here</a>. For important news about ocean health, <a href="http://newsdeeply.us5.list-manage1.com/subscribe?u=8b78e9a34ff7443ec1e8c62c6&amp;id=dfde037196" type="external">you can sign up to the Oceans Deeply email list.</a></p>
<p /> | false | 1 | july 18 upi hundreds thousands fishing vessels millions square miles ocean billions radio transmissions constant stream data overwhelm even dedicated fisheries managers trying combat 23 billion illegal fishing industry economically underdeveloped countries small team analysts must pore surveillance profiles thousands fishing enterprises often environmental cops much six months behind time see vessel jurisdiction acting suspiciously ship sailed thats according chris wilcox principal research scientist oceans atmosphere business unit commonwealth scientific industrial research organization csiro australian governments main research arm colleagues deploying algorithms help authorities make better faster decisions vessels pursue inspect want help port inspectors fisheries managers make quick informed decisions target highrisk vessels wilcox told oceans deeply international maritime law requires large ships use automated identification system ais transmits vessels identity direction speed sometimes data means avoiding collisions around 15 years ago someone discovered signals detectable satellite wilcoxs team leverages data virtually free designed bunch statistical algorithms look suspicious patterns vessels move around explained formulas look three things whether vessel moves unusual way given type vessel location whether seems shutting id transponder really good reason whether vessel history sailing waters countries high levels crime corruption areas high levels illegal fishing cargo vessel sitting outside maritime border country thats weird wilcox said ships expensive operate ought moving port port quickly possible staying put might indicate taking cargo vessels trying avoid catch limits according united nations food agriculture organization illegal fishing costs nations billions dollars year contributes collapse fish populations around world find way get reins problem said jackie savitz senior vice president environmental nonprofit oceana otherwise able provide fish meal every day 15 billion people around world rely ocean protein successful management depleted fisheries united states led recovery according national oceanic atmospheric administration tools help us savitz said csiros new system based ais data vessels assigned risk score authorities register area interest territorial waters suspect illegal fishing may occurring instance area dont capacity patrol whenever vessel identified suspicious enters area authorities receive alert also query csiros database specific vessel receive risk report port inspectors use information help decide many vessels entering port ought board system called monitoring control surveillance analytics illegal unreported unregulated fishing launches october developed collaboration vulcan seattlebased company owned microsoft cofounder paul g allen valuable tool enable enforcement agencies identify locate suspicious vessels world mark powell illegal fishing program officer vulcan said statement released csiro wilcoxs algorithms build global fishing watch free online tool oceana helped develop google skytruth enable anyone internet connection monitor fishing activity anywhere earth value add csiros system risk report really good idea savitz said scoring based suspicious behavior allowing port authorities prioritize attention good strategy global fishing watch csiros tool first several new weapons come fight high crimes high seas first international agreement illegal fishing international port state measures agreement became law last year encouraging development tools csiro focused repurposing lowcost widely available data designed surveillance ais one data set another comes visible infrared imaging radiometer suite sensor noaa satellite looks visible light conceived means tracking human development turns viirs also see large ships youre fisheries manager looking noncompliant vessels large area viirs something use doesnt cost anything wilcox said need someone set infrastructure process data team also hopes deploy hydrophones listen coral reefdestroying dynamite fishing one ecologically destructive methods harvesting ocean scientists use hydrophones track behavior marine life underwater volcanic activity us military uses listen submarines csiro hopes develop system listens sounds might indicate dynamite fishing automatically alerts local maritime authority vulcan last month committed part uns sustainable development goal 14 develop detection system give law enforcement evidence illegal fishing activity nearreal time together cofunding csiros system company working surveillance approach analytics approach combat illegal fishing theres really thing much work space savitz said planetsized problem need planetsized solutions lay depleted fish populations start rebuild article originally appeared oceans deeply find original important news ocean health sign oceans deeply email list | 640 |
<p>Big money is on the move in Las Vegas’ Ward 2.</p>
<p>Two political action committees and three City Council contenders raised a combined $1.1 million this year in a contentious and costly contest to decide who sits in one City Council seat.</p>
<p>Contribution and expense reports filed Friday provide a final look at candidate war chests before voters decide City Council races Tuesday in Las Vegas, North Las Vegas and Henderson.</p>
<p>Las Vegas Ward 2 Councilman Bob Beers, who is trying to fend off a challenge from Steve Seroka, a retired Air Force colonel, reported raising $30,480 from May 20 to June 8. His campaign has brought in $399,778 in 2017.</p>
<p>Beers got a boost from his council colleague Lois Tarkanian, whose campaign donated $5,000.</p>
<p>Seroka raised $41,310 this period, upping his total to $271,588. Christina Roush, who was eliminated in the primary, had pulled in $280,532.</p>
<p>Combined, the two PACs have raised $172,288 in their mailer-focused quests to defeat Beers or Seroka.</p>
<p>The anti-Beers PAC, Citizens to Preserve Neighborhoods, raised $40,288, most of which has come from Roush. The group spent roughly $34,000, with $27,000 going to A&amp;B Print and Mailing.</p>
<p>Citizens for Better Neighborhoods, the PAC that’s been sending mailers almost daily slamming Seroka, raised $69,000 since May 20 and $132,000 since its February creation.</p>
<p>The group has spent $113,534 on newspaper advertisements, postage and printing. The mailers’ content has ranged from criticizing Seroka for his stance on developing the Badlands golf course to salacious details from his ex-wife’s decade-old divorce filing.</p>
<p>The Badlands development, which returns to the Planning Commission on Tuesday, has fueled much of the Ward 2 race rhetoric. Since May 20, two limited liability companies listing the same address shown on Badlands developer EHB Cos.’ website, have pumped $15,000 into the PAC.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, $49,000 has come from eight different entities — including more LLCs and a family limited partnership — all listing the same Charleston Boulevard address. EHB Cos. has listed the same address with the secretary of state in past contributions to political campaigns.</p>
<p>In Las Vegas’ Ward 6, Michele Fiore pulled in $87,651 this period, to Kelli Ross’ $41,050. With 2017 contributions totaling $473,534, Fiore’s contributions are more than double Ross’ $211,360.</p>
<p>The Clark County Democratic Party filed a complaint with the secretary of state Tuesday, alleging possible misappropriation of campaign dollars, about Fiore’s campaign fund paying $44,000 to Politically Off the Wall, a consulting firm she created.</p>
<p>Fiore’s campaign paid the firm another $23,000 in May and June, the most recent filings show. Fiore’s team defended the practice, calling it a standard LLC that serves to simplify paying canvassers and associated taxes.</p>
<p>North Las Vegas</p>
<p>In North Las Vegas, challenger Scott Black outraised Ward 3 incumbent Anita Wood.</p>
<p>Black, the primary’s top vote-getter took in $28,076 from May 20 to June 8, upping his total to $141,627. He spent $112,383.</p>
<p>Black’s largest contribution was $5,000 from T.J. Fechser, son of former Wynn International Chairman Jack Binion, whose family owns land for a proposed shopping center in the city.</p>
<p>Wood raised $15,750, bringing her total to $208,673 since mid-2016. She spent $207,551 this year. Wood’s largest donation in the most recent filing period was $2,500 from the <a href="http://www.hotels.vegas/Las-Vegas-Hotels/South-Point-Hotel-Casino-Spa" type="external">South</a> <a href="http://www.hotels.vegas/Las-Vegas-Hotels/South-Point-Hotel-Casino-Spa" type="external">Point</a>.</p>
<p>Wood’s contribution records did not appear on the secretary of state’s website Saturday morning. Her campaign manager, Bradley Meyer, sent a copy of her latest campaign documents to the Review-Journal.</p>
<p>Wood said that she could not find her name during a search Friday on the secretary of state’s public portal.</p>
<p>Kent Alexander, a spokesman for the Nevada Secretary of State’s office, did not return a phone call Saturday.</p>
<p>“I got an email confirmation that I submitted the paperwork on time, but I have no idea what’s going on,” Wood said, adding that she plans to follow-up with the Secretary of State’s office.</p>
<p>Henderson</p>
<p>Ward 3 incumbent John Marz raised $51,910, more than 10 times his opponent, from May 20 to June 8 for a $237,155 total, reports filed with the secretary of state’s office show. He received $5,000 each from Soro LLC, GKT Acquisitions LLC, Insight Investment Partners LLC and LVGV LLC — which also operates as <a href="http://www.hotels.vegas/Las-Vegas-Hotels/M-Resort-Spa-&amp;-Casino" type="external">M Resort.</a></p>
<p>The report also shows Marz has spent $468,962 on his campaign this year — or $231,807 more than what he has raised — with much of it going to advertising-related expenses.</p>
<p>Challenger Carrie Cox’s contribution records also did not show on the secretary of state’s website, but Cox gave a copy of the documents to the Review-Journal.</p>
<p>Records show she raised $4,910 this period for a total of $31,724. Since January, Cox has spent $24,506 on her campaign. Her biggest contributors were Terrible Herbst, Samsone Companies and Sherolyn Emery, each donating $1,000.</p>
<p>Debra March, who won the mayoral race in April, raised $5,840 this period, and $164,752 in 2017.</p>
<p>Contact Jamie Munks at [email protected] or 702-383-0340. Follow <a href="http://www.twitter.com/JamieMunksRJ" type="external">@JamieMunksRJ</a> on Twitter. Contact Art Marroquin at [email protected] or 702-383-0336. Find <a href="http://www.twitter.com/@AMarroquin_LV" type="external">@AMarroquin_LV</a> on Twitter. Contact Sandy Lopez at [email protected] or 702-383-4686. Follow <a href="https://twitter.com/JournalismSandy" type="external">@JournalismSandy</a> on Twitter.</p>
<p>Las Vegas Municipal Judge race</p>
<p>Incumbent Judge Heidi Almase raised $6,088 in the brief reporting period that ended June 8, drawing her 2017 fundraising total to $72,931, more than $100,000 shy of challenger Cara Campbell. Campbell raised $41,242 during the most recent reporting period, and $176,769 in 2017.</p>
<p /> | false | 1 | big money move las vegas ward 2 two political action committees three city council contenders raised combined 11 million year contentious costly contest decide sits one city council seat contribution expense reports filed friday provide final look candidate war chests voters decide city council races tuesday las vegas north las vegas henderson las vegas ward 2 councilman bob beers trying fend challenge steve seroka retired air force colonel reported raising 30480 may 20 june 8 campaign brought 399778 2017 beers got boost council colleague lois tarkanian whose campaign donated 5000 seroka raised 41310 period upping total 271588 christina roush eliminated primary pulled 280532 combined two pacs raised 172288 mailerfocused quests defeat beers seroka antibeers pac citizens preserve neighborhoods raised 40288 come roush group spent roughly 34000 27000 going aampb print mailing citizens better neighborhoods pac thats sending mailers almost daily slamming seroka raised 69000 since may 20 132000 since february creation group spent 113534 newspaper advertisements postage printing mailers content ranged criticizing seroka stance developing badlands golf course salacious details exwifes decadeold divorce filing badlands development returns planning commission tuesday fueled much ward 2 race rhetoric since may 20 two limited liability companies listing address shown badlands developer ehb cos website pumped 15000 pac meanwhile 49000 come eight different entities including llcs family limited partnership listing charleston boulevard address ehb cos listed address secretary state past contributions political campaigns las vegas ward 6 michele fiore pulled 87651 period kelli ross 41050 2017 contributions totaling 473534 fiores contributions double ross 211360 clark county democratic party filed complaint secretary state tuesday alleging possible misappropriation campaign dollars fiores campaign fund paying 44000 politically wall consulting firm created fiores campaign paid firm another 23000 may june recent filings show fiores team defended practice calling standard llc serves simplify paying canvassers associated taxes north las vegas north las vegas challenger scott black outraised ward 3 incumbent anita wood black primarys top votegetter took 28076 may 20 june 8 upping total 141627 spent 112383 blacks largest contribution 5000 tj fechser son former wynn international chairman jack binion whose family owns land proposed shopping center city wood raised 15750 bringing total 208673 since mid2016 spent 207551 year woods largest donation recent filing period 2500 south point woods contribution records appear secretary states website saturday morning campaign manager bradley meyer sent copy latest campaign documents reviewjournal wood said could find name search friday secretary states public portal kent alexander spokesman nevada secretary states office return phone call saturday got email confirmation submitted paperwork time idea whats going wood said adding plans followup secretary states office henderson ward 3 incumbent john marz raised 51910 10 times opponent may 20 june 8 237155 total reports filed secretary states office show received 5000 soro llc gkt acquisitions llc insight investment partners llc lvgv llc also operates resort report also shows marz spent 468962 campaign year 231807 raised much going advertisingrelated expenses challenger carrie coxs contribution records also show secretary states website cox gave copy documents reviewjournal records show raised 4910 period total 31724 since january cox spent 24506 campaign biggest contributors terrible herbst samsone companies sherolyn emery donating 1000 debra march mayoral race april raised 5840 period 164752 2017 contact jamie munks jmunksreviewjournalcom 7023830340 follow jamiemunksrj twitter contact art marroquin amarroquinreviewjournalcom 7023830336 find amarroquin_lv twitter contact sandy lopez slopezreviewjournalcom 7023834686 follow journalismsandy twitter las vegas municipal judge race incumbent judge heidi almase raised 6088 brief reporting period ended june 8 drawing 2017 fundraising total 72931 100000 shy challenger cara campbell campbell raised 41242 recent reporting period 176769 2017 | 587 |
<p>As President Obama said in his post-election news conference, Republicans had a good night on November 4. They increased their majority in the House to a level not seen since the 1920s and may hold as many as 250 seats in the lower chamber. In the Senate, Republicans defeated at least three incumbent Democratic Senators, and are likely to defeat two more when all of the voting and counting is over.</p>
<p>The most likely scenario is that the GOP will hold 54 seats in the Senate come January — an increase of nine seats from the current Congress. It is noteworthy that half of the <a href="http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/26-senators-who-voted-for-obamacare-wont-be-part-of-new-senate/article/2555721?custom_click=rss" type="external">Democratic Senators</a> who voted to pass the Affordable Care Act (ACA) nearly five years ago will no longer be in the Senate in 2015.&#160;Despite some commentary to the contrary, the ACA was a big issue in the election. To a person, the successful GOP Senate candidates ran strongly against the ACA. In the middle of October, <a href="http://cookpolitical.com/story/7958" type="external">anti-ACA ads</a> were among the most frequently-aired political advertisements from Republican Senate candidates. By and large, these candidates won their races.</p>
<p>The conventional wisdom is that the ACA, now heading into its second year of full-scale implementation, cannot be rolled back in any substantial way at this point. That’s certainly the view of major corporate players and the health care industry. But it is decidedly not the view of the newly-elected Republican members of the House and Senate, or their constituents. They believe voters sent them to Washington to do their best to push back against the perceived excesses of the ACA and to begin replacing it with a reform plan that is less expensive, less damaging to the economy, and less reliant on federal regulation and control.</p>
<p>If nothing else, the mid-term election assured that the political debate over the ACA and possible alternative approaches is not over. At a minimum, the parties will continue to spar over this issue through the 2016 presidential election.</p>
<p>Although the GOP strengthened its position in the election, shifting direction in health care policy over the next two years will not be easy. For starters, President Obama has two more years left in his second term, and the GOP has nowhere near the numbers to override presidential vetoes. Moreover, in the Senate, Democrats (and the independent Senators who caucus with them) will hold no fewer than 46 seats. That’s more than enough votes to filibuster (and therefore kill) legislation before it ever reaches the president’s desk.</p>
<p>Boehner and McConnell have pledged to move to a vote on repealing the ACA in Congress and to send the bill to the president for a certain veto at the earliest opportunity. But it seems unlikely that even a GOP-controlled Congress could deliver a straight repeal of the ACA. For starters, as just noted, Democrats in the Senate could filibuster the bill, thus forcing the GOP to find 60 votes to close off debate and move to a vote. There won’t be 60 votes in the Senate to repeal the ACA.</p>
<p>In addition, a straight repeal of the ACA implies there would be no immediate replacement plan. Consequently, ACA supporters could accurately accuse repeal proponents of pushing several million people out of Medicaid and exchange-based insurance plans. That argument will almost certainly derail the effort at some stage in the legislative process.</p>
<p>The GOP would be better off keeping in clear focus the larger goal, which is to move health care policy in a more patient-centered, market-based, and less regulatory direction, while also improving work incentives and the budget outlook. Putting in place a reform plan with these characteristics will only happen if a Republican wins the presidency in 2016, too. An important goal of the Congress in 2015 and 2016 should be to prepare the way for enacting this kind of an agenda in 2017.</p>
<p>The congressional budget process could help the GOP make some progress over the coming two years. Both a budget resolution and a budget reconciliation bill are protected from the Senate filibuster, meaning they can pass with a simple majority vote of 51 Senators. Instead of full repeal, the GOP could use this process to approve provisions making targeted changes to the ACA.</p>
<p>Some of these provisions might even draw bipartisan support. For instance, many Democrats have expressed support for eliminating the Independent Payment Advisory Board, the medical device tax, and the employer mandate. Repeal of these provisions, and many others in the ACA, could proceed in the budget reconciliation process.</p>
<p>Republicans might want to consider legislation that codified protections for consumers in non-ACA compliant insurance products. At the moment, the president has given permission to states to allow some of these plans to continue in force, but the protection is temporary and partial. A GOP bill could require the states to allow consumers to keep their old plans if they like them, and indefinitely.</p>
<p>In addition, it may be beneficial to the GOP to consider targeted changes to the ACA that the president or Democrats in Congress initially oppose. These bills would highlight important differences between the parties. For instance, Republicans might close off the administration’s plan to provide open-ended “risk corridor” support to insurers losing money on the exchanges.&#160;The administration’s <a href="http://www.gao.gov/assets/670/666299.pdf" type="external">legal authority for these payments</a> is questionable, and, in any event, many Republicans believe that taxpayers should not be on the hook to cover losses for insurers that purposefully cut their premiums below what was responsible. They could attack these payments as one more corporate giveaway.</p>
<p>The GOP could also scale back the individual mandate tax by providing clear, statutory exemptions to many more households.</p>
<p>The most challenging task for the new GOP Congress, and for the GOP candidates lining up to run for president, will be to lay out a clear and compelling alternative vision for health reform. It is not necessary for the Congress to take up and pass such a plan over the next two years, but it is important for ACA opponents to begin coalescing around a unified proposal so that it can become part of the planned agenda for 2017.</p>
<p>In developing a replacement for the ACA, the GOP must be practical and realistic. Among other things, that means acknowledging that there are some 160 million people in employer-based health insurance today, and a reform plan cannot abruptly disrupt their coverage all at once and survive politically. In addition, a replacement plan for the ACA must provide access to affordable insurance for all households, and provide regulatory protections for persons with pre-existing conditions. A GOP replacement plan must meet these objectives at a fraction of the expense of the ACA, and with much less regulatory baggage.</p>
<p>Republican Senators <a href="http://healthaffairs.org/blog/2014/02/12/a-senate-gop-health-reform-proposal-the-burr-coburn-hatch-plan/" type="external">Richard Burr, Tom Coburn, and Orrin Hatch</a> have demonstrated that such a plan is possible. Their <a href="http://www.coburn.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?a=Files.Serve&amp;File_id=871b0ef8-7705-4f72-aef2-e81d01b9c009" type="external">Patient CARE Act</a> would cover approximately the same number of people with insurance as the ACA, at far less expense, and much less federal control, according to an evaluation of it by <a href="http://healthandeconomy.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/2014-01-29-CARE-Act-Score.pdf" type="external">the Center for Health and the Economy</a>.</p>
<p>The Burr-Coburn-Hatch plan is not a finished product; it can and should be refined, starting with a plan to allow those covered by the ACA’s Medicaid expansion and exchange-based insurance plans to remain where they are during a transition to the replacement program. Still, even without further modification, it is by far the most realistic and credible alternative to the ACA yet introduced by Republicans in Congress, and the GOP would be smart to begin elevating it in the public debate as the starting point for passing an appealing ACA alternative.</p>
<p>Republicans have been largely shut out of the health care policymaking business for the past six years. That will change modestly in 2015 as the party takes control of the Senate. But Republicans must be realistic about what they can do while President Obama remains in office. Some changes are possible, of course, but the ACA isn’t going to be repealed or replaced before 2017, or even altered to the satisfaction of ACA opponents. What the GOP can and should do is agree on where it wants to go, and begin to make progress toward that goal.</p>
<p>James C. Capretta is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and a visiting fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.</p> | false | 1 | president obama said postelection news conference republicans good night november 4 increased majority house level seen since 1920s may hold many 250 seats lower chamber senate republicans defeated least three incumbent democratic senators likely defeat two voting counting likely scenario gop hold 54 seats senate come january increase nine seats current congress noteworthy half democratic senators voted pass affordable care act aca nearly five years ago longer senate 2015160despite commentary contrary aca big issue election person successful gop senate candidates ran strongly aca middle october antiaca ads among frequentlyaired political advertisements republican senate candidates large candidates races conventional wisdom aca heading second year fullscale implementation rolled back substantial way point thats certainly view major corporate players health care industry decidedly view newlyelected republican members house senate constituents believe voters sent washington best push back perceived excesses aca begin replacing reform plan less expensive less damaging economy less reliant federal regulation control nothing else midterm election assured political debate aca possible alternative approaches minimum parties continue spar issue 2016 presidential election although gop strengthened position election shifting direction health care policy next two years easy starters president obama two years left second term gop nowhere near numbers override presidential vetoes moreover senate democrats independent senators caucus hold fewer 46 seats thats enough votes filibuster therefore kill legislation ever reaches presidents desk boehner mcconnell pledged move vote repealing aca congress send bill president certain veto earliest opportunity seems unlikely even gopcontrolled congress could deliver straight repeal aca starters noted democrats senate could filibuster bill thus forcing gop find 60 votes close debate move vote wont 60 votes senate repeal aca addition straight repeal aca implies would immediate replacement plan consequently aca supporters could accurately accuse repeal proponents pushing several million people medicaid exchangebased insurance plans argument almost certainly derail effort stage legislative process gop would better keeping clear focus larger goal move health care policy patientcentered marketbased less regulatory direction also improving work incentives budget outlook putting place reform plan characteristics happen republican wins presidency 2016 important goal congress 2015 2016 prepare way enacting kind agenda 2017 congressional budget process could help gop make progress coming two years budget resolution budget reconciliation bill protected senate filibuster meaning pass simple majority vote 51 senators instead full repeal gop could use process approve provisions making targeted changes aca provisions might even draw bipartisan support instance many democrats expressed support eliminating independent payment advisory board medical device tax employer mandate repeal provisions many others aca could proceed budget reconciliation process republicans might want consider legislation codified protections consumers nonaca compliant insurance products moment president given permission states allow plans continue force protection temporary partial gop bill could require states allow consumers keep old plans like indefinitely addition may beneficial gop consider targeted changes aca president democrats congress initially oppose bills would highlight important differences parties instance republicans might close administrations plan provide openended risk corridor support insurers losing money exchanges160the administrations legal authority payments questionable event many republicans believe taxpayers hook cover losses insurers purposefully cut premiums responsible could attack payments one corporate giveaway gop could also scale back individual mandate tax providing clear statutory exemptions many households challenging task new gop congress gop candidates lining run president lay clear compelling alternative vision health reform necessary congress take pass plan next two years important aca opponents begin coalescing around unified proposal become part planned agenda 2017 developing replacement aca gop must practical realistic among things means acknowledging 160 million people employerbased health insurance today reform plan abruptly disrupt coverage survive politically addition replacement plan aca must provide access affordable insurance households provide regulatory protections persons preexisting conditions gop replacement plan must meet objectives fraction expense aca much less regulatory baggage republican senators richard burr tom coburn orrin hatch demonstrated plan possible patient care act would cover approximately number people insurance aca far less expense much less federal control according evaluation center health economy burrcoburnhatch plan finished product refined starting plan allow covered acas medicaid expansion exchangebased insurance plans remain transition replacement program still even without modification far realistic credible alternative aca yet introduced republicans congress gop would smart begin elevating public debate starting point passing appealing aca alternative republicans largely shut health care policymaking business past six years change modestly 2015 party takes control senate republicans must realistic president obama remains office changes possible course aca isnt going repealed replaced 2017 even altered satisfaction aca opponents gop agree wants go begin make progress toward goal james c capretta senior fellow ethics public policy center visiting fellow american enterprise institute | 754 |
<p>It’s surprising, on reflection, that more fashion designers don’t go into filmmaking. Their art hinges on unfettered visual imagination with an activating element of human performance, savvy to the demands of a paying audience. Tom Ford proved the logic of the transition; in their first feature, the headily ornate but narratively anemic “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/woodshock/" type="external">Woodshock</a>,” Kate and <a href="http://variety.com/t/laura-mulleavy/" type="external">Laura Mulleavy</a> don’t come to the medium quite as fully formed.</p>
<p>The good news is that the celebrated sisterly duo behind the Rodarte couture label bring much of their singularly striking, busy aesthetic to the screen: With its layer upon layer of filters, lens flares, overlaid floral motifs and crystalline refractions, the film is as extravagantly embellished as one of their most gawp-worthy gowns. Yet this sparse meditation on a legal cannabis dealer (Kirsten Dunst) sent into concentric spirals of trauma and hallucination by her mother’s death could desperately use some extra detailing at the level of character and psychology. As it is, the vicarious intrigue of watching someone else’s increasingly distant drug trips burns out pretty fast, leaving viewers with an abstruse fusion of stoner cinema and slow cinema that plays to no obvious audience. A24 can play up “Woodshock’s” attractive, cultish trappings ahead of its Stateside opening on September 22, but it’d be more seductive as a nightclub background projection than as a theatrical experience.</p>
<p>“Woodshock” wastes no time getting to the despairing heart of its drama: Near the beginning, a distraught Theresa (Dunst) prepares a lethal cocktail of marijuana and another, indeterminate substance at the behest of her terminally ill mother (Susan Traylor), the preparation of the final spliff depicted in extreme, near-reverent closeup. The invalid peacefully slips away; Theresa, meanwhile, is left in a tormented state of mourning from which she can’t seem to extricate herself, with or without psychotropic assistance. That’s as clear and emotionally acute as the narrative gets before “Woodshock” disappears into the hazy no man’s land between reality and the disorienting hall of mirrors that is its heroine’s addled psyche.</p>
<p>The title refers to the mental state of extreme fear and panic associated with losing one’s bearings in the wilderness, here also given a literal application: Theresa lives with her ineffectual boyfriend Nick (British rising star Joe Cole, given precious little to work with) on the fringes of a redwood forest in California’s Humboldt County. How much time she spends wandering its paths or simply dreaming herself along them is anyone’s guess. (At one point, when a fevered Theresa tosses an entire box of eggs into the kitchen sink, it’s hard not to wonder if the Mulleavy’s are deliberately poking fun at the “this is your brain on drugs” cautionary campaigns of the 1980s.) When not brooding, tripping or both, Theresa works alongside her burly, romantically suggestive friend Keith (the reliable Pilou Asbaek) at a kind of artisan marijuana boutique for the medically eligible. The question of when the film is set, given this high-end, above-board business and the absence of any contemporary technology from the screen, is kept deliberately elusive.</p>
<p>Production designer and co-producer K.K. Barrett situates the film in a similarly dreamy, inexact milieu to his work with Spike Jonze and Sofia Coppola — the decorative flourishes of kitsch in Theresa’s boxy, claustrophobic house could be period detailing or retro hipster affectations — while the Mulleavys’ own costumes (in collaboration with Christie Wittenborn) shift in terms of formality, silhouette and sheer shimmer to match Theresa’s deteriorating grasp on reality. The further she slips into oblivion, the closer she gets to exquisitely sequined Rodarte nirvana. Highly inventive Finnish cinematographer Peter Flinckenberg (an ASC winner for his work on “Concrete Night”) deftly evokes colliding shards of reality, altered reality and outright delusion through glimmering games of watercolor-soft focus and double exposure.</p>
<p>With the film’s human element so glassy and its storytelling so thin, however, all this elegant formal trickery soon turns more aggravating than intoxicating — by its extremely splintered, impressionistic finale, the film skates perilously close to misery chic. Dunst has form in playing irretrievably inverted depression to riveting effect, but the Mulleavy’s script hardly gives her as complex an emotional or intellectual palette to work with as, say, Lars von Trier’s “Melancholia.” Theresa’s relationships with Nick and Keith are likewise marked by watery conflict and attraction. By the time a lucid strain of narrative and feeling does emerge from “Woodshock’s” stunned tangle of whispery impulses and reflections, it lends proceedings a discomfiting whiff of anti-euthanasia sentiment, with the film in no steady state to get political on us.</p>
<p>Reviewed at Venice Film Festival (Cinema nel Giardino), Sept. 3, 2017. Running time:&#160;101 MIN.&#160;MPAA Rating: R.</p>
<p>An A24 release of a COTA Films production in association with Waypoint Entertainment. Producers: Ben LeClair, K.K. Barrett, Ken Kao, Michael Costigan. Executive producer: Kirsten Dunst.</p>
<p>Directors, screenplay: Kate Mulleavy, Laura Mulleavy. Camera (color, widescreen, 35mm): Peter Finckenberg. Editor: Julia Bloch, Dino Jonsäter. Music: Peter Raeburn.</p>
<p>Kirsten Dunst, Pilou Asbaek, Joe Cole, Jack Kilmer, Stephan DuVall, Susan Traylor.</p> | false | 1 | surprising reflection fashion designers dont go filmmaking art hinges unfettered visual imagination activating element human performance savvy demands paying audience tom ford proved logic transition first feature headily ornate narratively anemic woodshock kate laura mulleavy dont come medium quite fully formed good news celebrated sisterly duo behind rodarte couture label bring much singularly striking busy aesthetic screen layer upon layer filters lens flares overlaid floral motifs crystalline refractions film extravagantly embellished one gawpworthy gowns yet sparse meditation legal cannabis dealer kirsten dunst sent concentric spirals trauma hallucination mothers death could desperately use extra detailing level character psychology vicarious intrigue watching someone elses increasingly distant drug trips burns pretty fast leaving viewers abstruse fusion stoner cinema slow cinema plays obvious audience a24 play woodshocks attractive cultish trappings ahead stateside opening september 22 itd seductive nightclub background projection theatrical experience woodshock wastes time getting despairing heart drama near beginning distraught theresa dunst prepares lethal cocktail marijuana another indeterminate substance behest terminally ill mother susan traylor preparation final spliff depicted extreme nearreverent closeup invalid peacefully slips away theresa meanwhile left tormented state mourning cant seem extricate without psychotropic assistance thats clear emotionally acute narrative gets woodshock disappears hazy mans land reality disorienting hall mirrors heroines addled psyche title refers mental state extreme fear panic associated losing ones bearings wilderness also given literal application theresa lives ineffectual boyfriend nick british rising star joe cole given precious little work fringes redwood forest californias humboldt county much time spends wandering paths simply dreaming along anyones guess one point fevered theresa tosses entire box eggs kitchen sink hard wonder mulleavys deliberately poking fun brain drugs cautionary campaigns 1980s brooding tripping theresa works alongside burly romantically suggestive friend keith reliable pilou asbaek kind artisan marijuana boutique medically eligible question film set given highend aboveboard business absence contemporary technology screen kept deliberately elusive production designer coproducer kk barrett situates film similarly dreamy inexact milieu work spike jonze sofia coppola decorative flourishes kitsch theresas boxy claustrophobic house could period detailing retro hipster affectations mulleavys costumes collaboration christie wittenborn shift terms formality silhouette sheer shimmer match theresas deteriorating grasp reality slips oblivion closer gets exquisitely sequined rodarte nirvana highly inventive finnish cinematographer peter flinckenberg asc winner work concrete night deftly evokes colliding shards reality altered reality outright delusion glimmering games watercolorsoft focus double exposure films human element glassy storytelling thin however elegant formal trickery soon turns aggravating intoxicating extremely splintered impressionistic finale film skates perilously close misery chic dunst form playing irretrievably inverted depression riveting effect mulleavys script hardly gives complex emotional intellectual palette work say lars von triers melancholia theresas relationships nick keith likewise marked watery conflict attraction time lucid strain narrative feeling emerge woodshocks stunned tangle whispery impulses reflections lends proceedings discomfiting whiff antieuthanasia sentiment film steady state get political us reviewed venice film festival cinema nel giardino sept 3 2017 running time160101 min160mpaa rating r a24 release cota films production association waypoint entertainment producers ben leclair kk barrett ken kao michael costigan executive producer kirsten dunst directors screenplay kate mulleavy laura mulleavy camera color widescreen 35mm peter finckenberg editor julia bloch dino jonsäter music peter raeburn kirsten dunst pilou asbaek joe cole jack kilmer stephan duvall susan traylor | 530 |
<p>WASHINGTON — A revised version of the Senate GOP health care bill will be unveiled in days and votes could begin next week, though Majority Leader Mitch McConnell would not say Tuesday whether he had gained enough votes to pass the controversial legislation.</p>
<p>“We are going to do health care next week,” McConnell, R-Ky., told reporters following a GOP caucus luncheon that included Vice President Mike Pence.</p>
<p>Although Republican leaders said they were moving forward with a bill, they did not describe changes to a first draft of the legislation that more than a dozen senators opposed, including Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev.</p>
<p>Opposition from moderates and conservative GOP lawmakers forced McConnell to pull the bill from a vote before the July 4 holiday break.</p>
<p>Lawmakers returned to Washington this week to a message from President Donald Trump urging them to pass health care legislation before its next break.</p>
<p>McConnell announced Tuesday that he was delaying the month-long August recess to work on health care and other legislative priorities.</p>
<p>Once the Senate completes its work on health care reform, McConnell said the Senate will take up the defense bill and “the backlog of critical nominations that have been mindlessly stalled by Democrats.”</p>
<p>Democrats scoff at delay</p>
<p>Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., scoffed at the recess delay and accusations of Democratic obstruction, saying Republicans have had seven years and six months to write a bill to replace the Affordable Care Act, commonly called Obamacare.</p>
<p>“They are struggling with health care. The problem is not timing, it’s the substance,” Schumer said. “Two more weeks isn’t going to solve their problems.”</p>
<p>Democrats are united in their opposition to repeal Obamacare, which passed without a single GOP vote in 2010.</p>
<p>Some 98 percent of letters and 93 percent of telephone calls to the office of Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev., were opposed to “Trumpcare,” she said on social media.</p>
<p>Republicans are trying to repeal and replace the law under budget reconciliation rules that allow a simple majority vote. But with only 52 Republican members, McConnell can afford to lose only a couple of votes to pass the bill.</p>
<p>More than a dozen Republican senators have voiced opposition to a previous bill, including Heller, who said cuts to Medicaid could result in more than 200,000 Nevadans losing coverage.</p>
<p>Heller has said he wants to repeal Obamacare, and has voted to do so in the past, but has opposed the current Senate bill because of Medicaid cuts of more than $780 billion.</p>
<p>“Obamacare is a train wreck and we need to do something about it, but Senator Heller remains opposed to the Senate bill in its current form,” said spokeswoman Megan Taylor.</p>
<p>A Congressional Budget Office analysis found the Senate bill would result in the loss of coverage for 22 million people.</p>
<p>Republican leaders said a new CBO analysis on the revised legislation would likely come next week.</p>
<p>GOP divisions remain</p>
<p>But divisions remain among GOP conservatives, who want deeper cuts, and moderates who oppose Medicaid cuts and those who oppose defunding of Planned Parenthood, which provides prenatal care, family planning and cancer screening for low-income women.</p>
<p>Following Tuesday’s luncheon, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said he was in favor of forming a bipartisan working group to write legislation that could garner votes from some Democrats.</p>
<p>Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D., said that at this point in the “chaos,” leaders from both parties should come together and work on the health care legislation.</p>
<p>Obamacare mandates included a provision that insurance companies provide coverage for people with pre-existing medical conditions. It also required younger people to purchase insurance, or face tax penalties, and gave subsidies to low-income people to buy plans.</p>
<p>Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, are proposing language that would allow insurance companies to provide bare-bones coverage plans, as long as one plan was offered that includes all Obamacare mandates for pre-existing conditions.</p>
<p>Cruz told reporters his amendment would lower premiums. He also said his amendment was key to getting the votes needed to repeal Obamacare and pass a replacement bill.</p>
<p>“It remains challenging, but there is a path forward,” Cruz said.</p>
<p>Schumer called the Cruz amendment a “hoax” that would allow insurance companies to sell “junk plans.”</p>
<p>“It’s an extreme step in an already extreme bill,” said Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa.</p>
<p>The Cruz amendment was sent to the CBO to analyze.</p>
<p>Under a scenario outlined by Republican leaders, a procedural vote will be held to bring the legislation to the floor. The Senate then will proceed in a “vote-a-rama” on amendments.</p>
<p>Two weeks ago, Senate GOP leaders lacked support to bring the bill to the floor for consideration.</p>
<p>The House passed its version of the legislation earlier this year.</p>
<p>Trump made repeal of Obamacare a campaign pledge and has worked behind the scenes to muster GOP support in the Senate to give him his first major legislative victory.</p>
<p>Contact Gary Martin at 202-662-7390 or [email protected]. Follow <a href="http://www.twitter.com/@garymartindc" type="external">@garymartindc</a> on Twitter.</p>
<p>What’s needed to pass</p>
<p>Republicans, who hold 52 seats in the 100-seat Senate, would need 50 votes to pass the health care bill, with Vice President Mike Pence providing the tie-breaking vote.</p>
<p>More than a dozen senators opposed the first draft of the bill, including Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev.</p>
<p /> | false | 1 | washington revised version senate gop health care bill unveiled days votes could begin next week though majority leader mitch mcconnell would say tuesday whether gained enough votes pass controversial legislation going health care next week mcconnell rky told reporters following gop caucus luncheon included vice president mike pence although republican leaders said moving forward bill describe changes first draft legislation dozen senators opposed including sen dean heller rnev opposition moderates conservative gop lawmakers forced mcconnell pull bill vote july 4 holiday break lawmakers returned washington week message president donald trump urging pass health care legislation next break mcconnell announced tuesday delaying monthlong august recess work health care legislative priorities senate completes work health care reform mcconnell said senate take defense bill backlog critical nominations mindlessly stalled democrats democrats scoff delay senate minority leader charles schumer dny scoffed recess delay accusations democratic obstruction saying republicans seven years six months write bill replace affordable care act commonly called obamacare struggling health care problem timing substance schumer said two weeks isnt going solve problems democrats united opposition repeal obamacare passed without single gop vote 2010 98 percent letters 93 percent telephone calls office sen catherine cortez masto dnev opposed trumpcare said social media republicans trying repeal replace law budget reconciliation rules allow simple majority vote 52 republican members mcconnell afford lose couple votes pass bill dozen republican senators voiced opposition previous bill including heller said cuts medicaid could result 200000 nevadans losing coverage heller said wants repeal obamacare voted past opposed current senate bill medicaid cuts 780 billion obamacare train wreck need something senator heller remains opposed senate bill current form said spokeswoman megan taylor congressional budget office analysis found senate bill would result loss coverage 22 million people republican leaders said new cbo analysis revised legislation would likely come next week gop divisions remain divisions remain among gop conservatives want deeper cuts moderates oppose medicaid cuts oppose defunding planned parenthood provides prenatal care family planning cancer screening lowincome women following tuesdays luncheon sen lindsey graham rsc said favor forming bipartisan working group write legislation could garner votes democrats sen heidi heitkamp dnd said point chaos leaders parties come together work health care legislation obamacare mandates included provision insurance companies provide coverage people preexisting medical conditions also required younger people purchase insurance face tax penalties gave subsidies lowincome people buy plans sen ted cruz rtexas sen mike lee rutah proposing language would allow insurance companies provide barebones coverage plans long one plan offered includes obamacare mandates preexisting conditions cruz told reporters amendment would lower premiums also said amendment key getting votes needed repeal obamacare pass replacement bill remains challenging path forward cruz said schumer called cruz amendment hoax would allow insurance companies sell junk plans extreme step already extreme bill said sen bob casey dpa cruz amendment sent cbo analyze scenario outlined republican leaders procedural vote held bring legislation floor senate proceed votearama amendments two weeks ago senate gop leaders lacked support bring bill floor consideration house passed version legislation earlier year trump made repeal obamacare campaign pledge worked behind scenes muster gop support senate give first major legislative victory contact gary martin 2026627390 gmartinreviewjournalcom follow garymartindc twitter whats needed pass republicans hold 52 seats 100seat senate would need 50 votes pass health care bill vice president mike pence providing tiebreaking vote dozen senators opposed first draft bill including sen dean heller rnev | 560 |
<p>Despite the new wave of violence in the Middle East and worldwide criticism over Donald Trump’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, the US ambassador to the UN has a controversial message: “The sky’s still up there. It hasn’t fallen.”</p>
<p>“When the president made this comment (recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital) on Wednesday, everybody said the sky was going to fall. So Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, the sky’s still up there. It hasn’t fallen,” Nikki Haley <a href="https://www.msn.com/en-us/video/c/haley-sky-hasnt-fallen-after-jerusalem-move/vp-BBGuW7a" type="external">told</a> CNN’s ‘State of the Union.’ She <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDQYzEd1Dns" type="external">made</a> a similar comment to CBS’ ‘Face the Nation.’&#160;</p>
<p>The ambassador’s comments may, from her comfortable UN seat in New York, seem almost factual. However, the situation in the Middle East is far less peaceful and it may seem to some as though the sky has indeed fallen.</p>
<p>Read more</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/412596-arab-league-us-sanctions-jerusalem/" type="external" /></p>
<p>Hundreds have been injured in ‘Day of Rage’ protests across Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Gaza since Trump’s announcement. On Friday alone, two Palestinians were killed and over 1,000 others injured.</p>
<p>Two people were also <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/412534-israel-gaza-strikes-rockets/" type="external">killed</a> and dozens wounded in Gaza after Israel launched airstrikes on alleged Hamas targets on Saturday. It came after three rocket attacks were launched at Israeli territory, following a call from Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh for a new Palestinian intifada following Trump’s decision.&#160;</p>
<p>The term “intifada” has long been associated with two Palestinian uprisings against Israel. The first occurred from 1987 to 1993, while the second – and more violent – took place in the early 2000s, and lasted around four years. More than 4,000 people, mostly Palestinians, died in the second intifada. A third intifada has been predicted for years, and may soon come to light if people heed the calls of Haniyeh, who says Trump’s decisions amounted to a “declaration of war.”</p>
<p>Trump’s decision has also sparked protests in other areas throughout the Muslim world, with a massive <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/412627-us-embassy-beirut-riots-jerusalem/" type="external">rally</a> outside the US diplomatic mission in Lebanon on Sunday, which resulted in protesters breaking down the embassy’s gates and shouting pro-Palestinian slogans. People also took to the streets of Asian capitals to <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/412507-muslims-rallies-asia-trump/" type="external">protest</a> against Trump’s decision, particularly in the Muslim-majority countries of Malaysia and Indonesia. Around 3,000 people also gathered in front of the main mosque in Dhaka, Bangladesh.&#160;</p>
<p>Protests in Berlin saw Israeli flags being burned. Some 2,500 people came out for the latest <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/412674-germany-antisemitism-protests-berlin/" type="external">rally</a> on Sunday, which took place under the slogan “Jerusalem will always be the capital of Palestine.”&#160;A massive rally was also held in Paris on Saturday, with demonstrators turning up with signs that read “Boycott Israel” and “Free Palestine.”</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/412488-trump-israel-jerusalem-palestine/" type="external">READ MORE:&#160;‘US declaration on Jerusalem adds fuel to the fire in destabilized Middle East region’</a></p>
<p>Trump’s decision has also sparked criticism from America’s biggest allies, including the United Kingdom. Speaking during a UN Security Council meeting on Friday, British Ambassador Matthew Rycroft said the UK “disagrees” with Trump’s decision. France also said it “regrets” the move made by the White House, while German Chancellor Angela Merkel stressed that Berlin “does not support” Trump’s position, since the status of the city “is to be resolved in the framework of a two-state solution.”</p>
<p>Read more</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/412547-trump-jerusalem-city-discord/" type="external" /></p>
<p>EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini also stated that the European Union would continue to recognize the “international consensus” on Jerusalem. “The only realistic solution to the conflict between Israel and Palestine is based on two states with Jerusalem as the capital of both,” Mogherini said while standing next to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at a news conference in Brussels on Monday.</p>
<p>Even despite the protests, Haley insisted multiple times on Sunday that Trump’s move was “the right thing to do.” She told “Face the Nation’ that “it’s just reality” because Jerusalem is the indisputably the capital of Israel.</p>
<p>Haley also implied during a UN Security Council meeting on Friday that only the United States – not the other 14 nations comprising the council – has credibility when it comes to mediating the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. “The United States has credibility with both sides. Israel will never be, and should never be, bullied into an agreement by the United Nations, or by any collection of countries that have proven their disregard for Israel’s security,” she <a href="https://www.rt.com/usa/412609-haley-palestine-us-exceptionalism/" type="external">said</a>.&#160;</p>
<p>On Friday, she noted that previous Israeli-Palestinian agreements had been signed on the White House lawn. However, Haley likely shouldn’t hold her breath for more sentimental moments to take place on the lawn, particularly after Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas canceled an upcoming meeting with US Vice President Mike Pence. In addition, Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki stressed that there would be no contact at all between US and Palestinian officials. He said his government was seeking a new mediator, as Washington had surrendered its neutrality with Trump’s declaration.</p>
<p>Pence is also being snubbed by religious leaders, including by Egyptian Coptic Pope Tawadros II. The Coptic Church announced that it had “excused itself from hosting Mike Pence,” citing Trump’s decision, which came at an “unsuitable time” and was made “without the consideration for the feelings of millions of people,” MENA news agency reported.</p> | false | 1 | despite new wave violence middle east worldwide criticism donald trumps decision recognize jerusalem israels capital us ambassador un controversial message skys still hasnt fallen president made comment recognition jerusalem israels capital wednesday everybody said sky going fall thursday friday saturday sunday skys still hasnt fallen nikki haley told cnns state union made similar comment cbs face nation160 ambassadors comments may comfortable un seat new york seem almost factual however situation middle east far less peaceful may seem though sky indeed fallen read hundreds injured day rage protests across jerusalem west bank gaza since trumps announcement friday alone two palestinians killed 1000 others injured two people also killed dozens wounded gaza israel launched airstrikes alleged hamas targets saturday came three rocket attacks launched israeli territory following call hamas leader ismail haniyeh new palestinian intifada following trumps decision160 term intifada long associated two palestinian uprisings israel first occurred 1987 1993 second violent took place early 2000s lasted around four years 4000 people mostly palestinians died second intifada third intifada predicted years may soon come light people heed calls haniyeh says trumps decisions amounted declaration war trumps decision also sparked protests areas throughout muslim world massive rally outside us diplomatic mission lebanon sunday resulted protesters breaking embassys gates shouting propalestinian slogans people also took streets asian capitals protest trumps decision particularly muslimmajority countries malaysia indonesia around 3000 people also gathered front main mosque dhaka bangladesh160 protests berlin saw israeli flags burned 2500 people came latest rally sunday took place slogan jerusalem always capital palestine160a massive rally also held paris saturday demonstrators turning signs read boycott israel free palestine read more160us declaration jerusalem adds fuel fire destabilized middle east region trumps decision also sparked criticism americas biggest allies including united kingdom speaking un security council meeting friday british ambassador matthew rycroft said uk disagrees trumps decision france also said regrets move made white house german chancellor angela merkel stressed berlin support trumps position since status city resolved framework twostate solution read eu foreign policy chief federica mogherini also stated european union would continue recognize international consensus jerusalem realistic solution conflict israel palestine based two states jerusalem capital mogherini said standing next israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu news conference brussels monday even despite protests haley insisted multiple times sunday trumps move right thing told face nation reality jerusalem indisputably capital israel haley also implied un security council meeting friday united states 14 nations comprising council credibility comes mediating israelipalestinian conflict united states credibility sides israel never never bullied agreement united nations collection countries proven disregard israels security said160 friday noted previous israelipalestinian agreements signed white house lawn however haley likely shouldnt hold breath sentimental moments take place lawn particularly palestinian president mahmoud abbas canceled upcoming meeting us vice president mike pence addition palestinian foreign minister riyad almaliki stressed would contact us palestinian officials said government seeking new mediator washington surrendered neutrality trumps declaration pence also snubbed religious leaders including egyptian coptic pope tawadros ii coptic church announced excused hosting mike pence citing trumps decision came unsuitable time made without consideration feelings millions people mena news agency reported | 512 |
<p>Barely more than 24 hours after the firing of James Comey as director of the F.B.I. the following headline appeared in the&#160; <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/10/us/politics/trump-comey-firing.html" type="external">New York Times:</a>&#160;“Sense of Crisis Deepens as Trump Defends F.B.I. Firing.” Had the “sense of crisis” had a chance appreciably to “deepen” in such a short time? And wasn’t it deep enough to begin with, at least according to the previous day’s&#160; <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/09/us/politics/trump-fbi-investigation-nixon.html" type="external">Times</a>, to warrant a comparison to the undoubtedly deep crisis of Watergate? Without even going on to read the article, one had the impression that Michael D. Shear, Jennifer Steinhauer and Matt Flegenheimer were all doing their darnedest to make us&#160;see&#160;the crisis as deepening — perhaps even to see it as a crisis — but quite independently of any facts they might have to place in evidence for such a congenial conclusion.</p>
<p>Whenever I see a headline like that one, I think of Michael Cieply’s shockingly unshocked account for&#160; <a href="http://deadline.com/2016/11/shocked-by-trump-new-york-times-finds-time-for-soul-searching-1201852490/" type="external">Deadline Hollywood&#160;</a>last November of the difference he found working for the&#160;New York Times&#160;compared with&#160;The Los Angeles Times:</p>
<p>For starters, it’s important to accept that&#160;the New York Times&#160;has always — or at least for many decades — been a far more editor-driven, and self-conscious, publication than many of those with which it competes. Historically,&#160;the Los Angeles Times, where I worked twice, for instance, was a reporter-driven, bottom- up newspaper. Most editors wanted to know, every day, before the first morning meeting: “What are you hearing? What have you got?” It was a shock on arriving at&#160;the New York Times&#160;in 2004, as the paper’s movie editor, to realize that its editorial dynamic was essentially the reverse. By and large, talented reporters scrambled to match stories with what internally was often called “the narrative.” We were occasionally asked to map a narrative for our various beats a year in advance, square the plan with editors, then generate stories that fit the pre- designated line. Reality usually had a way of intervening. But I knew one senior reporter who would play solitaire on his computer in the mornings, waiting for his editors to come through with marching orders. Once, in the Los Angeles bureau, I listened to a visiting National staff reporter tell a contact, more or less: “My editor needs someone to say such-and-such, could you say that?”</p>
<p>Mr Cieply’s piece was written in response to the alleged soul-searching going on at&#160;The New York Times, in the wake of the election, for having completely missed the Trump surge, carrying him to victory in the American heartland — in which the paper had appeared to take no more interest than Hillary Clinton did. But the lesson about the dangers of sticking to your “narrative” at all costs appears not to have been learned since then. You just know that somebody, somewhere at the&#160;Times&#160;said to somebody else: “My editor needs someone to say that the sense of crisis over the F.B.I. firing is deepening; could you say that?” And of course, somebody, if only one of the reporters themselves, did say that. If that’s not Fake News, then nothing is.</p>
<p>The point is not that the sense of crisis over Mr Trump’s dismissal of James Comey was&#160;not&#160;deepening, though that would have to depend on&#160;whose&#160;sense of crisis you’re talking about. The media’s appears to have been deepening well before Mr Comey’s dismissal. That is what the media’s sense of crisis is there to do. But the headline hinted that the Trump administration must have felt&#160;itself&#160;to be in a deepening crisis, and that was at odds with the whole tenor of the article, at least on my reading of it. It had one named “expert” to push the deepening crisis narrative, but it was mainly concerned with the amused mockery by the Russian foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, of the American press pack for its obsession with Mr Comey and the Russian “collusion” story.</p>
<p>“I never thought I’d have to answer such questions,” said Mr Lavrov, “all the more in the United States of America, with your greatly developed democratic and political system.” That last bit, according to the ever-perceptive&#160;Times&#160;reporters, was said with “a tinge of sarcasm in his voice.” If so, however, it has had no more effect than my own tinges of sarcasm ever have had on the media bloodhounds in pursuit of a scandal. They kept asking Mr Lavrov about the Comey firing until, exasperated, he said to them in American demotic: “Guys, this is not serious.” He was finding out what happens to you in our greatly developed democratic and political system when you don’t say what “the narrative” needs you to say: you just get badgered until you give them something that the narrative can use. In this case it was the suggestion that his sarcasm and dismissiveness about it must mean that he, too, has something to hide — and, therefore, that the crisis must be deepening.</p>
<p>Anyway, wasn’t everybody else saying so too? Of course there could be a reason for that beside the allegedly deepening crisis itself. What would you have guessed you might hear, for example, if you asked the famous Carl Bernstein, who owes his celebrity status to Watergate, what&#160;he&#160;thinks about the Comey firing? CNN decided to find out and, to no one’s surprise,&#160; <a href="http://www.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/1705/10/cnr.07.html" type="external">he told them</a>&#160;that it was a “terribly dangerous moment in American history.” You know, sort of like Watergate.</p>
<p>The White House has kept up [sic] from trying to learn what we need to learn (he said). And this is the ultimate execution of that strategy. And unlike Watergate, where Republicans were the heroes, and Republicans said about Richard Nixon, regardless of party, we need to know the truth about what happened, a great senator from Tennessee, a Republican, said, what did the president know and when did he know it, we now have Republicans like Mitch McConnell who have shown no interest in the best obtainable version of the truth here.</p>
<p>He began, that is, with the unspoken assumption that Russia-gate was&#160;just like Watergatebecause he knew his opinion would not have been solicited in the first place if his interlocutors didn’t already think that — and then he said that it was actually&#160;worse&#160;than Watergate, because the Republicans don’t agree with the scandal narrative’s invidious equation and so must be presumed to be assisting with the cover-up. Who’s going to doubt the mythic hero of Watergate himself when he says such stuff?</p>
<p>Of course, he wasn’t the only one.&#160;The New York Times, as I mentioned earlier, greeted the news on the day after with&#160; <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/09/us/politics/trump-fbi-investigation-nixon.html" type="external">the headline</a>&#160;“In Trump’s Firing of James Comey, Echoes of Watergate.” Who didn’t see that one coming? The specific echo, picked up by numerous other headlines from around the media merry-go-round compared it to the “Saturday Night Massacre”of October 20, 1973, when the attorney general, Elliot Richardson, and his deputy, William Ruckleshaus, both resigned rather than fire the Watergate special prosecutor, Archibald Cox — so that solicitor general Robert Bork was got in to do the deed in their stead. Though there was only one corpse in this “massacre,” the hype hardly seemed enough, somehow. As the ever calm and judicious Nobel prize-winner Paul Krugman wrote in his&#160; <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/12/opinion/judas-tax-cuts-and-the-great-betrayal.html" type="external">New York Times&#160;column</a>:&#160; “At this point. . . almost an entire party appears to have decided that potential treason in the cause of tax cuts for the wealthy is no vice. And that’s barely hyperbole.”</p>
<p>Elliot Richardson is dead, but Mr Ruckleshaus is still alive, a hale and hearty 83 and living in Medina, Washington, where&#160; <a href="http://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/nation-politics/william-ruckelshaus-fired-in-watergate-probe-reflects-on-trumps-firing-decision-in-immigration-ban/" type="external">The Seattle Times</a>&#160;caught up with him way back in January on the occasion of an earlier recrudescence of the Watergate narrative. The results were amusing and instructive for connoisseurs of media narrative-pushing. Asked about the the dismissal of Sally Yates as acting attorney general for declining to defend the Trump “travel ban,” her predecessor in office was not entirely co-operative. “Ruckelshaus recognizes the parallels between the two situations,” wrote the reporter, David Gutman:</p>
<p>Both he and Yates were asked to carry out a presidential order and refused. In Ruckelshaus’ case, however, he was asked by the president to thwart an investigation into the president. Yates was only asked to defend the president’s policy in court. Ruckelshaus, who was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2015, says he doesn’t know enough about the specifics to judge Yates’ actions, but it comes down to that concept of “fundamentally wrong.” “Just because you don’t get your way with the president doesn’t necessarily mean you refuse to take his orders, refuse to carry out his commands,” he said. “What I’ve seen on television is they’re mostly arguing the legal points, and for me that’s not as important as whether, under all the circumstances involved, she was asked to do something that she believed was fundamentally wrong. I don’t know that.”</p>
<p>Whatever. Mr Gutman’s editor needed Mr Ruckelshaus to say something, and if he didn’t say it, well, the “parallels” were close enough — close enough, anyway, to lead with the one thing we know the two ex-acting attorneys general have in common: they both “know what it’s like to publicly say no to the most powerful man in the world, who also happens to be your boss.” Anyway, it all “comes down to that concept of ‘fundamentally wrong’” — even if there’s nothing anyone knows about that&#160;is&#160;fundamentally wrong.</p>
<p>It’s another way of adducing the bogus “lesson” of Watergate, mentioned in this space two months ago (see “Of leaks, links and lies” in&#160;The New Criterion&#160;of April, 2017), that the “cover-up” not the crime makes the scandal, even when there is no crime. Why would anyone believe, let alone teach as a fundamental tenet of scandalology, anything so absurd? Why else but that Watergate is the media’s accepted template for scandal, even when the alleged scandal bears no resemblance to its great original. Watergate is the celebrity of scandals, just as Mr Bernstein, with his erstwhile partner Bob Woodward, is the celebrity of Watergate. That it has lent its -gate suffix to hundreds of wannabe scandals over the last 45 years is only the most obvious indication that it remains the scandal narrative that all subsequent scandal narratives seek to emulate.</p>
<p>And that makes it the off-the-shelf narrative to be reached for and reinforced by suitable quotation from media “experts” whenever there is a potential presidential scandal a-brewing, as there has been since even before Sally Yates, now enjoying a second round of celebrity interviews on account of her unheeded warning to the incoming Trump administration about Michael Flynn’s Russian “ties.” Retrospectively, that has now become part of the “deepening” scandal, which has actually been deepening since before Mr Trump took office. “OK, NOW Is It Watergate?” wrote Elizabeth Drew in the&#160; <a href="http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/05/10/trump-fire-fbi-comey-watergate-nixon-215121" type="external">Politico&#160;magazine</a>&#160;by way of acknowledging that for her, as for the rest of the far-seeing, Trump-hating media, it has been Watergate all along, Watergate&#160;a priori, Watergate&#160;fils&#160;just waiting for its confirmation by some such plausible “parallel” as the firing of Mr Comey, which disobligingly happened on a Tuesday.</p>
<p>Somebody with a sense of mischief at the Nixon Library tweeted: “”FUN FACT: President Nixon never fired the Director of the FBI #FBIDirector #notNixonian,” but then had to take it back because, according to&#160; <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/11/us/politics/nixon-library-tweet-trump.html" type="external">The New York Times</a>, “some saw [the message] as a bizarre jab at Mr. Trump” and therefore a violation of the official non-partisanship of the National Archives, under whose rules the Nixon Library operates. I, on the other hand, saw it as a not-at-all-bizarre jab at the media’s monomaniacal attempts to jam the Trump-Russia story into the Procrustean bed of their ever-loving scandal “narrative.” In that narrative, Watergate is what scandal means, and it has become impossible for the media to think about scandal at all without reference to it. In media-land, politicians, especially Republican politicians, are always assumed to be covering something up which it is always going to be the job of the next lucky heirs to the mantle of Woodward and Bernstein to uncover.</p>
<p>My own entirely original theory about Mr Comey’s dismissal, which I promise you I came up with even before Mr Trump sought to explain himself by calling him “a grandstander” (“Trump Shifts Rationale for Firing Comey, Calling Him a ‘Showboat’,” headlined&#160; <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/11/us/politics/trump-comey-showboat-fbi.html" type="external">The New York Times</a>), is that it resulted from the latter’s transmogrification from humble policeman to a celebrity detective by putting himself at the public and media center of the investigations, first, of Hillary Clinton’s e-mail server and then of the Trump campaign’s alleged Russian connections. As Mrs Clinton found out, this is not a good situation to find yourself in if you are the subject of the celebrity detective’s investigation. He has too many incentives to keep the media’s attention on himself at the expense of truth or justice, let alone of proper procedure. I don’t see how Mr Trump could be faulted for having profited by his erstwhile opponent’s example. He must have reckoned that the scandal of firing Mr Comey could be no more damaging to him than any of the dozens of others rustled up by a hostile media since he took office.</p>
<p>In fact, as a (sometimes) canny investor, he may well have spotted the political equivalent of the money-making opportunity outlined by the thriller-writer Matthew Lynn in the London&#160; <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2017/05/09/profit-made-ignoring-social-media-hysteria/" type="external">Daily Telegraph</a>. Writing under the heading: “There’s profit to be made from ignoring social media hysteria” (talk about News You Can Use!), Mr Lynn pointed out that, after plunging when video of the forcible removal of a passenger from one of its airplanes went viral, United Airlines stock had pretty quickly rebounded to where it was before the incident.</p>
<p>It is far from alone in that. Volkswagen has recovered very quickly from its diesel scandal, and the Twitter campaigns against Uber and Lego fizzled out in just a few weeks. There are small armies of consultants advising companies on how to cope with the occasional storms of criticism that blows [sic] their way on social media. But in fact the best thing they could do is to just ignore it all — while smart investors should buy the dips, safe in the knowledge that the shares will bounce back next week.</p>
<p>I pass this along in the same spirit of generosity, confident that, with so much outrage about, outrage fatigue must be a sound investment for the long haul. For outrage feeds both on itself and on its absence. It’s one of the wonders of nature. When one outrage begins to fade in the memory, that becomes a spur to further outrage, which only multiplies outrages to the point where they become entirely evanescent. The Comey affair was being fitted into the Watergate template in the hope of prolonging that outrage, but I’m betting it will turn out that even Watergate can’t escape the iron rule of scandalology emerging from the Trump era: when everything is Watergate, nothing is Watergate.</p>
<p>James Bowman is resident scholar at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p> | false | 1 | barely 24 hours firing james comey director fbi following headline appeared the160 new york times160sense crisis deepens trump defends fbi firing sense crisis chance appreciably deepen short time wasnt deep enough begin least according previous days160 times warrant comparison undoubtedly deep crisis watergate without even going read article one impression michael shear jennifer steinhauer matt flegenheimer darnedest make us160see160the crisis deepening perhaps even see crisis quite independently facts might place evidence congenial conclusion whenever see headline like one think michael cieplys shockingly unshocked account for160 deadline hollywood160last november difference found working the160new york times160compared with160the los angeles times starters important accept that160the new york times160has always least many decades far editordriven selfconscious publication many competes historically160the los angeles times worked twice instance reporterdriven bottom newspaper editors wanted know every day first morning meeting hearing got shock arriving at160the new york times160in 2004 papers movie editor realize editorial dynamic essentially reverse large talented reporters scrambled match stories internally often called narrative occasionally asked map narrative various beats year advance square plan editors generate stories fit pre designated line reality usually way intervening knew one senior reporter would play solitaire computer mornings waiting editors come marching orders los angeles bureau listened visiting national staff reporter tell contact less editor needs someone say suchandsuch could say mr cieplys piece written response alleged soulsearching going at160the new york times wake election completely missed trump surge carrying victory american heartland paper appeared take interest hillary clinton lesson dangers sticking narrative costs appears learned since know somebody somewhere the160times160said somebody else editor needs someone say sense crisis fbi firing deepening could say course somebody one reporters say thats fake news nothing point sense crisis mr trumps dismissal james comey was160not160deepening though would depend on160whose160sense crisis youre talking medias appears deepening well mr comeys dismissal medias sense crisis headline hinted trump administration must felt160itself160to deepening crisis odds whole tenor article least reading one named expert push deepening crisis narrative mainly concerned amused mockery russian foreign minister sergey lavrov american press pack obsession mr comey russian collusion story never thought id answer questions said mr lavrov united states america greatly developed democratic political system last bit according everperceptive160times160reporters said tinge sarcasm voice however effect tinges sarcasm ever media bloodhounds pursuit scandal kept asking mr lavrov comey firing exasperated said american demotic guys serious finding happens greatly developed democratic political system dont say narrative needs say get badgered give something narrative use case suggestion sarcasm dismissiveness must mean something hide therefore crisis must deepening anyway wasnt everybody else saying course could reason beside allegedly deepening crisis would guessed might hear example asked famous carl bernstein owes celebrity status watergate what160he160thinks comey firing cnn decided find ones surprise160 told them160that terribly dangerous moment american history know sort like watergate white house kept sic trying learn need learn said ultimate execution strategy unlike watergate republicans heroes republicans said richard nixon regardless party need know truth happened great senator tennessee republican said president know know republicans like mitch mcconnell shown interest best obtainable version truth began unspoken assumption russiagate was160just like watergatebecause knew opinion would solicited first place interlocutors didnt already think said actually160worse160than watergate republicans dont agree scandal narratives invidious equation must presumed assisting coverup whos going doubt mythic hero watergate says stuff course wasnt one160the new york times mentioned earlier greeted news day with160 headline160in trumps firing james comey echoes watergate didnt see one coming specific echo picked numerous headlines around media merrygoround compared saturday night massacreof october 20 1973 attorney general elliot richardson deputy william ruckleshaus resigned rather fire watergate special prosecutor archibald cox solicitor general robert bork got deed stead though one corpse massacre hype hardly seemed enough somehow ever calm judicious nobel prizewinner paul krugman wrote his160 new york times160column160 point almost entire party appears decided potential treason cause tax cuts wealthy vice thats barely hyperbole elliot richardson dead mr ruckleshaus still alive hale hearty 83 living medina washington where160 seattle times160caught way back january occasion earlier recrudescence watergate narrative results amusing instructive connoisseurs media narrativepushing asked dismissal sally yates acting attorney general declining defend trump travel ban predecessor office entirely cooperative ruckelshaus recognizes parallels two situations wrote reporter david gutman yates asked carry presidential order refused ruckelshaus case however asked president thwart investigation president yates asked defend presidents policy court ruckelshaus awarded presidential medal freedom 2015 says doesnt know enough specifics judge yates actions comes concept fundamentally wrong dont get way president doesnt necessarily mean refuse take orders refuse carry commands said ive seen television theyre mostly arguing legal points thats important whether circumstances involved asked something believed fundamentally wrong dont know whatever mr gutmans editor needed mr ruckelshaus say something didnt say well parallels close enough close enough anyway lead one thing know two exacting attorneys general common know like publicly say powerful man world also happens boss anyway comes concept fundamentally wrong even theres nothing anyone knows that160is160fundamentally wrong another way adducing bogus lesson watergate mentioned space two months ago see leaks links lies in160the new criterion160of april 2017 coverup crime makes scandal even crime would anyone believe let alone teach fundamental tenet scandalology anything absurd else watergate medias accepted template scandal even alleged scandal bears resemblance great original watergate celebrity scandals mr bernstein erstwhile partner bob woodward celebrity watergate lent gate suffix hundreds wannabe scandals last 45 years obvious indication remains scandal narrative subsequent scandal narratives seek emulate makes offtheshelf narrative reached reinforced suitable quotation media experts whenever potential presidential scandal abrewing since even sally yates enjoying second round celebrity interviews account unheeded warning incoming trump administration michael flynns russian ties retrospectively become part deepening scandal actually deepening since mr trump took office ok watergate wrote elizabeth drew the160 politico160magazine160by way acknowledging rest farseeing trumphating media watergate along watergate160a priori watergate160fils160just waiting confirmation plausible parallel firing mr comey disobligingly happened tuesday somebody sense mischief nixon library tweeted fun fact president nixon never fired director fbi fbidirector notnixonian take back according to160 new york times saw message bizarre jab mr trump therefore violation official nonpartisanship national archives whose rules nixon library operates hand saw notatallbizarre jab medias monomaniacal attempts jam trumprussia story procrustean bed everloving scandal narrative narrative watergate scandal means become impossible media think scandal without reference medialand politicians especially republican politicians always assumed covering something always going job next lucky heirs mantle woodward bernstein uncover entirely original theory mr comeys dismissal promise came even mr trump sought explain calling grandstander trump shifts rationale firing comey calling showboat headlined160 new york times resulted latters transmogrification humble policeman celebrity detective putting public media center investigations first hillary clintons email server trump campaigns alleged russian connections mrs clinton found good situation find subject celebrity detectives investigation many incentives keep medias attention expense truth justice let alone proper procedure dont see mr trump could faulted profited erstwhile opponents example must reckoned scandal firing mr comey could damaging dozens others rustled hostile media since took office fact sometimes canny investor may well spotted political equivalent moneymaking opportunity outlined thrillerwriter matthew lynn london160 daily telegraph writing heading theres profit made ignoring social media hysteria talk news use mr lynn pointed plunging video forcible removal passenger one airplanes went viral united airlines stock pretty quickly rebounded incident far alone volkswagen recovered quickly diesel scandal twitter campaigns uber lego fizzled weeks small armies consultants advising companies cope occasional storms criticism blows sic way social media fact best thing could ignore smart investors buy dips safe knowledge shares bounce back next week pass along spirit generosity confident much outrage outrage fatigue must sound investment long haul outrage feeds absence one wonders nature one outrage begins fade memory becomes spur outrage multiplies outrages point become entirely evanescent comey affair fitted watergate template hope prolonging outrage im betting turn even watergate cant escape iron rule scandalology emerging trump era everything watergate nothing watergate james bowman resident scholar ethics public policy center | 1,308 |
<p />
<p>Shatila camp, BEIRUT&#160;— The 72-hour ceasefire was supposed to get under way on August 1 starting at 8 a.m. local time—but no sooner had it begun than it appeared to collapse. According to the Gaza Health Ministry, more than 30 Palestinians were killed, and dozens more injured, in an Israeli attack near the southern town of Rafah.</p>
<p>If, against all odds, a genuine ceasefire were to actually take place, the pause would allow time for both sides’ fighters to regroup and re-arm. But what of the civilian population of a now substantially destroyed Gaza? Presumably many will try to visit their bombed homes to retrieve some belongings, as we have seen in Syria and Iraq, and many will try finding a place to hide, say, perhaps, a UN school—well, maybe that’s a bad choice. Others may simply stay in their homes and wait to die.</p>
<p>For the invading Zionist forces, they are insured of plenty of munitions both during and after any ceasefire—because the Obama Administration is supporting Israel’s aggression in the Gaza Strip, and it is doing so, in part, by allowing it to tap into local US arms stockpiles. The Israelis will be able to resupply themselves with 40mm grenades and 120mm mortar rounds, stocks that the Pentagon claims “need to be refreshed,” this according to Rear Admiral John Kirby, the Pentagon’s press secretary, who rejected out of hand this week’s Amnesty International demand that “the US government immediately end its ongoing arms deliveries to Israel, which are providing the tools to commit further serious violations of international law in Gaza.” And not only that. Earlier, the US Senate, by a vote of 100 to 0, passed a resolution drafted by AIPAC expressing support for Israel’s attack on Gaza, a resolution reading in part, “The United States Senate reaffirms American support for Israel’s right to defend its citizens and ensure the survival of the State of Israel”—and which says not a single word about Palestinian deaths.</p>
<p>Additionally, US politicians are working to provide millions of dollars in supplementary funding for Israel’s “Iron Dome” missile shield. The US Senate Appropriations Committee added $225 million for Iron Dome to a spending bill mainly intended to provide money to handle an influx of thousands of Central American children across the US-Mexico border.</p>
<p>“It is not that Iron Dome is all that effective, it fails 75% of the time,” said one Congressional staffer in an email to this observer earlier this week. “But Congress is under pressure to be seen as supporting Israel, and we’ve got to be seen doing something before we adjourn for five weeks.”</p>
<p>And likewise, as a sop to AIPAC, the White House announced on July 31 that it “strongly opposes” a Republican-crafted emergency spending bill, in part because it contains no funds for Israeli missile defense and other presumed necessities. Earlier in the day the Senate had begun debating a $3.5 billion auxiliary spending measure that included the $225 million in additional funding for Iron Dome when suddenly the White House voiced its opposition to the House version, claiming it “does not include funding for the Department of Defense to support the government of Israel’s request for critical defense needs.”</p>
<p>It was also on July 31, that Brian Wood, Head of Arms Control and Human Rights at Amnesty International, reminded Mr. Kirby, the illustrious rear admiral, of an unpleasant truth, one that doesn’t normally penetrate Washington’s deaf-dumb-and-blind bubble: “It is deeply cynical for the White House to condemn the deaths and injuries of Palestinians, including children, and humanitarian workers, when it knows full well that the Israeli military responsible for such attacks are armed to the teeth with weapons and equipment bankrolled by US taxpayers.”</p>
<p>But despite all the American government’s massive support for Israel, survival of the apartheid regime is not at all assured. Recently expressed antipathy toward the Zionist state from notables in Europe, South America and parts of Asia seems to be considerably more than just bluster. Israelis are correct in thinking they can no longer count on public opinion, not in Europe or even, to a lesser extent, perhaps, from the American public either. Increasingly the latter are pressuring their Zionist-bought politicians, admittedly on a modest scale still at this point, but in a manner causing them to ponder their electability as Israel continues its descent into a pariah state. A recent Gallup poll found a majority of Americans less than 30 years of age believe Israel’s actions in Gaza to be unjustified and criminal. This is because younger Americans have grown up witnessing a US-armed-and- propped-up Israel brutally occupying the West Bank, killing Palestinians, while also invading Lebanon in numerous, periodic attacks that claimed more than 30,000 lives between 1948 and 2006.</p>
<p>In aggregate, Americans still see Israel favorably…but in smaller numbers, while more are viewing it as illegitimate, as a 19th century colonial enterprise with no legitimate place in a civilized international society. “Delegitimisation,” says Einat Wilf, a former Israeli parliamentarian and one of the authors of an as-yet-unpublished study of the topic at the Jewish People Policy Institute (JPPI) in Jerusalem, is becoming “a strategic threat”.</p>
<p>As Robert Fisk pointed out this week, “Gaza, which is being so graphically covered by journalists that our masters and our media are suffering a new experience: not fear of being called anti-Semitic, but fear of their own television viewers and readers – ordinary folk so outraged by the war crimes committed against the women and children of Gaza that they are demanding to know why, even now, television moguls and politicians are refusing to treat their own people like moral, decent, intelligent human beings.”</p>
<p>From Antwerp to Warsaw, demonstrators’ placards have ranged from criticism of Israeli policy (“1,2,3,4, Occupation No More”) to condemning Israel itself (“5,6,7,8, Israel is a Terror State”). A growing percentage of the world’s population is coming to the conclusion that the regime occupying Palestine is a mistake and that history must be corrected. As The Economist recently reported, France is experiencing major unrest, which may be no surprise given that it claims the largest Jewish and Arab populations in Europe, but the extent of the tensions in France, including attacks on synagogues and raids on Jewish shops, has been shocking nonetheless. Even in normally sedate Oslo, the Jewish museum closed its doors.</p>
<p>Frankly, it comes as no great surprise then that many Jews feel that the world is against them, and view criticism of Zionist apartheid Israel as a mask for animosity towards Jews. In this they are very wrong. Let them visit the Middle East, in peace, and they will learn quickly that the rejection here is not at all about Jews, but only about Zionism as a fascist, racist creed. What people of good will reject, in the Middle East as elsewhere, is an antiquated movement that promotes a chosen people’s right to steal land belonging to others while ethnically cleansing an indigenous population; a movement that encourages chants of “Death to Arabs” among school children, whose settlers organize ‘fun-days,’ gathering as spectators to observe Zionist forces slaughtering Arab children in Gaza, as teachers hand out balloons and ice cream while leading the children in hate filled songs.</p>
<p>International public opinion matters. And much of it relating to the carnage being inflicted by those illegally occupying Palestine is right. The international public is increasingly aware that what is happening in Palestine today is not really about Hamas; it is not about rockets; it is not about “human shields” or terrorism or tunnels. It is about Israel’s permanent control over Palestinian land and Palestinian lives. It is about an unswerving, decades-long Israeli policy of denying Palestine self-determination, freedom, and sovereignty.</p>
<p>Having created a huge open-air prison in Gaza, PM Netanyahu now claims that Israel cannot relinquish security control of the West Bank for fear of Islamist attack—meaning that the Zionist occupiers intend to consolidate their illegal occupation, thus withdrawing all hope from Palestinians.</p>
<p>This region, and increasingly the global community as a whole, is planning for a post-Zionist Middle East and how best to achieve it without further suffering. The Zionist regime can stop the slaughter in Gaza; it can withdraw from Palestinian lands through agreement with international norms and UN resolutions, or, sooner or later, it will very likely cease to exist.</p> | false | 1 | shatila camp beirut160 72hour ceasefire supposed get way august 1 starting 8 local timebut sooner begun appeared collapse according gaza health ministry 30 palestinians killed dozens injured israeli attack near southern town rafah odds genuine ceasefire actually take place pause would allow time sides fighters regroup rearm civilian population substantially destroyed gaza presumably many try visit bombed homes retrieve belongings seen syria iraq many try finding place hide say perhaps un schoolwell maybe thats bad choice others may simply stay homes wait die invading zionist forces insured plenty munitions ceasefirebecause obama administration supporting israels aggression gaza strip part allowing tap local us arms stockpiles israelis able resupply 40mm grenades 120mm mortar rounds stocks pentagon claims need refreshed according rear admiral john kirby pentagons press secretary rejected hand weeks amnesty international demand us government immediately end ongoing arms deliveries israel providing tools commit serious violations international law gaza earlier us senate vote 100 0 passed resolution drafted aipac expressing support israels attack gaza resolution reading part united states senate reaffirms american support israels right defend citizens ensure survival state israeland says single word palestinian deaths additionally us politicians working provide millions dollars supplementary funding israels iron dome missile shield us senate appropriations committee added 225 million iron dome spending bill mainly intended provide money handle influx thousands central american children across usmexico border iron dome effective fails 75 time said one congressional staffer email observer earlier week congress pressure seen supporting israel weve got seen something adjourn five weeks likewise sop aipac white house announced july 31 strongly opposes republicancrafted emergency spending bill part contains funds israeli missile defense presumed necessities earlier day senate begun debating 35 billion auxiliary spending measure included 225 million additional funding iron dome suddenly white house voiced opposition house version claiming include funding department defense support government israels request critical defense needs also july 31 brian wood head arms control human rights amnesty international reminded mr kirby illustrious rear admiral unpleasant truth one doesnt normally penetrate washingtons deafdumbandblind bubble deeply cynical white house condemn deaths injuries palestinians including children humanitarian workers knows full well israeli military responsible attacks armed teeth weapons equipment bankrolled us taxpayers despite american governments massive support israel survival apartheid regime assured recently expressed antipathy toward zionist state notables europe south america parts asia seems considerably bluster israelis correct thinking longer count public opinion europe even lesser extent perhaps american public either increasingly latter pressuring zionistbought politicians admittedly modest scale still point manner causing ponder electability israel continues descent pariah state recent gallup poll found majority americans less 30 years age believe israels actions gaza unjustified criminal younger americans grown witnessing usarmedand proppedup israel brutally occupying west bank killing palestinians also invading lebanon numerous periodic attacks claimed 30000 lives 1948 2006 aggregate americans still see israel favorablybut smaller numbers viewing illegitimate 19th century colonial enterprise legitimate place civilized international society delegitimisation says einat wilf former israeli parliamentarian one authors asyetunpublished study topic jewish people policy institute jppi jerusalem becoming strategic threat robert fisk pointed week gaza graphically covered journalists masters media suffering new experience fear called antisemitic fear television viewers readers ordinary folk outraged war crimes committed women children gaza demanding know even television moguls politicians refusing treat people like moral decent intelligent human beings antwerp warsaw demonstrators placards ranged criticism israeli policy 1234 occupation condemning israel 5678 israel terror state growing percentage worlds population coming conclusion regime occupying palestine mistake history must corrected economist recently reported france experiencing major unrest may surprise given claims largest jewish arab populations europe extent tensions france including attacks synagogues raids jewish shops shocking nonetheless even normally sedate oslo jewish museum closed doors frankly comes great surprise many jews feel world view criticism zionist apartheid israel mask animosity towards jews wrong let visit middle east peace learn quickly rejection jews zionism fascist racist creed people good reject middle east elsewhere antiquated movement promotes chosen peoples right steal land belonging others ethnically cleansing indigenous population movement encourages chants death arabs among school children whose settlers organize fundays gathering spectators observe zionist forces slaughtering arab children gaza teachers hand balloons ice cream leading children hate filled songs international public opinion matters much relating carnage inflicted illegally occupying palestine right international public increasingly aware happening palestine today really hamas rockets human shields terrorism tunnels israels permanent control palestinian land palestinian lives unswerving decadeslong israeli policy denying palestine selfdetermination freedom sovereignty created huge openair prison gaza pm netanyahu claims israel relinquish security control west bank fear islamist attackmeaning zionist occupiers intend consolidate illegal occupation thus withdrawing hope palestinians region increasingly global community whole planning postzionist middle east best achieve without suffering zionist regime stop slaughter gaza withdraw palestinian lands agreement international norms un resolutions sooner later likely cease exist | 788 |
<p>With a high-profile, bipartisan proposal for “premium support” on the table for discussion, this year will likely be marked by as much intense debate about Medicare as was 2011.</p>
<p>In April 2011, House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI) released a budget plan that would have put the nation’s fiscal house in order by imposing spending discipline in every corner of the federal budget. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#1b" type="external">[1]</a>&#160;Importantly, the Ryan budget plan, which passed the House but not the Senate, included significant entitlement reforms. For Medicare, the plan called for converting the program for future program entrants (those under the age of 55) into a premium support model. In a premium support program, the government would move away from running a health plan and instead provide fixed levels of support for insurance plans selected by the beneficiaries themselves.</p>
<p>Even though premium support has enjoyed a long history of bipartisan support, President Barack Obama immediately attacked the Ryan proposal in a highly publicized speech, setting the stage for an intense, months-long debate over how best to ensure that Medicare will be solvent and stable for future generations. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#2b" type="external">[2]</a>&#160;The debate gained new life in December when Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) joined with Ryan in offering an updated version of premium support for discussion and debate in 2012. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#3b" type="external">[3]</a></p>
<p>Flawed Arguments</p>
<p>Regrettably, not all of the debate over premium support has been edifying. Indeed, opponents of premium support have used many seriously flawed and biased arguments. The following are the five arguments most commonly cited by premium support opponents and the reasons why these arguments are seriously flawed and provide no real basis for opposing a premium support plan.</p>
<p>Flawed Argument #1: Premium support would simply shift costs to the beneficiaries.</p>
<p>Opponents have repeatedly suggested that moving to premium support would achieve budgetary savings only by shifting massive costs onto the beneficiaries. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#4b" type="external">[4]</a>&#160;To support their argument, they cite a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) analysis of the Ryan proposal in which the CBO estimated that beneficiaries would pay $6,400 more in premiums under premium support than under the current Medicare program. However, this analysis relies on two highly implausible assumptions. First, it assumes that the deep payment rate reductions imposed under Obamacare are sustainable. That is evident from the CBO’s assumption that, because of government-imposed price controls, current Medicare could provide the standard package of health coverage in 2022 for just 72 percent of what it would cost a private plan to provide the same coverage.</p>
<p>Yet this massive gap will exist only if the price controls are sustainable, which they clearly are not. The chief actuary for Medicare has repeatedly warned Congress since Obamacare was enacted that the steep payment rate reductions imposed by that law will drive providers out of the Medicare program and thus severely restrict access to care for seniors. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#5b" type="external">[5]</a>&#160;That is not a basis for reliably controlling costs.</p>
<p>The second implausible assumption is that competition in Medicare will not affect the efficiency or cost of the options offered to Medicare participants. The whole point of premium support is to build a functioning marketplace in which plans must compete for the business of cost-conscious consumers. Ryan and other proponents of premium support rightly believe that this is the key to genuine “delivery-system reform,” which will incentivize service providers to find new, better, more efficient, and less costly ways of providing needed services. The CBO’s assessment assumes nothing will change, which is simply not credible.</p>
<p>Flawed Argument #2: Government-run Medicare is more efficient than private plans.</p>
<p>Opponents of premium support frequently assert that private plans have long been more costly than traditional Medicare. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#6b" type="external">[6]</a>&#160;Indeed, this assertion has been repeated so often that it has become part of the conventional wisdom. The only problem is that it is false.</p>
<p>According to data provided by the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission, on an apples-to-apples basis, the private plans serving Medicare patients provide Medicare-covered benefits for exactly the same cost as the traditional program. Moreover, the HMOs participating in Medicare Advantage (MA), which have by far the highest MA enrollment, provide Medicare benefits for 97 percent of the cost of the traditional program. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#7b" type="external">[7]</a></p>
<p>Furthermore, the MA plans accomplish this despite the huge advantages enjoyed by the traditional fee-for-service (FFS) program. Under the FFS program, the government can essentially dictate the prices it will pay for services through the regulated payment systems that apply to all hospitals, doctors, clinics, labs, and other providers. In contrast, Medicare Advantage plans must negotiate contracts with those same providers to ensure access to care for their enrollees. The result is that the FFS program shifts huge costs onto the private plans to the detriment of a fully functioning health care marketplace.</p>
<p>Flawed Argument #3: Medicare spending has grown more slowly than private health care spending.</p>
<p>Opponents also argue that Medicare costs have grown more slowly than private plan costs over the years because of Medicare’s strong cost control mechanisms. This is also false. First, the studies that allegedly show that Medicare controls costs better than private plans fail to control for changes in coverage. Since the early 1970s, Medicare’s statutorily required benefit package has not kept up with changes in medical practice. In contrast, private plans cover many more services and products today than they did 40 years ago. When the changes in coverage by private plans are taken into account, private plans have performed better on cost than traditional Medicare. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#8b" type="external">[8]</a></p>
<p>Further, characterizing Medicare practices as “cost control” is misleading. By fiat, Medicare imposes archaic, outdated, and completely arbitrary fee schedules on service providers. These regulated payment systems shift costs onto other insurance plans and have done nothing to improve the efficiency of the health care sector.</p>
<p>Flawed Argument #4: Medicare’s drug benefit, the prototype for premium support, is not a success story.</p>
<p>For a long time, opponents of markets in health care argued that no evidence shows that competition controls cost growth. This was before Congress enacted the Medicare drug benefit (Medicare Part D), which is designed as a premium support program for prescription drug coverage. At the time of enactment, opponents said it would never work. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#9b" type="external">[9]</a>&#160;Some said it would fail because private plans would decline to participate without a guaranteed share of the market. Others said the beneficiaries would not sign up for the voluntary benefit because the competitive structure would be too complex to navigate. Still others said that program costs would explode without government-imposed price controls.</p>
<p>All these predictions were dead wrong. The program has achieved widespread coverage, scores of plans participate and compete against each other, and costs have grown at a very moderate pace.</p>
<p>Opponents have since resorted to trying to discredit the clear evidence that the competitive design of the drug benefit has worked incredibly well. Their arguments still do not hold water.</p>
<p>For instance, some have suggested that the moderate rise in drug costs in Medicare is unrelated to the benefit’s design, but simply a reflection of moderating spending gr owth systemwide. While cost growth has moderated across the board for prescription drugs, the slowdown has been more pronounced in Medicare. Today, the actuaries at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services project that Medicare prescription drug spending over the first decade of the program will come in about 40 percent below the projections at the time of enactment. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#10b" type="external">[10]</a>&#160;At the time of the drug benefit’s enactment, the actuaries issued projections of national health expenditures indicating that total retail spending on prescription drugs for the ensuing decade would reach about $3.5 trillion. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#11b" type="external">[11]</a>&#160;In early 2010, the actuaries released new projections for the same 10-year period and put total drug spending at about $2.4 trillion—31 percent below the previous projection. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#12b" type="external">[12]</a>&#160;Of course, these projections of total national spending on drugs also include prescription drug spending for the elderly. When the elderly, who account for about one-third of all spending, are removed from the estimate, the drop in projected spending for everyone else was less pronounced, only about 27 percent, well below the 40 percent reduction for the Medicare drug benefit.</p>
<p>Moreover, the real question is what precipitated the fall in projected systemwide spending. Obamacare apologists are constantly arguing that changes in Medicare have the potential to influence the entire health care market. If this is the case, Medicare Part D should also affect the entire market. For instance, Part D plans have aggressively pushed generic substitution as a way to lower premiums with considerable success. This trend among the elderly has also likely influenced how physicians and pharmacists behave with the rest of their patients.</p>
<p>Flawed Argument #5: The government can engineer “delivery system reform” more effectively than a functioning marketplace.</p>
<p>Opponents of premium support offer up improvements in a government-led “delivery system” as an alternative vision for cost control and Medicare reform. The idea is that the federal government, using the leverage that comes with Medicare program spending, is nimble enough to implement payment changes and other regulatory reforms that will lead to more productivity and efficiency in the health sector. Among the most prominently mentioned reforms are Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) and payments for full episodes of care that bundle reimbursements for the various providers of medical services into a single, larger payment.</p>
<p>Dr. Donald Berwick, former administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, is a leading proponent of this point of view. In a revealing interview after his departure from the CMS, he said:</p>
<p>I don’t think Medicare is broken. I don’t think Medicaid is broken. They’re very important social programs of good intent that are accomplishing largely what they intend to accomplish. Health care is broken. The delivery system isn’t working. That’s the problem.</p>
<p>We set up a delivery system which is fragmented, unsafe, not sufficiently patient-centered, full of waste, unreliable, despite…great efforts of the work force. We built it wrong. It isn’t built for modern times.</p>
<p>Medicare doesn’t need fixing. Health care needs fixing. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#13b" type="external">[13]</a></p>
<p>Regrettably, this perspective completely ignores the history of Medicare and the long and mostly futile history of federal efforts to control Medicare’s escalating costs.</p>
<p>Yes, health care delivery in the United States is too fragmented, uncoordinated, wasteful, and unresponsive to patient concerns and wishes. However, the primary cause of all of these problems isMedicare, especially Medicare’s dominant fee-for-service insurance model. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#14b" type="external">[14]</a>In Medicare FFS, service providers are paid for every procedure or test that they perform, regardless of whether it helps the patient. The government reimburses all claims submitted by a licensed provider, no questions asked.</p>
<p>In most markets, Medicare FFS is the largest purchaser of medical care. The entire delivery system has been built up around the program’s distorted incentives. Every type of provider has its own payment system. This fosters extreme fragmentation as every lab, clinic, physician’s office, and hospital can bill Medicare separately. Moreover, 90 percent of Medicare FFS enrollees have supplemental insurance that pays for all of the costs that Medicare does not cover. This means these beneficiaries pay nothing at the point of service and therefore have no incentive to limit the amount of care they receive, regardless of how questionable the potential benefits. Of course, those providing the services can increase their incomes from Medicare only by increasing the volume of services consumed by their Medicare patients. The result is a quite predictable and longstanding trend of rapidly increasing use of services.</p>
<p>The response of the political system to this inefficiency and high cost is counterproductive price controls. To meet budget targets, Congress and Medicare’s regulatory apparatus have reduced the amounts that the program pays for medical procedures. This kind of cost cutting makes no distinction based on the quality or efficiency of care provided. Rather, it is across-the-board, hitting good actors and bad alike. Some advocates of price controls say that the government is merely using its market leverage, but the truth is that private-insurance enrollees are paying hundreds of billions of dollars in higher premiums because the federal government forces doctors and hospitals to provide services to Medicare and Medicaid recipients at artificially low rates. This cost-shifting from public insurance to private insurance enrollees is far greater than the frequently lamented cost-shifting from the uninsured to the insured.</p>
<p>Dr. Berwick and his allies now downplay Medicare’s role in creating the current mess by arguing that future cost cutting will become more rational through such ideas as Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs), which are essentially government-organized HMOs. This is just more wishful thinking. For ACOs or any other model to work, the government must build a high-quality, low-cost network of providers—something the federal government has demonstrated absolutely no capacity for doing in 30 years of trying. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#15b" type="external">[15]</a></p>
<p>Conclusion</p>
<p>The arguments used by opponents of premium support are weak and flawed. This might explain why The New York Times recently endorsed the concept of premium support as worth pursuing in an editorial that otherwise rehashed many of the same flawed arguments put forth by opponents. It is no small matter when The New York Times editorial page, which is not known for being friendly to market-based approaches to health reform, nods in the direction of market-based reform for Medicare:</p>
<p>The best proposal for premium support is one that gives beneficiaries choice while protecting them from any added costs if competition does not keep prices down. Enrollees would be given a set amount of money to buy a plan comparable to what Medicare now provides. If they chose a plan that cost less, they could pocket the difference. If they wanted better benefits, they would have to pay the added premium themselves. But if market competition failed to restrain costs, the federal government would increase the support given. <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#16b" type="external">[16]</a></p>
<p>The editorial went on to suggest that the primary advocates of premium support do not support the version that the editorial page could support, thus implying that premium support stands no chance of being adopted any time soon. Yet this is not true. The premium support p lan advanced by the Debt Reduction Task Force of the Bipartisan Policy Center, <a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#17b" type="external">[17]</a>&#160;led by former Senator Pete Domenici (R-NM) and former Clinton Administration Budget Director Alice Rivlin, is very similar to the plan The New York Times suggests, as is the Wyden-Ryan plan, which was introduced after the editorial was published.</p>
<p>When The New York Times and Representative Ryan are calling for essentially the same type of reform, political momentum is clearly building for the change. This is very good news for those who are counting on Medicare to be there for them in the coming years and decades.</p>
<p>James C. Capretta is a fellow at the <a href="" type="internal">Ethics and Public Policy Center</a>&#160;and project director of e21’s <a href="http://www.obamacarewatch.org/" type="external">ObamaCare Watch</a>. He was an associate director at the Office of Management and Budget from 2001 to 2004.</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>__________________________________________________________________________</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#1" type="external">[1]</a>&#160;See Committee on the Budget, U.S. House of Representatives, “Path to Prosperity: Restoring America’s Promise,” April 2011, at <a href="http://budget.house.gov/UploadedFiles/PathToProsperityFY2012.pdf" type="external">http://budget.house.gov/UploadedFiles/PathToProsperityFY2012.pdf</a>&#160;(January 19, 2012).</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#2" type="external">[2]</a>&#160;Barack Obama, “Remarks by the President on Fiscal Policy,” The White House, April 13, 2011, at <a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/04/13/remarks-president-fiscal-policy" type="external">http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/04/13/remarks-president-fiscal-policy</a>&#160;(January 19, 2012).</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#3" type="external">[3]</a>&#160;Ron Wyden and Paul Ryan, “Guaranteed Choices to Strengthen Medicare and Health Security for All: Bipartisan Options for the Future,” December 2011, at <a href="http://budget.house.gov/UploadedFiles/WydenRyan.pdf" type="external">http://budget.house.gov/UploadedFiles/WydenRyan.pdf</a>&#160;(January 19, 2012).</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#4" type="external">[4]</a>&#160;See Ezekiel J. Emanuel, “For Medicare, We Must Cut Costs, Not Shift Them,”The New York Times, December 19, 2011, at <a href="http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/19/for-medicare-we-must-cut-costs-not-shift-them/" type="external">http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/19/for-medicare-we-must-cut-costs-not-shift-them/</a>&#160;(January 19, 2012).</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#5" type="external">[5]</a>&#160;See John D. Shatto and M. Kent Clemens, “Projected Medicare Expenditures Under an Illustrative Scenario with Alternative Payment Updates to Medicare Providers,” Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Office of the Actuary, August 5, 2010, at <a href="https://www.cms.gov/ReportsTrustFunds/downloads/2010TRAlternativeScenario.pdf" type="external">https://www.cms.gov/ReportsTrustFunds/downloads/2010TRAlternativeScenario.pdf</a>&#160;(January 19, 2012).</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#6" type="external">[6]</a>&#160;See editorial, “What About Premium Support?” The New York Times, December 3, 2011, at <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/04/opinion/sunday/what-about-premium-support.html" type="external">http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/04/opinion/sunday/what-about-premium-support.html</a>&#160;(January 19, 2012).</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#7" type="external">[7]</a>&#160;See Medicare Payment Advisory Commission, Health Care Spending and the Medicare Program: A Data Book, June 2011, p. 150, at <a href="http://www.medpac.gov/documents/Jun11DataBookEntireReport.pdf" type="external">http://www.medpac.gov/documents/Jun11DataBookEntireReport.pdf</a>&#160;(January 19, 2012).</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#8" type="external">[8]</a>&#160;SeeThe 2003 Joint Economic Report, S. Rep. 108-206, 108th Cong., 1st Sess., pp. 103-113, at <a href="http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CRPT-108srpt206/pdf/CRPT-108srpt206.pdf" type="external">http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CRPT-108srpt206/pdf/CRPT-108srpt206.pdf</a>&#160;(January 19, 2012).</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#9" type="external">[9]</a>&#160;See Ezra Klein, “Does Medicare Part D Make the Case for Paul Ryan’s Plan?”The Washington Post, June 8, 2011, at <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/does-medicart-part-d-make-the-case-for-paul-ryans-plan/2011/05/19/AGfPbyLH_blog.html" type="external">http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/does-medicart-part-d-make-the-case-for-paul-ryans-plan/2011/05/19/AGfPbyLH_blog.html</a>&#160;(January 19, 2012). The Heritage Foundation and other conservative institutions and analysts opposed drug benefit on other grounds, mainly because the benefit was universal and unpaid for.</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#10" type="external">[10]</a>&#160;Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Office of the Actuary, “Comparison of the Office of the Actuary’s Original Title I MMA Estimates to Those Underlying the CY 2011 Trustees Report,” 2011.</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#11" type="external">[11]</a>&#160;Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Office of the Actuary, “National Health Expenditures Projections: 2003-2013,” February 2004, at <a href="http://www.cms.gov/NationalHealthExpendData/downloads/nheprojections2003-2013.pdf" type="external">http://www.cms.gov/NationalHealthExpendData/downloads/nheprojections2003-2013.pdf</a>&#160;(January 19, 2012).</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#12" type="external">[12]</a>&#160;Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Office of the Actuary, “National Health Expenditures Projections 2009-2019,” January 2010, at <a href="http://www.cms.gov/NationalHealthExpendData/downloads/proj2009.pdf" type="external">http://www.cms.gov/NationalHealthExpendData/downloads/proj2009.pdf</a> (January 19, 2012).</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#13" type="external">[13]</a>&#160;Kaiser Health News, “Transcript: Donald Berwick on Medicare, Medicaid, ‘Rationing’ and Who Decides,” December 12, 2011, at <a href="http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/Stories/2011/December/12/transcript-donald-berwick-interview.aspx" type="external">http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/Stories/2011/December/12/transcript-donald-berwick-interview.aspx</a>&#160;(January 19, 2012).</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#14" type="external">[14]</a>&#160;Amy Finkelstein, “The Aggregate Effects of Health Insurance: Evidence from the Introduction of Medicare,” April 2006, at <a href="http://econ-www.mit.edu/files/788" type="external">http://econ-www.mit.edu/files/788</a>&#160;(January 19, 2012).</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#15" type="external">[15]</a>&#160;Congressional Budget Office, “Lessons from Medicare’s Demonstration Projects on Disease Management, Care Coordination, and Value-Based Payment,”Issue Brief, January 2012, at <a href="http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/126xx/doc12663/01-18-12-MedicareDemoBrief.pdf" type="external">http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/126xx/doc12663/01-18-12-MedicareDemoBrief.pdf</a>&#160;(January 24, 2012).</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#16" type="external">[16]</a>&#160;See editorial, “What About Premium Support?”</p>
<p><a type="external" href="" /> <a href="#17" type="external">[17]</a>&#160;See Pete Domenici and Alice Rivlin, “The Domenici-Rivlin Premium Support Plan,” in Premium Support: A Primer, The Brookings Institution, December 2011, pp. 24-30, at <a href="http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Files/rc/papers/2011/1216_premium_support_primer/1216_premium_support_primer.pdf" type="external">http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Files/rc/papers/2011/1216_premium_support_primer/1216_premium_support_primer.pdf</a>&#160;(January 19, 2012).</p> | false | 1 | highprofile bipartisan proposal premium support table discussion year likely marked much intense debate medicare 2011 april 2011 house budget committee chairman paul ryan rwi released budget plan would put nations fiscal house order imposing spending discipline every corner federal budget 1160importantly ryan budget plan passed house senate included significant entitlement reforms medicare plan called converting program future program entrants age 55 premium support model premium support program government would move away running health plan instead provide fixed levels support insurance plans selected beneficiaries even though premium support enjoyed long history bipartisan support president barack obama immediately attacked ryan proposal highly publicized speech setting stage intense monthslong debate best ensure medicare solvent stable future generations 2160the debate gained new life december senator ron wyden dor joined ryan offering updated version premium support discussion debate 2012 3 flawed arguments regrettably debate premium support edifying indeed opponents premium support used many seriously flawed biased arguments following five arguments commonly cited premium support opponents reasons arguments seriously flawed provide real basis opposing premium support plan flawed argument 1 premium support would simply shift costs beneficiaries opponents repeatedly suggested moving premium support would achieve budgetary savings shifting massive costs onto beneficiaries 4160to support argument cite congressional budget office cbo analysis ryan proposal cbo estimated beneficiaries would pay 6400 premiums premium support current medicare program however analysis relies two highly implausible assumptions first assumes deep payment rate reductions imposed obamacare sustainable evident cbos assumption governmentimposed price controls current medicare could provide standard package health coverage 2022 72 percent would cost private plan provide coverage yet massive gap exist price controls sustainable clearly chief actuary medicare repeatedly warned congress since obamacare enacted steep payment rate reductions imposed law drive providers medicare program thus severely restrict access care seniors 5160that basis reliably controlling costs second implausible assumption competition medicare affect efficiency cost options offered medicare participants whole point premium support build functioning marketplace plans must compete business costconscious consumers ryan proponents premium support rightly believe key genuine deliverysystem reform incentivize service providers find new better efficient less costly ways providing needed services cbos assessment assumes nothing change simply credible flawed argument 2 governmentrun medicare efficient private plans opponents premium support frequently assert private plans long costly traditional medicare 6160indeed assertion repeated often become part conventional wisdom problem false according data provided medicare payment advisory commission applestoapples basis private plans serving medicare patients provide medicarecovered benefits exactly cost traditional program moreover hmos participating medicare advantage far highest enrollment provide medicare benefits 97 percent cost traditional program 7 furthermore plans accomplish despite huge advantages enjoyed traditional feeforservice ffs program ffs program government essentially dictate prices pay services regulated payment systems apply hospitals doctors clinics labs providers contrast medicare advantage plans must negotiate contracts providers ensure access care enrollees result ffs program shifts huge costs onto private plans detriment fully functioning health care marketplace flawed argument 3 medicare spending grown slowly private health care spending opponents also argue medicare costs grown slowly private plan costs years medicares strong cost control mechanisms also false first studies allegedly show medicare controls costs better private plans fail control changes coverage since early 1970s medicares statutorily required benefit package kept changes medical practice contrast private plans cover many services products today 40 years ago changes coverage private plans taken account private plans performed better cost traditional medicare 8 characterizing medicare practices cost control misleading fiat medicare imposes archaic outdated completely arbitrary fee schedules service providers regulated payment systems shift costs onto insurance plans done nothing improve efficiency health care sector flawed argument 4 medicares drug benefit prototype premium support success story long time opponents markets health care argued evidence shows competition controls cost growth congress enacted medicare drug benefit medicare part designed premium support program prescription drug coverage time enactment opponents said would never work 9160some said would fail private plans would decline participate without guaranteed share market others said beneficiaries would sign voluntary benefit competitive structure would complex navigate still others said program costs would explode without governmentimposed price controls predictions dead wrong program achieved widespread coverage scores plans participate compete costs grown moderate pace opponents since resorted trying discredit clear evidence competitive design drug benefit worked incredibly well arguments still hold water instance suggested moderate rise drug costs medicare unrelated benefits design simply reflection moderating spending gr owth systemwide cost growth moderated across board prescription drugs slowdown pronounced medicare today actuaries centers medicare medicaid services project medicare prescription drug spending first decade program come 40 percent projections time enactment 10160at time drug benefits enactment actuaries issued projections national health expenditures indicating total retail spending prescription drugs ensuing decade would reach 35 trillion 11160in early 2010 actuaries released new projections 10year period put total drug spending 24 trillion31 percent previous projection 12160of course projections total national spending drugs also include prescription drug spending elderly elderly account onethird spending removed estimate drop projected spending everyone else less pronounced 27 percent well 40 percent reduction medicare drug benefit moreover real question precipitated fall projected systemwide spending obamacare apologists constantly arguing changes medicare potential influence entire health care market case medicare part also affect entire market instance part plans aggressively pushed generic substitution way lower premiums considerable success trend among elderly also likely influenced physicians pharmacists behave rest patients flawed argument 5 government engineer delivery system reform effectively functioning marketplace opponents premium support offer improvements governmentled delivery system alternative vision cost control medicare reform idea federal government using leverage comes medicare program spending nimble enough implement payment changes regulatory reforms lead productivity efficiency health sector among prominently mentioned reforms accountable care organizations acos payments full episodes care bundle reimbursements various providers medical services single larger payment dr donald berwick former administrator centers medicare medicaid services leading proponent point view revealing interview departure cms said dont think medicare broken dont think medicaid broken theyre important social programs good intent accomplishing largely intend accomplish health care broken delivery system isnt working thats problem set delivery system fragmented unsafe sufficiently patientcentered full waste unreliable despitegreat efforts work force built wrong isnt built modern times medicare doesnt need fixing health care needs fixing 13 regrettably perspective completely ignores history medicare long mostly futile history federal efforts control medicares escalating costs yes health care delivery united states fragmented uncoordinated wasteful unresponsive patient concerns wishes however primary cause problems ismedicare especially medicares dominant feeforservice insurance model 14in medicare ffs service providers paid every procedure test perform regardless whether helps patient government reimburses claims submitted licensed provider questions asked markets medicare ffs largest purchaser medical care entire delivery system built around programs distorted incentives every type provider payment system fosters extreme fragmentation every lab clinic physicians office hospital bill medicare separately moreover 90 percent medicare ffs enrollees supplemental insurance pays costs medicare cover means beneficiaries pay nothing point service therefore incentive limit amount care receive regardless questionable potential benefits course providing services increase incomes medicare increasing volume services consumed medicare patients result quite predictable longstanding trend rapidly increasing use services response political system inefficiency high cost counterproductive price controls meet budget targets congress medicares regulatory apparatus reduced amounts program pays medical procedures kind cost cutting makes distinction based quality efficiency care provided rather acrosstheboard hitting good actors bad alike advocates price controls say government merely using market leverage truth privateinsurance enrollees paying hundreds billions dollars higher premiums federal government forces doctors hospitals provide services medicare medicaid recipients artificially low rates costshifting public insurance private insurance enrollees far greater frequently lamented costshifting uninsured insured dr berwick allies downplay medicares role creating current mess arguing future cost cutting become rational ideas accountable care organizations acos essentially governmentorganized hmos wishful thinking acos model work government must build highquality lowcost network providerssomething federal government demonstrated absolutely capacity 30 years trying 15 conclusion arguments used opponents premium support weak flawed might explain new york times recently endorsed concept premium support worth pursuing editorial otherwise rehashed many flawed arguments put forth opponents small matter new york times editorial page known friendly marketbased approaches health reform nods direction marketbased reform medicare best proposal premium support one gives beneficiaries choice protecting added costs competition keep prices enrollees would given set amount money buy plan comparable medicare provides chose plan cost less could pocket difference wanted better benefits would pay added premium market competition failed restrain costs federal government would increase support given 16 editorial went suggest primary advocates premium support support version editorial page could support thus implying premium support stands chance adopted time soon yet true premium support p lan advanced debt reduction task force bipartisan policy center 17160led former senator pete domenici rnm former clinton administration budget director alice rivlin similar plan new york times suggests wydenryan plan introduced editorial published new york times representative ryan calling essentially type reform political momentum clearly building change good news counting medicare coming years decades james c capretta fellow ethics public policy center160and project director e21s obamacare watch associate director office management budget 2001 2004 160 __________________________________________________________________________ 1160see committee budget us house representatives path prosperity restoring americas promise april 2011 httpbudgethousegovuploadedfilespathtoprosperityfy2012pdf160january 19 2012 2160barack obama remarks president fiscal policy white house april 13 2011 httpwwwwhitehousegovthepressoffice20110413remarkspresidentfiscalpolicy160january 19 2012 3160ron wyden paul ryan guaranteed choices strengthen medicare health security bipartisan options future december 2011 httpbudgethousegovuploadedfileswydenryanpdf160january 19 2012 4160see ezekiel j emanuel medicare must cut costs shift themthe new york times december 19 2011 httpopinionatorblogsnytimescom20111219formedicarewemustcutcostsnotshiftthem160january 19 2012 5160see john shatto kent clemens projected medicare expenditures illustrative scenario alternative payment updates medicare providers centers medicare medicaid services office actuary august 5 2010 httpswwwcmsgovreportstrustfundsdownloads2010tralternativescenariopdf160january 19 2012 6160see editorial premium support new york times december 3 2011 httpwwwnytimescom20111204opinionsundaywhataboutpremiumsupporthtml160january 19 2012 7160see medicare payment advisory commission health care spending medicare program data book june 2011 p 150 httpwwwmedpacgovdocumentsjun11databookentirereportpdf160january 19 2012 8160seethe 2003 joint economic report rep 108206 108th cong 1st sess pp 103113 httpwwwgpogovfdsyspkgcrpt108srpt206pdfcrpt108srpt206pdf160january 19 2012 9160see ezra klein medicare part make case paul ryans planthe washington post june 8 2011 httpwwwwashingtonpostcomblogsezrakleinpostdoesmedicartpartdmakethecaseforpaulryansplan20110519agfpbylh_bloghtml160january 19 2012 heritage foundation conservative institutions analysts opposed drug benefit grounds mainly benefit universal unpaid 10160centers medicare medicaid services office actuary comparison office actuarys original title mma estimates underlying cy 2011 trustees report 2011 11160centers medicare medicaid services office actuary national health expenditures projections 20032013 february 2004 httpwwwcmsgovnationalhealthexpenddatadownloadsnheprojections20032013pdf160january 19 2012 12160centers medicare medicaid services office actuary national health expenditures projections 20092019 january 2010 httpwwwcmsgovnationalhealthexpenddatadownloadsproj2009pdf january 19 2012 13160kaiser health news transcript donald berwick medicare medicaid rationing decides december 12 2011 httpwwwkaiserhealthnewsorgstories2011december12transcriptdonaldberwickinterviewaspx160january 19 2012 14160amy finkelstein aggregate effects health insurance evidence introduction medicare april 2006 httpeconwwwmitedufiles788160january 19 2012 15160congressional budget office lessons medicares demonstration projects disease management care coordination valuebased paymentissue brief january 2012 httpwwwcbogovftpdocs126xxdoc12663011812medicaredemobriefpdf160january 24 2012 16160see editorial premium support 17160see pete domenici alice rivlin domenicirivlin premium support plan premium support primer brookings institution december 2011 pp 2430 httpwwwbrookingsedumediafilesrcpapers20111216_premium_support_primer1216_premium_support_primerpdf160january 19 2012 | 1,783 |
<p>Just when you thought nothing new could be done with the undead, “The Cured” pulls off a fresh take on zombie terrain. Irish writer-director <a href="http://variety.com/t/david-freyne/" type="external">David Freyne</a>’s impressive first feature lends the dimension of political allegory that recently deceased subgenre king George Romero brought to his many “Dead” films, albeit in a somewhat subtler fashion. The result effectively plays more as serious drama than as horror thriller, despite key elements of the latter. With <a href="http://variety.com/t/ellen-page/" type="external">Ellen Page</a> offering an additional lure for stateside audiences, this imperfect but compelling work has strong prospects if it can avoid the often hazardous theatrical gap between art house and mainstream audiences.</p>
<p>Opening text informs us that the “Maze virus” began sweeping Europe some years before, inducing “violent psychosis” and cannibalistic hunger among its victims. A cure was found (apparently by Paula Malcolmson’s Dr. Joan Lyons), but one-quarter of those infected remain “Resistants,” immune to its effect. The luckier majority are haunted by undiluted memories of what they saw and did while animalistic savages — and many of those who survived uninfected cannot forgive them, no matter that the afflicted had no control over themselves. A first and second “wave” of such societal re-integrations apparently had disastrous consequences. Lyons and the government insist the cure has now been perfected. But a third wave of “the Cured” are being released to face public fear, prejudice and attacks.</p>
<p>Among them is young Senan ( <a href="http://variety.com/t/sam-keeley/" type="external">Sam Keeley</a>), whose nightmare-addled guilt is all the worse for the fact that he remembers killing and devouring his brother, Luke. He can’t bring himself to share the knowledge with the latter’s widow, Abbie (Page), an American journalist who’s stayed in Dublin to raise their child as Irish. (It’s also hinted that she may be stuck here due to strict U.S. contagion-prevention laws.) She’s invited Senan to stay with them both, to start his life afresh after four years in rabid hell.</p>
<p>That puts him in a better position than most of his kind, who for lack of any such offers, get housed in guarded dormitories vulnerable to angry picketers and potential vigilantes. Particularly resenting this lowly status is Conor (Tom Vaughan-Lawlor), a former barrister with political aspirations who’s been rejected by his upper-class family and can get no job higher than janitor. He has a friendship with Senan he’s unwilling to let go of — and it takes a while for Freyne’s script to reveal just how disturbingly deep their past association goes. In the present tense, Conor turns his discontent into a sort of extremist underground political movement, riling up the Cured to acts that seem designed simply to discourage their public abuse but take on increasingly terroristic characteristics.</p>
<p>With the morally conflicted Senan and investigating Abbie caught up against their will, Conor launches a full-on insurrection that brings the hitherto primarily broody (albeit with jolts of mostly flashback-enclosed violence) film to a harrowing action climax.</p>
<p>Freyne’s thoughtful script is least successful in charting Conor’s rise to a sort of cult demagoguery; it seems to happen too fast and against excessive military-police odds. (It’s also a bit troubling that the air of homoerotic menace infusing Senan and Conor’s scenes together lends the latter character a literally, lethally “predatory homosexual” tinge.) “The Cured” works as a political allegory one can interpret in many ways, as its conceptual outline can be read as commentary on any current worldwide debates about religion, race and immigration, not to mention Ireland’s own longtime Troubles.</p>
<p>But mostly it plays as a somber drama about grief, guilt and self-loathing, with both lead figures shell-shocked in their way. Page’s muted performance, so different from her concurrent Toronto one in “My Days of Mercy,” takes pains not to exude any “guest Hollywood star” quality. She’s very good while deferring primary focus to Keeley, whose sensitive presence must convey a lot of roiling emotion without much dialogue in a close-mouthed role. Both leads have excellent chemistry with Oscar Nolan, the child actor who plays nephew Cillian. Vaughan-Lawlor summons appropriate intensity in his more schematic part, while Malcolmson, Stuart Graham and others provide strong support turns.</p>
<p>A tone at once mournful and urgent is skillfully struck by Freyne as director, whose modestly scaled but astute assembly is highlighted by Piers McGrail’s grungy yet handsome location shooting and a solid score from Rory Friers and Naill Kennedy.</p>
<p>Reviewed at Toronto Film Festival (Special Presentation), Sept. 10, 2017. Running time: 95 MIN.</p>
<p>(Ireland-U.K.-France) A Board Scannan Na Heireann and Irish Film Board presentation in association with Broadcasting Association of Ireland, Northern Ireland Screen, Shinawil, Savage Prods. and Yellow Moon Prods. of a Tilted Pictures, BAC Films and Bounder &amp; Cad production. (Int’l sales: BAC, Paris.) Producers: Rachael O’Kane, Rory Dungan, Ellen Page. Executive producers: Aidan Elliott, Mark Huffam, Aaron Farrell, Kelly Bush Novak, Conor Barry, John Keville. Co-producers: Mathieu Robinet, David Grumbach.</p>
<p>Director, writer: David Freyne. Camera (color, widescreen, HD): Piers McGrail. Editor: Chris Gill. Music: Rory Friers, Naill Kennedy.</p>
<p>Sam Keely, Page, Tom Vaughan-Lawlor, Paula Malcomson, Stuart Graham, Oscar Nolan, David Herlihy, Peter Campion, Hilda Fay, Lesley Conroy, Natalia Kosfrzewa, Barry McGovern.</p> | false | 1 | thought nothing new could done undead cured pulls fresh take zombie terrain irish writerdirector david freynes impressive first feature lends dimension political allegory recently deceased subgenre king george romero brought many dead films albeit somewhat subtler fashion result effectively plays serious drama horror thriller despite key elements latter ellen page offering additional lure stateside audiences imperfect compelling work strong prospects avoid often hazardous theatrical gap art house mainstream audiences opening text informs us maze virus began sweeping europe years inducing violent psychosis cannibalistic hunger among victims cure found apparently paula malcolmsons dr joan lyons onequarter infected remain resistants immune effect luckier majority haunted undiluted memories saw animalistic savages many survived uninfected forgive matter afflicted control first second wave societal reintegrations apparently disastrous consequences lyons government insist cure perfected third wave cured released face public fear prejudice attacks among young senan sam keeley whose nightmareaddled guilt worse fact remembers killing devouring brother luke cant bring share knowledge latters widow abbie page american journalist whos stayed dublin raise child irish also hinted may stuck due strict us contagionprevention laws shes invited senan stay start life afresh four years rabid hell puts better position kind lack offers get housed guarded dormitories vulnerable angry picketers potential vigilantes particularly resenting lowly status conor tom vaughanlawlor former barrister political aspirations whos rejected upperclass family get job higher janitor friendship senan hes unwilling let go takes freynes script reveal disturbingly deep past association goes present tense conor turns discontent sort extremist underground political movement riling cured acts seem designed simply discourage public abuse take increasingly terroristic characteristics morally conflicted senan investigating abbie caught conor launches fullon insurrection brings hitherto primarily broody albeit jolts mostly flashbackenclosed violence film harrowing action climax freynes thoughtful script least successful charting conors rise sort cult demagoguery seems happen fast excessive militarypolice odds also bit troubling air homoerotic menace infusing senan conors scenes together lends latter character literally lethally predatory homosexual tinge cured works political allegory one interpret many ways conceptual outline read commentary current worldwide debates religion race immigration mention irelands longtime troubles mostly plays somber drama grief guilt selfloathing lead figures shellshocked way pages muted performance different concurrent toronto one days mercy takes pains exude guest hollywood star quality shes good deferring primary focus keeley whose sensitive presence must convey lot roiling emotion without much dialogue closemouthed role leads excellent chemistry oscar nolan child actor plays nephew cillian vaughanlawlor summons appropriate intensity schematic part malcolmson stuart graham others provide strong support turns tone mournful urgent skillfully struck freyne director whose modestly scaled astute assembly highlighted piers mcgrails grungy yet handsome location shooting solid score rory friers naill kennedy reviewed toronto film festival special presentation sept 10 2017 running time 95 min irelandukfrance board scannan na heireann irish film board presentation association broadcasting association ireland northern ireland screen shinawil savage prods yellow moon prods tilted pictures bac films bounder amp cad production intl sales bac paris producers rachael okane rory dungan ellen page executive producers aidan elliott mark huffam aaron farrell kelly bush novak conor barry john keville coproducers mathieu robinet david grumbach director writer david freyne camera color widescreen hd piers mcgrail editor chris gill music rory friers naill kennedy sam keely page tom vaughanlawlor paula malcomson stuart graham oscar nolan david herlihy peter campion hilda fay lesley conroy natalia kosfrzewa barry mcgovern | 552 |
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