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<p><a href="" type="internal">Download this paper (PDF)</a></p>
<p>India’s first domestically constructed nuclear submarine capable of firing ballistic missiles is about to be launched. INS Arihant is the first in its class with four more to follow shortly. It is part of a program to make India a major military power in a region that is fraught with potential crises.</p>
<p>India’s Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral Nirmal Verma, has declared that INS Arihant is now in its “last stage of testing,” and is elected to join the Indian navy “within the next 18 months.” “The advent of INS Arihant into the fleet will complete the crucial link in India’s nuclear triad—the ability to fire nuclear weapons from land, air and sea,” according to Indian news sources.[1] Indian’s defense research organization last month announced the development of the missiles that are likely to be carried by the Arihant:</p>
<p>The Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO) announced last month that it has successfully developed nuclear-tipped submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs). Long shrouded in secrecy, unlike surface-to-surface nuclear missiles like Agni, the SLBM was a closely-guarded secret while in development and was called the “Sagarika Project.” In all probability, the INS Arihant will take this missile on board. So far, countries like the US, Russia, France, China and the UK have the capability to launch a submarine-based ballistic missile.[2]</p>
<p>The SLBM (K-15) only has a range of 750-km. However the INS Arihant can also carry 3,500-km range K-4 missile.[3]</p>
<p>Indian’s conventional navy is, however, in a state of disrepair and obsolescence. The Indian navy has asked the Government whether it can construct submarines at a foreign shipyard;[4] that is, in Russia. Indo-Russian co-operation in defense development is of long duration.</p>
<p>In regard to the INS Arihant, Ranjit Pandit writes that Russia helped with the submarine’s secret nuclear reactor. The rector was “designed, fabricated and executed in India,” by Indian industry and under the direction of Indian scientists, the Chairman of India’s Atomic Energy Commission, Dr Anil Kakodkar, stated. Of the important Russian input, Dr Kakpdkar stated back in 2009:</p>
<p>I would also like to thank our Russian colleagues…. [T]hey have played a very important role as consultants, they have a lot of experience in this so their consultancy has been of great help so that I think we should acknowledge.[5]</p>
<p>However, Dr Kakodkar emphasized that the reactor was of Indian design.[6]</p>
<p>Despite drawbacks, India is pursuing a vigorous naval construction program to redress the obsolescence of much of its fleet. A Times of India report states:</p>
<p>With 46 warships and submarines being constructed, and another 49 in the pipeline under overall plans worth Rs 2.73 lakh crore, Admiral Verma said, “Today, I am confident we do not suffer asymmetries with anyone. We have the wherewithal to defend our maritime interests.”[7]</p>
<p>There is no doubt about the reason for India’s determination to add nuclear-armed submarines to their military: China, although India has been elusive when questioned on this.[8] After all, there is supposed to be a magical new entity called BRIC which places India and China together in alliance with Brazil and Russia, and is supposedly conjuring a grand new bloc between states that not only have nothing in common but which include historical enemies. However, it has been reported that India’s development of nuclear-armed submarines is aimed at Pakistan and China.</p>
<p>In connection with the vast current naval construction program and the INS Arihant, Admiral Verma has insisted that India will not deploy its naval forces in the South China Sea.[9] However, this does not accord with his franker statements in previous interviews. Suman Sharma reporting for The Sunday Guardian, wrote of this in 2011:</p>
<p>With an eye on the strategic South China Sea, the Indian Navy is preparing to base some of its important assets on the eastern seaboard at the Vishakhapatnam-based Eastern Naval Command. It has outlined massive expansion plans for the same.</p>
<p>After former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam officially endorsed India’s Look East policy in 2006, the Navy, which is considered the strategic force among the three armed forces, has been building a strong base on the eastern front.</p>
<p>The Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral Nirmal Verma, on the eve of Navy Day on 4 December, Sunday, outlined an ambitious expansion plan for the service, which is eyeing a greater role in the South China Sea. Militarily, India will have a greater footprint in the South China Sea. By 2027 the Indian Navy would have 500 aircraft, of all varieties, and 150 ships, in its inventory, with five ships every year being manufactured, after five years from now.</p>
<p>With Project Varsha underway, which is a special berthing base for India’s indigenous SSBN INS Arihant class nuclear-powered submarines, the Naval Chief, Admiral Nirmal Verma told The Sunday Guardian that the first indigenous aircraft carrier too would be based in the Eastern Command. Right now the Eastern Naval Command has 45 ships and six submarines.[10]</p>
<p>Lack of “Asia’s” Synergy</p>
<p>Unsurprisingly, Admrial Verma is emphasizing the need for peaceful solutions for the region. China has so far achieved its ends through diplomacy and economic relations, extending its influence while appearing to compromise. Meanwhile the regional powers talk peace but prepare for war. There are many unresolved territorial issues involving China. These include:</p>
<p>Russia’s dispute with China centered around the control of Zhenbao Island (Damansky in Russian) on the Usuri River and islands on the Amur and Argun rivers. These disputes led to shooting conflicts during the 1960s,[12] despite the friendship treaty and “fraternal relations” supposedly existing between the two major Communist powers. The compromise included Russia handing over half of Heixiazi Island (Bolshoy Ussurysky Island), at the confluence of the Amur and Ussurui rivers, to China in 2004.[13]</p>
<p>China has increasingly eased Russia out of Mongolia. In 2006, Russia and China offered to build railways, using different tracks running in opposite directions, running from the Tavan Tolgoi mine, one of the world’s largest unexploited coal deposits,[14] indicating the rivalry that continues between the two regardless of the smiles and handshakes, and use of terms such as “BRIC.” Border disputes between China and Khazakhstan from the Soviet era have been replaced by the two coming closer together, again with Russia being sidelined from this oil- and gas-rich state.[15] Russia’s traditional sphere of influence in Afghanistan was dislodged by an alliance between the USA and what are now referred by the neo-cons as “Islamists.” However, while Russia was eliminated, under the US occupation regime China has moved in to gain vast oil and gas concessions in northeast Afghanistan. Bhutan is regarded as a buffer between India and China and while aligned with India, diplomatic accord with China has not been extended, nor has a disputed 495 square km been resolved. [16]</p>
<p>What should be clear is that there is no “Rise of Asia,” despite the rhetoric from media and academe, and the friendly gestures among sundry states, because there is not, has never been, nor ever will be any such entity as “Asia” in a geopolitical, ethnographic, or any other significant sense that can define a power bloc. Despite whatever trade, diplomatic relations, and even some border concessions that might be gained, “Asia” faces a future that will become ever more uncertain in regard to conflict.[17] The “Asian Century” thesis revolves around the rise of China and India in conjunction, but the two remain in rivalry.[18]</p>
<p>What will emerge within “Asia” is the broadening or delineation of alliances that are based on geopolitics and realpolitik. The USA and China will both seek hegemonic status within Asia. Those states that reject Chinese or American hegemony will align in a Russo-Indic bloc. Russia’s role in Asia is already well established and historically contra that of China, even during the era where both were “Communist” states supposedly in accord.[19] The grinning façade of Chinese diplomacy will drop and the true character of the regime will again become evident, as it did during the 1960s with Russia, in 1979 with the Chinese invasion of Vietnam, and the war with India in 1962.</p>
<p />
<p /> | false | 1 | download paper pdf indias first domestically constructed nuclear submarine capable firing ballistic missiles launched ins arihant first class four follow shortly part program make india major military power region fraught potential crises indias chief naval staff admiral nirmal verma declared ins arihant last stage testing elected join indian navy within next 18 months advent ins arihant fleet complete crucial link indias nuclear triadthe ability fire nuclear weapons land air sea according indian news sources1 indians defense research organization last month announced development missiles likely carried arihant defense research development organization drdo announced last month successfully developed nucleartipped submarinelaunched ballistic missiles slbms long shrouded secrecy unlike surfacetosurface nuclear missiles like agni slbm closelyguarded secret development called sagarika project probability ins arihant take missile board far countries like us russia france china uk capability launch submarinebased ballistic missile2 slbm k15 range 750km however ins arihant also carry 3500km range k4 missile3 indians conventional navy however state disrepair obsolescence indian navy asked government whether construct submarines foreign shipyard4 russia indorussian cooperation defense development long duration regard ins arihant ranjit pandit writes russia helped submarines secret nuclear reactor rector designed fabricated executed india indian industry direction indian scientists chairman indias atomic energy commission dr anil kakodkar stated important russian input dr kakpdkar stated back 2009 would also like thank russian colleagues played important role consultants lot experience consultancy great help think acknowledge5 however dr kakodkar emphasized reactor indian design6 despite drawbacks india pursuing vigorous naval construction program redress obsolescence much fleet times india report states 46 warships submarines constructed another 49 pipeline overall plans worth rs 273 lakh crore admiral verma said today confident suffer asymmetries anyone wherewithal defend maritime interests7 doubt reason indias determination add nucleararmed submarines military china although india elusive questioned this8 supposed magical new entity called bric places india china together alliance brazil russia supposedly conjuring grand new bloc states nothing common include historical enemies however reported indias development nucleararmed submarines aimed pakistan china connection vast current naval construction program ins arihant admiral verma insisted india deploy naval forces south china sea9 however accord franker statements previous interviews suman sharma reporting sunday guardian wrote 2011 eye strategic south china sea indian navy preparing base important assets eastern seaboard vishakhapatnambased eastern naval command outlined massive expansion plans former president apj abdul kalam officially endorsed indias look east policy 2006 navy considered strategic force among three armed forces building strong base eastern front chief naval staff admiral nirmal verma eve navy day 4 december sunday outlined ambitious expansion plan service eyeing greater role south china sea militarily india greater footprint south china sea 2027 indian navy would 500 aircraft varieties 150 ships inventory five ships every year manufactured five years project varsha underway special berthing base indias indigenous ssbn ins arihant class nuclearpowered submarines naval chief admiral nirmal verma told sunday guardian first indigenous aircraft carrier would based eastern command right eastern naval command 45 ships six submarines10 lack asias synergy unsurprisingly admrial verma emphasizing need peaceful solutions region china far achieved ends diplomacy economic relations extending influence appearing compromise meanwhile regional powers talk peace prepare war many unresolved territorial issues involving china include russias dispute china centered around control zhenbao island damansky russian usuri river islands amur argun rivers disputes led shooting conflicts 1960s12 despite friendship treaty fraternal relations supposedly existing two major communist powers compromise included russia handing half heixiazi island bolshoy ussurysky island confluence amur ussurui rivers china 200413 china increasingly eased russia mongolia 2006 russia china offered build railways using different tracks running opposite directions running tavan tolgoi mine one worlds largest unexploited coal deposits14 indicating rivalry continues two regardless smiles handshakes use terms bric border disputes china khazakhstan soviet era replaced two coming closer together russia sidelined oil gasrich state15 russias traditional sphere influence afghanistan dislodged alliance usa referred neocons islamists however russia eliminated us occupation regime china moved gain vast oil gas concessions northeast afghanistan bhutan regarded buffer india china aligned india diplomatic accord china extended disputed 495 square km resolved 16 clear rise asia despite rhetoric media academe friendly gestures among sundry states never ever entity asia geopolitical ethnographic significant sense define power bloc despite whatever trade diplomatic relations even border concessions might gained asia faces future become ever uncertain regard conflict17 asian century thesis revolves around rise china india conjunction two remain rivalry18 emerge within asia broadening delineation alliances based geopolitics realpolitik usa china seek hegemonic status within asia states reject chinese american hegemony align russoindic bloc russias role asia already well established historically contra china even era communist states supposedly accord19 grinning façade chinese diplomacy drop true character regime become evident 1960s russia 1979 chinese invasion vietnam war india 1962 | 777 |
<p />
<p>Since 1840, the year of the signing of New Zealand’s “founding document,” the Treaty of Waitangi,[1] New Zealand has seldom pursued an independent foreign policy. Naturally being a British Crown Colony, New Zealand followed British interests (as well as interests that were not so “British” but nonetheless undertaken in the name of the Empire[2]) across the world, including participation in the nefarious wars against the Afrikaners for the sake of Alfred Beit, et al. At the start of World War II, Prime Minister Joseph Savage (a conscientious objector during World War I) asserted, “New Zealand goes where Britain goes.”[3] New Zealand passed the Statute of Westminster Adoption Act in 1947, affirming New Zealand’s status as a self-governing Dominion within the “British Commonwealth.” The residual powers of the British Parliament were not removed until the Constitution Act of 1986.</p>
<p>The British identity, for better or worse, provided an anchorage; constitutional, linguistic, legal and cultural foundations — a unifying factor among New Zealand’s two primary ethnic groups, the Maori and those of British descent, in order to shape “one people” according to the Treaty of Waitangi, regardless of how that is now interpreted differently by dubious interests.</p>
<p>However, with the conclusion of World War II, the British Empire and Commonwealth were in eclipse, a process that had been accelerated by the war but that had begun well before. All the European colonial empires were in the process of being dismantled, as the USA and the USSR pursued an agenda that happened to coincide with the interests of both: global European decolonization.[4] The final vestige of the British-NZ tie was broken when Britain entered the Common Market. Brian L Crowe, First Secretary of the British Embassy in Washington, was to state in relation to the burden of World War II and the impending joining of Britain with the Common Market that, “… we continued to bear a combination of burdens that were too much for us. The burden of debt was a crushing one. To finance the war we had liquidated most of our very considerable foreign assets…”[5] His view seems to accord with those unorthodox historians and commentators who maintained that the biggest winner of the war would be international finance.[6]</p>
<p>ANZUS Pact</p>
<p>New Zealand as an economy that is based primarily on exports was pushed into the US orbit. The foundation for this relationship had already been established as early as 1952 with the Pacific Security Treaty, between Australia, New Zealand and the US (hence ANZUS), New Zealand and Australia having been fearful of a resurgent Japan. It is notable that the USA insisted that Britain be excluded from the alliance,[7] thereby indicating that the USA was no ally of British world interests, as genuine conservatives sought to expose at the time; a fact little understood by today’s pro-American so-called “conservative” cheer leaders in New Zealand and the other former Dominions and indeed in Britain herself.[8]</p>
<p>As paradoxical as it might seem to many, including this writer, it was the Labour Opposition in the New Zealand Parliament at the time that expressed concern that ANZUS was subverting New Zealand’s relationship with Britain. The Labour Leader of the Opposition, Walter Nash, stated in the House: “There is a keen disappointment and surprise throughout New Zealand that Britain had been exclude from the [ANZUS] meetings.” Prime Minster Holland (of the “conservative” National Party, the significance of which will be apparent later), replied that the question itself was nonsense, that “nothing could weaken the bonds that attach us with Britain.”[9]</p>
<p>S F Newman commented on this news item of the time: “Despite pressure from New Zealand to extend membership to Britain, the point of view of the senior partner in ANZUS, the United States, prevailed.”[10]</p>
<p>A year later, the USA reaffirmed that Britain would not be permitted into the ANZUS alliance. Despite New Zealand Prime Minister Holland’s assurance the year before in regard to New Zealand’s relationship with Britain, in 1953 all three states agreed that “the tripartite Anzus Pacific Pact” would not be broadened … by admitting Britain or any other country.”[11] Sir Winston Churchill expressed regret in the British Parliament that membership of ANZUS would not be extended to Britain;[12] hence it can be seen that New Zealand followed a flagrantly anti-British line by the USA which sought to displace Britain and all other colonial powers, and inaugurate its own post-war era of neo-colonialism.</p>
<p>These events were taking place at a time when 96% of New Zealanders were of British decent, a situation that is today difficult to imagine, but can still be recalled by this writer when a child. Pro-British sentiment was innate and the most conservative sections of New Zealand society were also the most dubious about New Zealand’s relationship with the USA to the detriment of British ties. For example: “The exclusion of Britain from the Anzus Pact was deplored in a motion passed by the Wellington branch of the Royal Society of St. George [which] also decided to ask the Prime Minister why Britain had been excluded, and whether the British Government had been consulted before the Pact was signed.”[13]</p>
<p>This relationship with the USA via ANZUS within the first decade of the end of World War II, shows the place of the National Government in leading the way towards New Zealand’s pro-US orientation. From thereafter, it was no longer a matter of “where Britain goes …” but “where the USA goes…”</p>
<p>Collapse of ANZUS</p>
<p>The New Zealand military relationship with the USA and ANZUS collapsed in 1984 when the Labour Government adopted a policy of not allowing nuclear powered or armed ships to call at New Zealand ports, and New Zealand’s “nuclear-free status” was formalized and defined in 1987.[14] However, this process had previously been set in motion by Norman Kirk’s Labour Government, which sent two frigates to Mururoa Atoll in 1973 to protest French nuclear testing, accompanied by Cabinet Minister Fraser Colman. Whatever one might think of this action – and this writer is an admirer of France’s own determination to maintain her national sovereignty – it set the basis for the subsequent de facto exclusion of US ships from New Zealand ports. The USA in return stated that it was suspending ANZUS treaty obligations until US nuclear powered ships could be admitted, now describing New Zealand as “a friend, but not an ally.” While subsequent National Governments, including the present, have had no choice, by force of public opinion, but to maintain the “nuclear-free policy,” a new accord has finally returned New Zealand to the US fold.</p>
<p>New Zealand’s global role in US interests</p>
<p>While New Zealand seemingly pursued from the time of the “nuclear free” position an independent foreign policy, the eagerness of a small state to play a big part on the “world stage” by talking big at world forums and clinging onto the coattails of the United Nations Organization as a part of New Zealand’s a supposed duty as a “good citizen of the world community” has resulted in both Labour and National governments sending troops all over the world often in accordance with US interests, albeit whether done in the name of the UNO or some alliance. Hence, US Administrations have been noting with quiet approval New Zealand’s commitment to pro-US causes which seem to have started under the Clark Labour Government, (Helen Clark being duly rewarded with a high position at the UNO), which has laid the foundation for the current re-formalization of the NZ-US relationship. For example, in 1994 New Zealand sent “the first of three reinforced rifle companies to Bosnia Herzegovina.</p>
<p>After being farewelled in an emotional street parade throughout Palmerston North, a 250-strong rifle company deployed and although it was attached to a British Regiment it took with it an impressive (at the time) assortment of kit – 25 armoured personnel carriers, Unimog trucks, land rovers, field kitchens and containers of equipment.[15]</p>
<p>Whether one calls such a New Zealand military presence “peace keeping, “ “reconstruction,” or whatever, and whether undertaken under the guise of the UNO or some ad hoc alliance of forces, such a military presence is nonetheless still assisting in the maintenance of US globalist adventures, and has been praised as such by the USA. In particular, the presence and role of New Zealand’s elite SAS force in Afghanistan has only recently become publicly understood:</p>
<p>The SAS is on its fourth deployment, which started in September last year and a commitment has been made to maintain about 70 personnel for up to 18 months, in three rotations. The Government intends over time to withdraw the Defence Force’s 140-strong provincial reconstruction team (PRT), which has been in Bamyan province since 2003.[16]</p>
<p>The SAS presence was acknowledged by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on her visit to New Zealand this month (November):</p>
<p>“They are very highly regarded,” she told TV New Zealand in an interview. “They work extremely professionally.” “We have a high regard for New Zealand and the troops that you deploy there, of course we would like them to stay as long as you have them stay,” Clinton said. She said she had discussed New Zealand’s military presence in Afghanistan, both the special forces and a 140-strong provincial reconstruction team of troops in Bamiyan, in talks with Prime Minister John Key in the capital of Wellington on Thursday. She would not say if she had asked him to keep the troops in Afghanistan.[17]</p>
<p />
<p /> | false | 1 | since 1840 year signing new zealands founding document treaty waitangi1 new zealand seldom pursued independent foreign policy naturally british crown colony new zealand followed british interests well interests british nonetheless undertaken name empire2 across world including participation nefarious wars afrikaners sake alfred beit et al start world war ii prime minister joseph savage conscientious objector world war asserted new zealand goes britain goes3 new zealand passed statute westminster adoption act 1947 affirming new zealands status selfgoverning dominion within british commonwealth residual powers british parliament removed constitution act 1986 british identity better worse provided anchorage constitutional linguistic legal cultural foundations unifying factor among new zealands two primary ethnic groups maori british descent order shape one people according treaty waitangi regardless interpreted differently dubious interests however conclusion world war ii british empire commonwealth eclipse process accelerated war begun well european colonial empires process dismantled usa ussr pursued agenda happened coincide interests global european decolonization4 final vestige britishnz tie broken britain entered common market brian l crowe first secretary british embassy washington state relation burden world war ii impending joining britain common market continued bear combination burdens much us burden debt crushing one finance war liquidated considerable foreign assets5 view seems accord unorthodox historians commentators maintained biggest winner war would international finance6 anzus pact new zealand economy based primarily exports pushed us orbit foundation relationship already established early 1952 pacific security treaty australia new zealand us hence anzus new zealand australia fearful resurgent japan notable usa insisted britain excluded alliance7 thereby indicating usa ally british world interests genuine conservatives sought expose time fact little understood todays proamerican socalled conservative cheer leaders new zealand former dominions indeed britain herself8 paradoxical might seem many including writer labour opposition new zealand parliament time expressed concern anzus subverting new zealands relationship britain labour leader opposition walter nash stated house keen disappointment surprise throughout new zealand britain exclude anzus meetings prime minster holland conservative national party significance apparent later replied question nonsense nothing could weaken bonds attach us britain9 f newman commented news item time despite pressure new zealand extend membership britain point view senior partner anzus united states prevailed10 year later usa reaffirmed britain would permitted anzus alliance despite new zealand prime minister hollands assurance year regard new zealands relationship britain 1953 three states agreed tripartite anzus pacific pact would broadened admitting britain country11 sir winston churchill expressed regret british parliament membership anzus would extended britain12 hence seen new zealand followed flagrantly antibritish line usa sought displace britain colonial powers inaugurate postwar era neocolonialism events taking place time 96 new zealanders british decent situation today difficult imagine still recalled writer child probritish sentiment innate conservative sections new zealand society also dubious new zealands relationship usa detriment british ties example exclusion britain anzus pact deplored motion passed wellington branch royal society st george also decided ask prime minister britain excluded whether british government consulted pact signed13 relationship usa via anzus within first decade end world war ii shows place national government leading way towards new zealands prous orientation thereafter longer matter britain goes usa goes collapse anzus new zealand military relationship usa anzus collapsed 1984 labour government adopted policy allowing nuclear powered armed ships call new zealand ports new zealands nuclearfree status formalized defined 198714 however process previously set motion norman kirks labour government sent two frigates mururoa atoll 1973 protest french nuclear testing accompanied cabinet minister fraser colman whatever one might think action writer admirer frances determination maintain national sovereignty set basis subsequent de facto exclusion us ships new zealand ports usa return stated suspending anzus treaty obligations us nuclear powered ships could admitted describing new zealand friend ally subsequent national governments including present choice force public opinion maintain nuclearfree policy new accord finally returned new zealand us fold new zealands global role us interests new zealand seemingly pursued time nuclear free position independent foreign policy eagerness small state play big part world stage talking big world forums clinging onto coattails united nations organization part new zealands supposed duty good citizen world community resulted labour national governments sending troops world often accordance us interests albeit whether done name uno alliance hence us administrations noting quiet approval new zealands commitment prous causes seem started clark labour government helen clark duly rewarded high position uno laid foundation current reformalization nzus relationship example 1994 new zealand sent first three reinforced rifle companies bosnia herzegovina farewelled emotional street parade throughout palmerston north 250strong rifle company deployed although attached british regiment took impressive time assortment kit 25 armoured personnel carriers unimog trucks land rovers field kitchens containers equipment15 whether one calls new zealand military presence peace keeping reconstruction whatever whether undertaken guise uno ad hoc alliance forces military presence nonetheless still assisting maintenance us globalist adventures praised usa particular presence role new zealands elite sas force afghanistan recently become publicly understood sas fourth deployment started september last year commitment made maintain 70 personnel 18 months three rotations government intends time withdraw defence forces 140strong provincial reconstruction team prt bamyan province since 200316 sas presence acknowledged us secretary state hillary clinton visit new zealand month november highly regarded told tv new zealand interview work extremely professionally high regard new zealand troops deploy course would like stay long stay clinton said said discussed new zealands military presence afghanistan special forces 140strong provincial reconstruction team troops bamiyan talks prime minister john key capital wellington thursday would say asked keep troops afghanistan17 | 896 |
<p>After violent protests rocked Charlottesville, Virginia last month, Republican Sen.&#160;John McCain took to Twitter to condemn hatred and bigotry and urge President Donald Trump to speak out more forcefully.</p>
<p>Then pro-Russian bots got activated on social media.</p>
<p>Within hours, an online campaign attacking McCain —&#160;a frequent Trump critic —&#160;began circulating, amplified with the help of automated and human-coordinated networks known as bots and cyborgs linking to blogs on “Traitor McCain” and the hashtag #ExplainMcCain.</p>
<p>After the 2016 U.S. presidential race was subject to Russian cyber meddling, analysts say the ferocity of more recent assaults is a preview of what could be coming in the 2018 elections, when Republicans will be defending their control of both chambers of Congress.</p>
<p>“They haven’t stood still since 2016,” said Ben Nimmo, a senior fellow in information defense at the Digital Forensic Research Lab at the Atlantic Council in Washington, which tracked the activity. “People have woken up to the idea that bots equal influence and lots of people will be wanting to be influencing the midterms.”</p>
<p>While special counsel and former FBI chief Robert Mueller keeps investigating the 2016 race, Nimmo’s work is among a number of initiatives cropping up at think tanks, startups, and even the Pentagon seeking to grasp how bots and influence operations are rapidly evolving. Blamed for steering political debate last year, bots used for Russian propaganda and other causes are only becoming more emboldened, researchers say.</p>
<p>“They’re prepping the battlefield and sowing seeds of discord” and “potentially laying the groundwork for what they’re going to do in 2018 or 2020,” said Laura Rosenberger, senior fellow and director of the Alliance for Securing Democracy at the German Marshall Fund.</p>
<p>The alliance last month unveiled Hamilton 68, an online dashboard designed to track Russian influence operations on Twitter with the hope of better highlighting sources of information.</p>
<p>The site culls real-time data from 600 Twitter users, analyzing trending hashtags, topics and links. The dashboard’s developers say the accounts they selected cover those likely controlled by Russian government influence operations. Other accounts are pro-Russia users that may be loosely connected to the government and some are people influenced by the first two groups and who are active in bolstering Russian media themes. Some are bot accounts.</p>
<p>“Our view is that exposure is a really important element of beginning to push back on some of these efforts,” said Rosenberger, who served at the National Security Council and the State Department in the Obama administration.&#160;</p>
<p>Cyborgs Vs. Bots</p>
<p>Short for “robot,” internet bots come in a couple of forms. There are automated versions in which software pumps out posts from social media accounts, often at rates that a human couldn’t conceivably do. Others are dubbed cyborgs —&#160;some of their content is automatically spit out, but a person also takes over posting at times. They can also be human-run accounts that are hacked or taken over by a robot.</p>
<p>Not all bots are nefarious.&#160;Although researchers say pro-Russian operatives exploiting social media have made headlines lately, the use of bots is broadening as they prove they can&#160;be influential in moving&#160;narratives from niche circles and the fringes of the internet to a wider audience by spreading links to blogs and news sites, as well as popularizing memes and hashtags. That will make them a potentially potent tool for competing interests trying to influence U.S. political debate in 2018 and beyond.</p>
<p>It’s hard to determine from where bots originate. Analysts are able to monitor the messaging that bots latch on to, such as advocating for Russian and alt-right narratives or anti-NATO stances. Nation-states or groups helping political campaigns might look to employ bots given their power to shift debates.</p>
<p>And while many online campaigns are clearly fake, bots are also used in more sophisticated efforts that start from a basis in truth.&#160;</p>
<p>Ukraine Unrest</p>
<p>A top theme users boosted the week after the Charlottesville clashes was “alt-right alarmism” about the left-wing anti-fascist movement, known as Antifa, according to the dashboard findings. The most-tweeted link in the Russian-linked network followed by the researchers was a petition to declare Antifa a terrorist group.</p>
<p>On Twitter, pro-Russian bots and cyborgs helped promote accusations that McCain allied with neo-Nazis in the past, such as during Ukraine’s civil unrest in 2013. At the time, the Arizona Republican, who is known for his tough stance against Russian meddling in Ukraine, met with and appeared on a stage with nationalist leader Oleh Tyahnybok, whose group has neo-Nazi roots.</p>
<p>McCain’s office didn’t respond to repeated requests for comment on his appearance with Tyahnybok.</p>
<p>One Twitter account tracked by Nimmo’s lab, @TeamTrumpRussia, is what the researchers call a “pro-Kremlin cyborg site.” It averages a rate of more than 220 tweets a day, including memes about McCain in the week after the Charlottesville unrest, which left one person dead.</p>
<p>Putin’s Rejection</p>
<p>Top Russian officials, including President Vladimir Putin, have repeatedly rejected accusations the country meddled in the U.S. election, a finding at odds with the conclusions of the U.S. intelligence community. In January, the nation’s top intelligence agencies agreed that Russia interfered in the election to discredit Hillary Clinton and boost Trump, who has often appeared reluctant to embrace the findings. Trump’s intelligence chiefs, including CIA Director Mike Pompeo and Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, have agreed with the conclusions.</p>
<p>Putin told NBC News in June that there’s “no proof” of any involvement by Russia at the “state level.” But he did say that “patriotically minded” Russians could have been behind intrusions into Clinton’s campaign.</p>
<p>The drumbeat of news about Russia’s role in the election have only helped push relations with the U.S. to post-Cold War lows. Nonetheless, analysts say Russia’s longer-term goal is less focused on Trump than on helping disrupt or undermine U.S. democratic institutions —&#160;an effort that has been under way for decades but which now has a more technological edge.</p>
<p>Researchers say Twitter isn’t the only domain for bots. They’re increasingly expanding to other platforms like YouTube, Instagram and LinkedIn. They even operate interactive “chatbots” on mobile applications available on Facebook, said Nitin Agarwal, an information science professor at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.</p>
<p>Mimicking Human Behavior</p>
<p>“The level of sophistication among these bots is increasing and becoming more and more advanced to try to evade bot detection and suspension from Twitter and other platforms,” said Agarwal, who’s spent a decade studying the use of social media for influence operations. They’re also trying to “mimic human behavior so that they can gain your trust and they can influence your behaviors,” he said.</p>
<p>Because the use of bots is still new, trying to understand how they operate has become a cutting-edge field. It’s even caught the attention of the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, known as DARPA.</p>
<p>In May, the agency awarded Agarwal and Intelligent Automation Inc., a Rockville, Maryland-based technology company, a contract of up to $1.5 million over three years — if research milestones are met — to study the classification of “social bots,” what their intent is and how they’re applied on social media.</p>
<p>For researchers, Twitter is a data gold mine because users’ accounts are usually publicly available. It’s harder to access private content on Facebook.</p>
<p>‘Powerful Antidote’</p>
<p>When asked how it was responding to growing sophistication by bots, a Twitter spokeswoman referred to a June 14 blog post by Colin Crowell, the company’s vice president of public policy, government and corporate philanthropy. Crowell outlined how Twitter is curbing “bots and other networks of manipulation,” including growing its team and resources and working “hard to detect spammy behaviors.”</p>
<p>“Twitter’s open and real-time nature is a powerful antidote to the spreading of all types of false information,” Crowell wrote. “This is important because we cannot distinguish whether every single Tweet from every person is truthful or not. We, as a company, should not be the arbiter of truth.”</p>
<p>Since the election, Twitter and Facebook have taken steps to counter false news and kill off fake accounts. In August, Facebook said it created a software algorithm to flag stories that may be suspicious and send them to third-party fact checkers.&#160;But bots are also getting savvier at dodging detection. That poses a challenge to social media companies trying to crack down on fake accounts — and fake news.</p>
<p>And with bot activity accelerating as the U.S. heads into another election season in 2018, social media companies could face further risks from these networks.</p>
<p>A challenge for social media companies is “how good their algorithms are at weeding out bot strikes,” Nimmo said. “That’s something that they need to be thinking of.”</p> | false | 1 | violent protests rocked charlottesville virginia last month republican sen160john mccain took twitter condemn hatred bigotry urge president donald trump speak forcefully prorussian bots got activated social media within hours online campaign attacking mccain 160a frequent trump critic 160began circulating amplified help automated humancoordinated networks known bots cyborgs linking blogs traitor mccain hashtag explainmccain 2016 us presidential race subject russian cyber meddling analysts say ferocity recent assaults preview could coming 2018 elections republicans defending control chambers congress havent stood still since 2016 said ben nimmo senior fellow information defense digital forensic research lab atlantic council washington tracked activity people woken idea bots equal influence lots people wanting influencing midterms special counsel former fbi chief robert mueller keeps investigating 2016 race nimmos work among number initiatives cropping think tanks startups even pentagon seeking grasp bots influence operations rapidly evolving blamed steering political debate last year bots used russian propaganda causes becoming emboldened researchers say theyre prepping battlefield sowing seeds discord potentially laying groundwork theyre going 2018 2020 said laura rosenberger senior fellow director alliance securing democracy german marshall fund alliance last month unveiled hamilton 68 online dashboard designed track russian influence operations twitter hope better highlighting sources information site culls realtime data 600 twitter users analyzing trending hashtags topics links dashboards developers say accounts selected cover likely controlled russian government influence operations accounts prorussia users may loosely connected government people influenced first two groups active bolstering russian media themes bot accounts view exposure really important element beginning push back efforts said rosenberger served national security council state department obama administration160 cyborgs vs bots short robot internet bots come couple forms automated versions software pumps posts social media accounts often rates human couldnt conceivably others dubbed cyborgs 160some content automatically spit person also takes posting times also humanrun accounts hacked taken robot bots nefarious160although researchers say prorussian operatives exploiting social media made headlines lately use bots broadening prove can160be influential moving160narratives niche circles fringes internet wider audience spreading links blogs news sites well popularizing memes hashtags make potentially potent tool competing interests trying influence us political debate 2018 beyond hard determine bots originate analysts able monitor messaging bots latch advocating russian altright narratives antinato stances nationstates groups helping political campaigns might look employ bots given power shift debates many online campaigns clearly fake bots also used sophisticated efforts start basis truth160 ukraine unrest top theme users boosted week charlottesville clashes altright alarmism leftwing antifascist movement known antifa according dashboard findings mosttweeted link russianlinked network followed researchers petition declare antifa terrorist group twitter prorussian bots cyborgs helped promote accusations mccain allied neonazis past ukraines civil unrest 2013 time arizona republican known tough stance russian meddling ukraine met appeared stage nationalist leader oleh tyahnybok whose group neonazi roots mccains office didnt respond repeated requests comment appearance tyahnybok one twitter account tracked nimmos lab teamtrumprussia researchers call prokremlin cyborg site averages rate 220 tweets day including memes mccain week charlottesville unrest left one person dead putins rejection top russian officials including president vladimir putin repeatedly rejected accusations country meddled us election finding odds conclusions us intelligence community january nations top intelligence agencies agreed russia interfered election discredit hillary clinton boost trump often appeared reluctant embrace findings trumps intelligence chiefs including cia director mike pompeo director national intelligence dan coats agreed conclusions putin told nbc news june theres proof involvement russia state level say patriotically minded russians could behind intrusions clintons campaign drumbeat news russias role election helped push relations us postcold war lows nonetheless analysts say russias longerterm goal less focused trump helping disrupt undermine us democratic institutions 160an effort way decades technological edge researchers say twitter isnt domain bots theyre increasingly expanding platforms like youtube instagram linkedin even operate interactive chatbots mobile applications available facebook said nitin agarwal information science professor university arkansas little rock mimicking human behavior level sophistication among bots increasing becoming advanced try evade bot detection suspension twitter platforms said agarwal whos spent decade studying use social media influence operations theyre also trying mimic human behavior gain trust influence behaviors said use bots still new trying understand operate become cuttingedge field even caught attention pentagons defense advanced research projects agency known darpa may agency awarded agarwal intelligent automation inc rockville marylandbased technology company contract 15 million three years research milestones met study classification social bots intent theyre applied social media researchers twitter data gold mine users accounts usually publicly available harder access private content facebook powerful antidote asked responding growing sophistication bots twitter spokeswoman referred june 14 blog post colin crowell companys vice president public policy government corporate philanthropy crowell outlined twitter curbing bots networks manipulation including growing team resources working hard detect spammy behaviors twitters open realtime nature powerful antidote spreading types false information crowell wrote important distinguish whether every single tweet every person truthful company arbiter truth since election twitter facebook taken steps counter false news kill fake accounts august facebook said created software algorithm flag stories may suspicious send thirdparty fact checkers160but bots also getting savvier dodging detection poses challenge social media companies trying crack fake accounts fake news bot activity accelerating us heads another election season 2018 social media companies could face risks networks challenge social media companies good algorithms weeding bot strikes nimmo said thats something need thinking | 871 |
<p>By Blanca Rodríguez and Sonya Dowsett</p>
<p>MADRID/BARCELONA (Reuters) – Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy took the first step on Wednesday toward suspending Catalonia’s political autonomy and ruling the region directly to thwart a push for independence.</p>
<p>He demanded that the regional government clarify whether it now considered itself independent following a speech by Catalan president Carles Puigdemont on Tuesday night.</p>
<p>This requirement is a necessary step before triggering Article 155 of the constitution, which would allow Madrid to suspend the region’s political autonomy.</p>
<p>Rajoy’s move could deepen the confrontation between Madrid and Catalonia but it also signals a way out of Spain’s biggest political crisis since a failed military coup in 1981.</p>
<p>The prime minister would be likely to call a snap regional election after activating the constitutional mechanism allowing him to do so.</p>
<p>Puigdemont made a symbolic declaration of independence from Spain on Tuesday night but then immediately suspended it and called for talks with the Madrid government.</p>
<p>“The cabinet has agreed this morning to formally request the Catalan government to confirm whether it has declared the independence of Catalonia, regardless of the deliberate confusion created over its implementation,” Rajoy said in a televised address after a cabinet meeting to consider the government’s response.</p>
<p>Without giving a specific deadline for the Catalan government to reply, Rajoy said: “The answer from the Catalan president will determine future events, in the next few days.”</p>
<p>It is not yet clear if and when the Catalan government would answer the requirement but it now faces a conundrum, political analysts say.</p>
<p>If Puigdemont says he did declare independence, the government would likely trigger Article 155. If he says he did not declare it, then far-left party CUP would likely withdraw its support to his minority government.</p>
<p>“Rajoy has two objectives: if Puigdemont remains ambiguous, the pro-independence movement will get more fragmented; if Puigdemont insists on defending independence then Rajoy will be able to apply Article 155,” said Antonio Barroso, deputy director of London-based research firm Teneo Intelligence.</p>
<p>“Either way Rajoy’s aim would be to first restore the rule of law in Catalonia and this could at some point lead to early elections in the region”.</p>
<p>DIALOGUE CALL DISMISSED</p>
<p>Puigdemont had been widely expected to unilaterally declare Catalonia’s independence on Tuesday after the Catalan government said 90 percent of Catalans had voted for a breakaway in an Oct. 1 referendum that Spain had declared illegal and which most opponents of independence boycotted.</p>
<p>Madrid responded angrily to Puigdemont’s speech, saying the Catalan government could not act on the results of the referendum.</p>
<p>“Neither Mr. Puigdemont nor anyone else can claim, without returning to legality and democracy, to impose mediation… Dialogue between democrats takes place within the law,” Deputy Prime Minister Soraya Saenz de Santamaria said.</p>
<p>Invoking Article 155 to ease Spain’s worst political crisis in four decades would make prospects of a negotiated solution to the Catalonia crisis even more remote.</p>
<p>A spokesman for the Catalan government said earlier on Wednesday that if Madrid went down this road, it would press ahead with independence.</p>
<p>“We have given up absolutely nothing…We have taken a time out…which doesn’t mean a step backwards, or a renunciation or anything like that,” Catalan government spokesman Jordi Turull told Catalunya Radio.</p>
<p>Socialist opposition leader Pedro Sanchez said he would back Rajoy if he had to activate Article 155 and said he had agreed with the prime minister to open a constitutional reform within six months to discuss how Catalonia could fit better in Spain.</p>
<p>It was not clear how the Catalan government would respond to the offer.</p>
<p>MARKET RELIEF</p>
<p>Puigdemont’s speech also disappointed supporters of independence, thousands of whom watched proceedings on giant screens outside parliament before sadly leaving for home.</p>
<p>Financial markets, however, were encouraged that an immediate declaration of independence had been avoided.</p>
<p>Following Puigdemont’s speech, Spain’s benchmark IBEX share index rose as much as 1.6 percent, outperforming the pan-European index. The rally pushed the main world stocks index, the MSCI’s 47-country ‘All-World’ index, to a record high.</p>
<p>Spain’s 10-year government bond yield — which moves inversely to the price — dropped 5 basis points to 1.65 percent in early trade, according to Tradeweb data.</p>
<p>In Brussels, there was relief that the euro zone’s fourth-largest economy now had at least bought some time to deal with a crisis that was still far from over.</p>
<p>One EU official said Puigdemont “seems to have listened to advice not to do something irreversible”.</p>
<p>The Catalan crisis has deeply divided the northeastern region itself as well as the Spanish nation. Opinion polls conducted before the vote suggested a minority of about 40 percent of residents in Catalonia backed independence.</p>
<p>The stakes are high — losing Catalonia, which has its own language and culture, would deprive Spain of a fifth of its economic output and more than a quarter of exports.</p>
<p>Some of Catalonia’s largest companies have moved their head offices out of the region and others were set to follow if he had declared independence.</p> | false | 1 | blanca rodríguez sonya dowsett madridbarcelona reuters spanish prime minister mariano rajoy took first step wednesday toward suspending catalonias political autonomy ruling region directly thwart push independence demanded regional government clarify whether considered independent following speech catalan president carles puigdemont tuesday night requirement necessary step triggering article 155 constitution would allow madrid suspend regions political autonomy rajoys move could deepen confrontation madrid catalonia also signals way spains biggest political crisis since failed military coup 1981 prime minister would likely call snap regional election activating constitutional mechanism allowing puigdemont made symbolic declaration independence spain tuesday night immediately suspended called talks madrid government cabinet agreed morning formally request catalan government confirm whether declared independence catalonia regardless deliberate confusion created implementation rajoy said televised address cabinet meeting consider governments response without giving specific deadline catalan government reply rajoy said answer catalan president determine future events next days yet clear catalan government would answer requirement faces conundrum political analysts say puigdemont says declare independence government would likely trigger article 155 says declare farleft party cup would likely withdraw support minority government rajoy two objectives puigdemont remains ambiguous proindependence movement get fragmented puigdemont insists defending independence rajoy able apply article 155 said antonio barroso deputy director londonbased research firm teneo intelligence either way rajoys aim would first restore rule law catalonia could point lead early elections region dialogue call dismissed puigdemont widely expected unilaterally declare catalonias independence tuesday catalan government said 90 percent catalans voted breakaway oct 1 referendum spain declared illegal opponents independence boycotted madrid responded angrily puigdemonts speech saying catalan government could act results referendum neither mr puigdemont anyone else claim without returning legality democracy impose mediation dialogue democrats takes place within law deputy prime minister soraya saenz de santamaria said invoking article 155 ease spains worst political crisis four decades would make prospects negotiated solution catalonia crisis even remote spokesman catalan government said earlier wednesday madrid went road would press ahead independence given absolutely nothingwe taken time outwhich doesnt mean step backwards renunciation anything like catalan government spokesman jordi turull told catalunya radio socialist opposition leader pedro sanchez said would back rajoy activate article 155 said agreed prime minister open constitutional reform within six months discuss catalonia could fit better spain clear catalan government would respond offer market relief puigdemonts speech also disappointed supporters independence thousands watched proceedings giant screens outside parliament sadly leaving home financial markets however encouraged immediate declaration independence avoided following puigdemonts speech spains benchmark ibex share index rose much 16 percent outperforming paneuropean index rally pushed main world stocks index mscis 47country allworld index record high spains 10year government bond yield moves inversely price dropped 5 basis points 165 percent early trade according tradeweb data brussels relief euro zones fourthlargest economy least bought time deal crisis still far one eu official said puigdemont seems listened advice something irreversible catalan crisis deeply divided northeastern region well spanish nation opinion polls conducted vote suggested minority 40 percent residents catalonia backed independence stakes high losing catalonia language culture would deprive spain fifth economic output quarter exports catalonias largest companies moved head offices region others set follow declared independence | 516 |
<p>Hotel de Love by Craig Rosenberg is, like Cosi, a fresh and amusing Australian film that puts Hollywood schlock like Fools Rush In to shame. It tells the story of twin brothers, Rick (Aden Young, who also plays Nick in Cosi) and Stephen (Simon Bossell) who fall in love with the same girl, Melissa (Saffron Burrows), at a party when they are 18. Rick gets in first and claims her, while she thinks that Stephen is just a good friend. Rick is unsuccessful in persuading her into bed because she has a “pact,” she tells him, with her future husband, to save her virginity for him. Stephen likes the idea of this pact; Rick does not. But the night before she is due to go back to England, and after returning home, she comes back and climbs in Rick’s window with a ladder, in her nightgown, and they make love. There are moments of great tenderness between them, and they promise to write.</p>
<p>Stephen, on coming home from an amorous experience of his own, is disgusted to find Melissa climbing out of the window. As they stand there talking, we hear the sounds of Rick’s and Stephen’s parents, Edith (Julia Blake) and Jack (Ray Barrett) Dunne, fighting. This seems to be a daily occurrence. Mention is made at this stage of what must now seem the cursed place where Edith and Jack spent their ill-starred honeymoon, the kitschy “Hotel de Love,” one of the features of which is something called Niagara Smalls, a little three foot waterfall. The younger generation is horrified at the very idea.</p>
<p>Ten years pass. We find that, of all places in the world Rick has ended up as a desk clerk at the Hotel de Love. Not only that, but Edith and Jack, escorted by Stephen, are coming back to the place to renew their wedding vows. This is a bizarre exercise, thinks Rick, “like watching the ambulance guys push the victims back in the car wreck: go on, in you go; you’re not disfigured enough yet.” Rick is there because he was jilted there by one Rachel. He is now wallowing in his misery at having been left and carrying on a loveless affair with Alison Leigh (Pippa Grandison), who does a clairvoyant, “love fortune” number at the theme-park hotel. The repartee between them suggests the battles of Rick’s parents, as when he says to her: “Don’t analyse me, I’m too shallow” or she to him: “I love being nice to you; it makes you so uncomfortable.”</p>
<p>Meanwhile Stephen is calculating the chances of a person’s finding love in the world by going to the airport and counting the number of people who are greeted with kisses and embraces as opposed to those who are not. He reckons the odds stand at 54 per cent in favor. It is his own response to the awful example of their parents, whose despair is rendered comically. On waking up in their luridly football-themed honeymoon suite, for example, Jack says simply: “Bloody hell! Still alive.” He then goes on about “one last breakfast to get me through the day,” and “one last banana.” Edith is still fed up with him, but finds an anonymous love letter to herself on the breakfast tray, with a little overwrought poetry inside. “My tongue searches for your damp wisdom.”</p>
<p>Who should turn up but Melissa with her latest boyfriend, Norman (Peter O’Brien). She spars a bit with Rick, because he never wrote to her. Rick’s sour attitude finds gnomic expression: “Men and women can’t be honest with each other; the whole social fabric would break down.” But Rick is still in love with Melissa and he tries to persuade her of this. She insists that she is going to marry Norman. And that the two of them are completely honest with each other.</p>
<p>“You have created a complete fantasy out of me; it’s a complete illusion,” she tells Rick.</p>
<p>“That’s love!” he replies.</p>
<p>When Norman takes the news of Rick’s presence badly, and Melissa begins to get more and more emotional, it becomes clear that she still cares for Rick too. Best bit of picture is the moment of Rick’s and Melissa’s two minutes of absolute honesty with each other. Melissa asks “Why do men lie?” This is a hard one, and Rick asks to be allowed to warm up with some other questions. Finally, however, he answers: Because, he says, we are not as good as you are, and we want to hide our failings so as to be allowed to be near to you. If we’re near you some of your goodness might rub off, and we will be better.” Whatever may be the truth of this observation, it is one to which the movie is faithful.</p>
<p>Edith finds that it was (of course) Jack who was writing her the anonymous letters. They decide to stay together after first having decided that it is time they divorce. Rick looks on in amazement at their reconciliation and says to the old and very bad piano player: “Maybe there’s something to this marriage thing after all; what do you think?” He never stays for a reply to these outpourings, but this time the piano player grabs him by the arm and gives him the pithy message: “The trick is doing it with the right person.”</p>
<p>So off he goes in pursuit of Melissa, who resists the temptation to leave Norman at the altar only to tell him, once they are in the car together: “I want a divorce.”</p>
<p>Rick and Melissa are married, we are told by Stephen, the narrator, a year later. He himself gets Alison on the rebound, having learned that she was at the same party where he and Rick first saw Melissa, and that if he had simply turned his head he would have seen her. And she’s the one! He promises to wait for her when she goes to “the beautiful city of Barcelona” —a trip she has deferred for one boyfriend after another and is not going to defer again. She says don’t bother to wait. She is not even sure she is coming back. He ends going down to the airport to wait for her to return every week, continuing his calculations on the chances of finding love, which he reckons are improving.</p> | false | 1 | hotel de love craig rosenberg like cosi fresh amusing australian film puts hollywood schlock like fools rush shame tells story twin brothers rick aden young also plays nick cosi stephen simon bossell fall love girl melissa saffron burrows party 18 rick gets first claims thinks stephen good friend rick unsuccessful persuading bed pact tells future husband save virginity stephen likes idea pact rick night due go back england returning home comes back climbs ricks window ladder nightgown make love moments great tenderness promise write stephen coming home amorous experience disgusted find melissa climbing window stand talking hear sounds ricks stephens parents edith julia blake jack ray barrett dunne fighting seems daily occurrence mention made stage must seem cursed place edith jack spent illstarred honeymoon kitschy hotel de love one features something called niagara smalls little three foot waterfall younger generation horrified idea ten years pass find places world rick ended desk clerk hotel de love edith jack escorted stephen coming back place renew wedding vows bizarre exercise thinks rick like watching ambulance guys push victims back car wreck go go youre disfigured enough yet rick jilted one rachel wallowing misery left carrying loveless affair alison leigh pippa grandison clairvoyant love fortune number themepark hotel repartee suggests battles ricks parents says dont analyse im shallow love nice makes uncomfortable meanwhile stephen calculating chances persons finding love world going airport counting number people greeted kisses embraces opposed reckons odds stand 54 per cent favor response awful example parents whose despair rendered comically waking luridly footballthemed honeymoon suite example jack says simply bloody hell still alive goes one last breakfast get day one last banana edith still fed finds anonymous love letter breakfast tray little overwrought poetry inside tongue searches damp wisdom turn melissa latest boyfriend norman peter obrien spars bit rick never wrote ricks sour attitude finds gnomic expression men women cant honest whole social fabric would break rick still love melissa tries persuade insists going marry norman two completely honest created complete fantasy complete illusion tells rick thats love replies norman takes news ricks presence badly melissa begins get emotional becomes clear still cares rick best bit picture moment ricks melissas two minutes absolute honesty melissa asks men lie hard one rick asks allowed warm questions finally however answers says good want hide failings allowed near near goodness might rub better whatever may truth observation one movie faithful edith finds course jack writing anonymous letters decide stay together first decided time divorce rick looks amazement reconciliation says old bad piano player maybe theres something marriage thing think never stays reply outpourings time piano player grabs arm gives pithy message trick right person goes pursuit melissa resists temptation leave norman altar tell car together want divorce rick melissa married told stephen narrator year later gets alison rebound learned party rick first saw melissa simply turned head would seen shes one promises wait goes beautiful city barcelona trip deferred one boyfriend another going defer says dont bother wait even sure coming back ends going airport wait return every week continuing calculations chances finding love reckons improving | 513 |
<p>Events in Ukraine and the expansionist policies of President Putin naturally raise questions about the defense of&#160; <a href="http://www.forbes.com/europe-news/" type="external">Europe</a>. Whatever Russian aims might be, there is no doubt that a heavily armed country with dwindling economic assets poses a threat, however theoretical, to an affluent neighbor with only tenuous means of defense. In the days of the cold war, when President Reagan took the North Atlantic Alliance ( <a href="https://history.state.gov/milestones/1945-1952/nato" type="external">NATO</a>) seriously, an effort was made to counter the military might of the Soviet Union, and to impress on the Soviet leaders that any attempt to annexe the countries to the West of them would lead to the destruction of their empire. The strategy worked, and eventually it became clear to the KGB that it would be easier to give up the struggle, transfer assets to Switzerland, buy a house in London and create a fake democracy back home.</p>
<p>NATO’s strategy worked because it was believable. It was clear to the Soviet elite that President Reagan really did intend to introduce defenses that would make the Soviet missiles ineffective. It was clear that America was not only the backbone of the Western alliance, but also entirely committed to its ruling doctrine, that an attack on one member is an attack on all. The&#160; <a href="http://militaryhistory.about.com/od/battleswars1900s/p/falklands.htm" type="external">Falklands war&#160;</a>delivered a shock to the&#160; <a href="http://www.coldwar.org/articles/50s/KGB.asp" type="external">KGB</a>, which had planned on the assumption that the Western powers would relinquish territory rather than embark on so costly a defense of it. Nor was this assumption absurd. Officer Putin and his fellow spies were well connected with the Western European left, and knew how hostile the European socialist parties were to the strategy of deterrence. The British Labour Party was committed at the time to nuclear disarmament( <a href="http://www.cnduk.org/about/item/437" type="external">CND</a>), the German Social Democrats were half-hearted members of NATO at best, the Scandinavian socialists were more or less neutral and the French, whether right or left, pursued an independent strategy whose only clear meaning was that they didn’t take orders from America.</p>
<p>Since that time the Atlantic Alliance has become radically less credible. Three factors are principally responsible for this. The first is the growth of the European Union, and its policy of dissolving national borders.&#160; The EU has set out to delegitimize the nation state, to make it irrelevant to the ‘citizens’ of the Union whether they be French, British, Polish or Italian, and to abolish the national customs and beliefs that make long-term patriotic loyalty seriously believable. The EU’s attempt to replace national with European identity has, however failed, and is widely regarded with ridicule. Moreover the EU’s inability to think coherently about defense, and its policy of ‘soft power’ which makes defense in any case more or less inconceivable, means that the motive which leads ordinary people to defend their country in its time of need has been substantially weakened. Patriotism is seen as a heresy, second only to fascism on the list of political sins, and the idea that the people of Europe might be called upon to defend their borders looks increasingly absurd in the light of the official doctrine that there are no borders anyway.</p>
<p>The second reason for European weakness is connected. I refer to the guarantee, under the European Treaties, of the right to work and settle in any part of the Union. This has led to a massive migration from the former communist countries to the West. The people who migrate are the skilled, the entrepreneurial, the educated – in short, the elite on whom the resolution and identity of a country most directly depends. Very soon countries like Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Romania, all of which are directly threatened by a militant Russia, will be without a committed and resident class of leaders. No doubt, should the tanks start to roll, the émigré populations of those countries will protest. But will they return home to fight a pointless war, leaving their newly-won security and prosperity behind? I doubt it.</p>
<p>The third factor tending to the indefensibility of Europe is the dwindling American commitment to the Western alliance. President G.W. Bush was prescient enough to revive the idea of&#160; <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_missile_defense_complex_in_Poland" type="external">anti-missile defenses</a>&#160;in Eastern Europe, and the military in both Poland and the Czech Republic were prepared to go along with it. Putin displayed his KGB training immediately, by declaring that these purely defensive installations would be an ‘act of aggression’. All the old&#160; <a href="http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=JTK_iPOozq0C&amp;pg=PA161&amp;lpg=PA161&amp;dq=newspeak+Roger+Scruton&amp;source=bl&amp;ots=2eCYbiMSik&amp;sig=vQc7x85x5kZ5qrTaZCOzrFrZsQU&amp;hl=en&amp;sa=X&amp;ei=LnJmU6mCMcS47QaCu4HYDg&amp;ved=0CC4Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&amp;q=newspeak%20Roger%20Scruton&amp;f=false" type="external">Newspeak</a>was trotted out in the effort to influence the incoming administration of President Obama against his predecessor’s policy. And the effort was successful. Obama weakly conceded the point, and the anti-missile defenses were not installed. Since then the Obama administration has continued to divert resources and attention elsewhere, creating the distinct impression in Europe that America is no longer wholeheartedly committed to its defense.</p>
<p>Nor can the Americans be blamed for this. Is it not somewhat absurd that the USA should still be maintaining troops in Germany, at great expense to the American taxpayer, 70 years after the end of the Second World War? Is it really acceptable, at a time when America has 60,000 troops stationed in Europe, that the Netherlands has committed only 17,000 people to its own defense? Writing on this page back in November 2012&#160; <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/dougbandow/2012/10/29/why-are-american-troops-still-stationed-in-europe/" type="external">Doug Bandow</a>&#160;pointed out that ‘today the U.S. is effectively bankrupt, but continues to write security checks which it cannot cover.&#160;&#160;America accounts for almost half of the world’s military expenditures and provides defense guarantees to prosperous, populous allies throughout Asia and Europe.&#160;&#160;Moreover, U.S. forces wander the globe attempting to create democracy and stability ex nihilo.&#160;&#160;At the same time&#160; <a href="http://www.forbes.com/washington/" type="external">Washington</a>&#160;props up unpopular dictatorships throughout the Persian Gulf and Central Asia.&#160;&#160;This strategy is unsustainable.’</p>
<p>He was surely right, and President Putin is aware of the point. The American people cannot go on defending a country like Germany – a country that enjoys a standard of living calculated to arouse envy in its impoverished Eastern neighbor, while self-righteously preaching ‘soft power’ and ‘non belligerence’ to its pampered people. At some point Americans are going to wake up to the fact that they are being unscrupulously exploited. Their armed forces are trained to fight and die in Europe, on behalf of people who would not dream of doing the same for America, and who are not prepared to die even for their homeland.</p>
<p>For those reasons, it seems to me, Europe is rapidly becoming indefensible. Even if Putin would prefer a ‘soft’ to a ‘hard’ way of acquiring the continent’s assets, the availability of the ‘hard’ way will surely strengthen his hand. And what is Europe doing about it? It is perhaps worth pointing out that the European Commissioner for Foreign affairs – in effect the EU’s foreign minister – is&#160; <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-11926764" type="external">Baroness Ashton</a>, a Labour Party appointee to the House of Lords. Ashton began her political career in the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, a KGB-funded ‘special operation’ which almost achieved its goal of making Britain indefensible. Advancing through leftist NGOs and Labour Party affiliates, and never standing for an election in her life, this woman is now my representative in the world of international affairs. Do I think she is going to risk her career to defend me, when all her privileged networks are at risk from doing so? Ask that of President Putin.</p>
<p>More information: My&#160; <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Palgrave-Macmillan-Dictionary-Political-Thought/dp/1403989524" type="external">Dictionary of Political Thought</a>&#160;has relevant entries.</p>
<p>Roger Scruton is a Senior Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p> | false | 1 | events ukraine expansionist policies president putin naturally raise questions defense of160 europe whatever russian aims might doubt heavily armed country dwindling economic assets poses threat however theoretical affluent neighbor tenuous means defense days cold war president reagan took north atlantic alliance nato seriously effort made counter military might soviet union impress soviet leaders attempt annexe countries west would lead destruction empire strategy worked eventually became clear kgb would easier give struggle transfer assets switzerland buy house london create fake democracy back home natos strategy worked believable clear soviet elite president reagan really intend introduce defenses would make soviet missiles ineffective clear america backbone western alliance also entirely committed ruling doctrine attack one member attack the160 falklands war160delivered shock the160 kgb planned assumption western powers would relinquish territory rather embark costly defense assumption absurd officer putin fellow spies well connected western european left knew hostile european socialist parties strategy deterrence british labour party committed time nuclear disarmament cnd german social democrats halfhearted members nato best scandinavian socialists less neutral french whether right left pursued independent strategy whose clear meaning didnt take orders america since time atlantic alliance become radically less credible three factors principally responsible first growth european union policy dissolving national borders160 eu set delegitimize nation state make irrelevant citizens union whether french british polish italian abolish national customs beliefs make longterm patriotic loyalty seriously believable eus attempt replace national european identity however failed widely regarded ridicule moreover eus inability think coherently defense policy soft power makes defense case less inconceivable means motive leads ordinary people defend country time need substantially weakened patriotism seen heresy second fascism list political sins idea people europe might called upon defend borders looks increasingly absurd light official doctrine borders anyway second reason european weakness connected refer guarantee european treaties right work settle part union led massive migration former communist countries west people migrate skilled entrepreneurial educated short elite resolution identity country directly depends soon countries like latvia lithuania poland romania directly threatened militant russia without committed resident class leaders doubt tanks start roll émigré populations countries protest return home fight pointless war leaving newlywon security prosperity behind doubt third factor tending indefensibility europe dwindling american commitment western alliance president gw bush prescient enough revive idea of160 antimissile defenses160in eastern europe military poland czech republic prepared go along putin displayed kgb training immediately declaring purely defensive installations would act aggression old160 newspeakwas trotted effort influence incoming administration president obama predecessors policy effort successful obama weakly conceded point antimissile defenses installed since obama administration continued divert resources attention elsewhere creating distinct impression europe america longer wholeheartedly committed defense americans blamed somewhat absurd usa still maintaining troops germany great expense american taxpayer 70 years end second world war really acceptable time america 60000 troops stationed europe netherlands committed 17000 people defense writing page back november 2012160 doug bandow160pointed today us effectively bankrupt continues write security checks cover160160america accounts almost half worlds military expenditures provides defense guarantees prosperous populous allies throughout asia europe160160moreover us forces wander globe attempting create democracy stability ex nihilo160160at time160 washington160props unpopular dictatorships throughout persian gulf central asia160160this strategy unsustainable surely right president putin aware point american people go defending country like germany country enjoys standard living calculated arouse envy impoverished eastern neighbor selfrighteously preaching soft power non belligerence pampered people point americans going wake fact unscrupulously exploited armed forces trained fight die europe behalf people would dream america prepared die even homeland reasons seems europe rapidly becoming indefensible even putin would prefer soft hard way acquiring continents assets availability hard way surely strengthen hand europe perhaps worth pointing european commissioner foreign affairs effect eus foreign minister is160 baroness ashton labour party appointee house lords ashton began political career campaign nuclear disarmament kgbfunded special operation almost achieved goal making britain indefensible advancing leftist ngos labour party affiliates never standing election life woman representative world international affairs think going risk career defend privileged networks risk ask president putin information my160 dictionary political thought160has relevant entries roger scruton senior fellow ethics public policy center | 668 |
<p />
<p>Democracy in the Middle East continues to be a hugely popular topic of discussion. Its virtues are tirelessly praised by rulers and oppositions alike, by intellectuals and ordinary people, by political prisoners and their prison guards. Yet, in actuality, it also remains an illusion, if not a front to ensure the demise of any real possibility of public participation in decision-making.</p>
<p>Bahrain was the latest Arab country to hold free and fair elections. It managed a reasonable voter turnout of 67 percent. The opposition also did very well, winning 45 percent of the seats. In terms of fairness and transparency, the Bahraini elections could serve as an excellent example of how ‘things are changing’ in the Middle East. More, they might provide Western leaders, such as US President Barack Obama, an opportunity to commend the contribution of American guidance to ‘progress’ in the region.</p>
<p>In actual fact, nothing is changing – except for the insistence by some that it is. Arab governments have made two important discoveries in the last decade.</p>
<p>The first discovery is that US interests cannot peacefully co-exist with true democracies in the region. Egypt had a rude awaking in 2005, when Muslim Brotherhood candidates won fifth of the votes, if not more. This was followed by the unmatched democratic revolution in Palestine when Hamas won the majority of the vote. The aftermath of both of these events was enough to remind both Arabs and the US of the folly of their so-called democracy project.</p>
<p>The second realization is that Arabs are not judged by the genuineness of their democracy; rather, the success of their democratic experiences is judged on the basis of how well they can serve and protect US interests. Since the democracy radar is measured by Washington, Arab countries deemed lacking in democratic reforms are often cited as promising and fledgling democracies in Congressional reports or White House statements. Countries deemed hostile to US economic and political interests are remorselessly shunned, as if their experiments with democracy could never yield anything of worth or consideration.</p>
<p>These two realizations led to a superficial change of course, forming a new trend that Shadi Hamid, writing in Foreign Policy, refers to as “free but unfair — and rather meaningless — election.”</p>
<p>Free elections are known to be the cornerstone of true democracy. Thus by giving the impression of freedom, automatically one tends to conclude fairness. But fairness is nowhere to be found, for if it truly exists then change becomes possible and is likely to follow. Those who have followed the new democratic experiences of some Arab countries will have observed that they have also been defined by the same political stagnation of the pre-democracy years.</p>
<p>American journalist, Sydney J. Harris once wrote, “Democracy is the only system that persists in asking the powers that be whether they are the powers that ought to be.” If Harris is correct, then whatever is underway in the Middle East is anything but democracy. Although new parliamentarians are elected, new faces flash on television, and an increasing number of women are paraded along with their male colleagues following each election, the powers that be remain unchanged, unhinged and truly unchallenged.</p>
<p>Most polls, whether conducted by Arab or non-Arab pollsters, indicate that the vast majority of Arab people view democracy in very positive terms. But the plot has truly thickened in recent years, when on the one hand democracy has become a household name in much of the Middle East, and not one ruler or government contests its virtues. Yet, no true democracy has in fact actualized in any shape or form.</p>
<p>Have Middle Eastern ruling elites figured out the democracy trick, the great con of our time? Have they realized that democracy in the Middle East is only what the White House says it can be?</p>
<p>Israel has mastered this very trick since the day of its inception. This is what Hasan Afif El-Hasan argues in his new and very instructive book, Is the Two-State Solution Already Dead? “The identity of the Israelis in their legal documents and ID cards is expressed in terms of their group religious affiliation as ‘Jewish,’ ‘Muslim,’ ‘Christian’, ‘Bahai,’ ‘Durzi,’ etc., where all privileges are conferred by the state on the Jews by virtue of being Jews, thus making Israel an religio-ethnocracy rather than a liberal democracy.”</p>
<p>Israel’s unique democracy is in fact getting more unique, as non-Jewish citizens of Israel are subjected to increasing levels of legal harassment and are constantly asked to jump through all sorts of political hoops to prove their loyalty to the Jewish state. Still, clever and persistent Israel has managed to present itself to the world at large, Arabs included, as being a model democracy.</p>
<p>This was and continues to be the original democracy con in the Middle East. It took some Arab governments decades to catch up and also present themselves as democratic, whatever the reality on the ground. This is not your everyday democracy scheme. It is particularly devious because it can boast of being free, fair and transparent – and the numbers would actually attest to that – but the political structure would still be construed in such a way that the freely elected parliaments are blocked from legislating effectively to challenge the powers that be. If any legislation is allowed to pass, through, say, unelected upper houses, and approved by the ultimate ruler (both usually serving as an insurance system against elected parliaments), it tends to be unimportant and largely decorative.</p>
<p>Since democracy is always a work in progress, for no country can claim to be perfectly democratic, then Middle East governments can always use this idea to justify their own shortcomings. Expectedly, the US tends to honor that, bestowing praise on their friends, and condemning their enemies – the former for courageously taking on democratic initiatives and the latter for failing the democracy test.</p>
<p>The great democracy con would not succeed, were it not for the fact that many players, including the US, are so invested in its success. As for the ordinary people, who are eager to see their rights respected, freedoms honored, and political horizons expanded, well, they can always vote – even if only their vote actually counts for nothing, and only further validates the very system they are trying to change.</p> | false | 1 | democracy middle east continues hugely popular topic discussion virtues tirelessly praised rulers oppositions alike intellectuals ordinary people political prisoners prison guards yet actuality also remains illusion front ensure demise real possibility public participation decisionmaking bahrain latest arab country hold free fair elections managed reasonable voter turnout 67 percent opposition also well winning 45 percent seats terms fairness transparency bahraini elections could serve excellent example things changing middle east might provide western leaders us president barack obama opportunity commend contribution american guidance progress region actual fact nothing changing except insistence arab governments made two important discoveries last decade first discovery us interests peacefully coexist true democracies region egypt rude awaking 2005 muslim brotherhood candidates fifth votes followed unmatched democratic revolution palestine hamas majority vote aftermath events enough remind arabs us folly socalled democracy project second realization arabs judged genuineness democracy rather success democratic experiences judged basis well serve protect us interests since democracy radar measured washington arab countries deemed lacking democratic reforms often cited promising fledgling democracies congressional reports white house statements countries deemed hostile us economic political interests remorselessly shunned experiments democracy could never yield anything worth consideration two realizations led superficial change course forming new trend shadi hamid writing foreign policy refers free unfair rather meaningless election free elections known cornerstone true democracy thus giving impression freedom automatically one tends conclude fairness fairness nowhere found truly exists change becomes possible likely follow followed new democratic experiences arab countries observed also defined political stagnation predemocracy years american journalist sydney j harris wrote democracy system persists asking powers whether powers ought harris correct whatever underway middle east anything democracy although new parliamentarians elected new faces flash television increasing number women paraded along male colleagues following election powers remain unchanged unhinged truly unchallenged polls whether conducted arab nonarab pollsters indicate vast majority arab people view democracy positive terms plot truly thickened recent years one hand democracy become household name much middle east one ruler government contests virtues yet true democracy fact actualized shape form middle eastern ruling elites figured democracy trick great con time realized democracy middle east white house says israel mastered trick since day inception hasan afif elhasan argues new instructive book twostate solution already dead identity israelis legal documents id cards expressed terms group religious affiliation jewish muslim christian bahai durzi etc privileges conferred state jews virtue jews thus making israel religioethnocracy rather liberal democracy israels unique democracy fact getting unique nonjewish citizens israel subjected increasing levels legal harassment constantly asked jump sorts political hoops prove loyalty jewish state still clever persistent israel managed present world large arabs included model democracy continues original democracy con middle east took arab governments decades catch also present democratic whatever reality ground everyday democracy scheme particularly devious boast free fair transparent numbers would actually attest political structure would still construed way freely elected parliaments blocked legislating effectively challenge powers legislation allowed pass say unelected upper houses approved ultimate ruler usually serving insurance system elected parliaments tends unimportant largely decorative since democracy always work progress country claim perfectly democratic middle east governments always use idea justify shortcomings expectedly us tends honor bestowing praise friends condemning enemies former courageously taking democratic initiatives latter failing democracy test great democracy con would succeed fact many players including us invested success ordinary people eager see rights respected freedoms honored political horizons expanded well always vote even vote actually counts nothing validates system trying change | 566 |
<p>The Opposite of Sex, written and directed by Don Roos, is a young man’s film with all the virtues that natural wit and talent can supply in the absence of maturity, depth and judgment. These last named are qualities which often come to people with time, so we may hope for splendid things in the future, but TOOS is a exercise in tedium punctuated by laughter, if that does not sound like too cryptic a judgment. The jokes, that is, are good, even if the dramatic context is a bore and a half owing to the fact that the film has only one voice, Mr Roos’s, which is not engaging enough to carry a whole film.</p>
<p>Another problem for me was that I found the film’s voiceover narrator, who does most of Mr Roos’s ventriloquism for him, a deeply unattractive character. I applaud the fact that the author has set for himself this exacting test, to make an unpleasant, ungrateful, foul-mouthed, sexually promiscuous 16 year old thief sympathetic to us; but I cannot forbear to report that, for this viewer at any rate, he has failed it. Christina Ricci, the moon-faced little girl from The Addams Family etc, now a moon-faced young woman, plays DeeDee Truitt who, made preganant by her simian boyfriend, Randy (William Scott Lee) decides to do a flit to seek out a half brother, Bill (Martin Donovan), in Indiana. The boyfriend’s brutal unpleasantness is signified, as so often in cinematic circles these days, by devout Christianity, while Bill’s goodness and kindliness is testified to by the fact that he is a homosexual—and one who has recently lost is partner to AIDS.</p>
<p>DeeDee’s voiceover narration is far too obtrusive, coyly self-conscious and marked by what is popularly known as “attitude”—by which expression people intend to convey the idea of a very bad attitude. After a vignette at her stepfather’s funeral in which she defies her mother by throwing other things than dirt into the grave, in order to make a public spectacle of her contempt for the dead man, she proceeds to narrate her packing for departure, which we can see on the screen in po mo style: “This part, where I take the gun, is like, duh, important” and ends with an assurance that she is a very bad girl indeed, certainly not “plucky and scrappy and in need of love. I don’t have a heart of gold and I don’t grow one later, OK?”</p>
<p>It’s not OK, actually, but her seeking our approval is only a gesture. Not that it is not a familiar strategy to defy traditional canons of style which involve the author’s or narrator’s attempts to ingratiate himself or herself with the audience. But to me the tic is quite as phony and quite as annoying as the affectation of charming innocence which it replaced. In fact, quite a lot more so. But for those, and I believe there are many in the fashion, entertainment and media industries, who are still inclined to admire and even celebrate youthful expressions of “attitude,” this will presumably not be a problem.</p>
<p>Bill in Indiana is as soft hearted as expected, taking his half sister in in spite of the doubts of his late lover’s sister, Lucia (Lisa Kudrow) who has more or less moved in with him in order to share her grief for the dead brother, Tom. As DeeDee’s narration has it, “She used to have a life, but she stopped feeding it and it went away.” Both Lucia and Bill are schoolteachers. As a former teacher myself, I think Lucia tough-minded enough for the job, but I doubt that Bill could actually have survived in it for as long as he is supposed to have done. It is a funny idea to have him just blandly correct the grammar (though his own grammar-knowledge seems to be a bit shaky, judging from the terms in which he puts his correction) of a teenage vandal caught writing some obscene graffiti about him in the boys’ lavatory, but in real life such a teacher would be educational dead meat. But then perhaps in America’s public schools today this does not matter.</p>
<p>The loathsome little DeeDee as she is coming to seem—despite, or perhaps because of, the voiceover chumminess—promptly sets to work to seduce the current lover of her half brother, an attractive but quite stupid young man called Matt (Ivan Sergei). As he is so stupid, she easily persuades him to try women (politically Roos may be taking a bit of a risk here) and then informs him that he is the father of her child. Matt’s immediate willingness to take responsibility for the child, even later when thanks to the sharp-eyed Lucia he learns that it is not his own, is meant to be seen as being of a piece with the rest of his stupidity. DeeDee is as usual displaying her “attitude” in defiance: “Love him, hate me, right?” says the tiresome voiceover. Well, yes. Right.</p>
<p>There is a sort of plot involving DeeDee’s and Matt’s disappearance with $10,000 of Bill’s money, Bill’s and Lucia’s attempts to find them, the reappearance of Randy on the scene, more bad behavior on the part of the by-now intolerably arch and cute DeeDee which culminates in a murder, further flight to Canada, and the birth of DeeDee’s baby which is treated, as is by now traditional in American movies by or about homosexuals, as a joyous affirmation of this “unconventional family” grouping. By this time the group includes a young man, Jason Block (Johnny Galecki), who is Matt’s alternative homosexual lover and who attempts to blackmail Bill. Also Carl Tippett (Lyle Lovett), a local sheriff’s deputy who meets cute with Lucia, helps the others through their little legal difficulties and ends up sleeping with Lucia in a highly significant breaking of her emotional dam.</p>
<p>But in a way the point of the film comes at the only moment where wimpy Bill manages to get tough, even though it is with the pathetic Jason, and gives a little speech about having “survived” (typically melodramatic gay language) his schoolyard and adolescence and a hostile political climate represented by “every Republican and every other Democrat” and so unwilling to knuckle under to a little nonentity like him. This defiance prepares him for the lesson he has shortly to learn from the hitherto despised and cretinous Matt, namely that it is time to come to terms at last with Tom’s death. “You don’t get to make it better by being this really good guy who only cares about the insides of people,” Matt tells him. The fact is, “he [i.e. Tom] was robbed”—presumably of his life, presumably by the cosmic mugger and father figure that so many homosexuals love to hate. You’d think an English teacher wouldn’t have to be reminded of the romantic satisfaction to be derived from shaking a fist at the Almighty.</p> | false | 1 | opposite sex written directed roos young mans film virtues natural wit talent supply absence maturity depth judgment last named qualities often come people time may hope splendid things future toos exercise tedium punctuated laughter sound like cryptic judgment jokes good even dramatic context bore half owing fact film one voice mr rooss engaging enough carry whole film another problem found films voiceover narrator mr rooss ventriloquism deeply unattractive character applaud fact author set exacting test make unpleasant ungrateful foulmouthed sexually promiscuous 16 year old thief sympathetic us forbear report viewer rate failed christina ricci moonfaced little girl addams family etc moonfaced young woman plays deedee truitt made preganant simian boyfriend randy william scott lee decides flit seek half brother bill martin donovan indiana boyfriends brutal unpleasantness signified often cinematic circles days devout christianity bills goodness kindliness testified fact homosexualand one recently lost partner aids deedees voiceover narration far obtrusive coyly selfconscious marked popularly known attitudeby expression people intend convey idea bad attitude vignette stepfathers funeral defies mother throwing things dirt grave order make public spectacle contempt dead man proceeds narrate packing departure see screen po mo style part take gun like duh important ends assurance bad girl indeed certainly plucky scrappy need love dont heart gold dont grow one later ok ok actually seeking approval gesture familiar strategy defy traditional canons style involve authors narrators attempts ingratiate audience tic quite phony quite annoying affectation charming innocence replaced fact quite lot believe many fashion entertainment media industries still inclined admire even celebrate youthful expressions attitude presumably problem bill indiana soft hearted expected taking half sister spite doubts late lovers sister lucia lisa kudrow less moved order share grief dead brother tom deedees narration used life stopped feeding went away lucia bill schoolteachers former teacher think lucia toughminded enough job doubt bill could actually survived long supposed done funny idea blandly correct grammar though grammarknowledge seems bit shaky judging terms puts correction teenage vandal caught writing obscene graffiti boys lavatory real life teacher would educational dead meat perhaps americas public schools today matter loathsome little deedee coming seemdespite perhaps voiceover chumminesspromptly sets work seduce current lover half brother attractive quite stupid young man called matt ivan sergei stupid easily persuades try women politically roos may taking bit risk informs father child matts immediate willingness take responsibility child even later thanks sharpeyed lucia learns meant seen piece rest stupidity deedee usual displaying attitude defiance love hate right says tiresome voiceover well yes right sort plot involving deedees matts disappearance 10000 bills money bills lucias attempts find reappearance randy scene bad behavior part bynow intolerably arch cute deedee culminates murder flight canada birth deedees baby treated traditional american movies homosexuals joyous affirmation unconventional family grouping time group includes young man jason block johnny galecki matts alternative homosexual lover attempts blackmail bill also carl tippett lyle lovett local sheriffs deputy meets cute lucia helps others little legal difficulties ends sleeping lucia highly significant breaking emotional dam way point film comes moment wimpy bill manages get tough even though pathetic jason gives little speech survived typically melodramatic gay language schoolyard adolescence hostile political climate represented every republican every democrat unwilling knuckle little nonentity like defiance prepares lesson shortly learn hitherto despised cretinous matt namely time come terms last toms death dont get make better really good guy cares insides people matt tells fact ie tom robbedpresumably life presumably cosmic mugger father figure many homosexuals love hate youd think english teacher wouldnt reminded romantic satisfaction derived shaking fist almighty | 582 |
<p>In 1984 the French scholar Gilles Kepel published a pathbreaking study of modern Islamist movements, issued the following year in a slightly updated edition in English translation as Muslim Extremism in Egypt: The Prophet and Pharaoh (Univ. of California Press). Kepel, who is professor of Middle East Studies at the Institute for Political Studies in Paris, has revisited the subject in his important book, Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam, published last year by Harvard University Press. Michael Cromartie spoke with Kepel in December.</p>
<p>Some commentators on your book suggested that you paint an overly optimistic picture of the future.</p>
<p>Many people do not really understand what I was saying. It’s not an issue of being optimistic or pessimistic; it’s more an issue of trying to be realistic about what is taking place in the Muslim world today.</p>
<p>So it’s more descriptive.</p>
<p>Yes. And it may be perceived as optimistic because, after 9/11, many commentators—who became instant experts on the issue—have described the Muslim world as irredeemably violent, characterized above all by a deep-seated animosity against the West.</p>
<p>We should not mistake the tree for the forest. Making such distinctions is particularly difficult now, but I have been doing that job for 25 years. I was probably the first scholar in the West to write a book on contemporary Islamist movements, Muslim Extremism in Egypt, which I wrote in the mid-1980s. Political Islam is nothing new to me. I’ve always tried to look at it in cold blood.</p>
<p>Today there are signs of increasing openness to democratization. But this is really the only alternative if the whole Muslim world is not to slide back to the Stone Age. They are lagging behind everywhere. They have not created anything in terms of the advancement of science. Their scientists are increasingly poor. There is no upward social mobility. What they have is oil and nothing else. And oil is unevenly distributed. This is the big challenge they are facing.</p>
<p>You say that political Islam has been “two-pronged” from the outset. On the one hand are the Khomeinists, who were behind the 1979 revolution in Iran. On the other hand are the Wahhabis, whose influence is strongest in Saudi Arabia. How are these two kinds of political Islam different?</p>
<p>Well, Khomeinism needed to mobilize the impoverished masses, in order to achieve the aim of toppling the Shah’s system. When Saddam Hussein attacked Iran, the year after the revolution, those impoverished masses were sent to their death in the Iraqi minefields. Much the same thing happened in the French Revolution with the sans-culottes. After the revolution, they were sent to Italy to pillage and loot so they would be estranged from the political center in France. But the Khomeinists had to mobilize the downtrodden masses to bring about revolution, and so from the outset their movement had a socially revolutionary parlance.</p>
<p>In contrast, the Wahhabis were never social revolutionaries. They were, and still are, social conservatives. Their understanding of religion favors the dominance of central Arabian Peninsula Bedouins, and has been used to legitimize their possession of the oil money from the Saudi royal family. To accomplish that, they needed two things. First, they needed to be in a very close alliance with the United States, a deal which was done when FDR met with Ibn Saud after the Yalta conference in February 1945. And, at the same time, they needed to buy peace with their local constituency. They used Islam as a means, if you will: by pretending to be exceedingly pious and uncompromising in religious matters, they deflected criticism for being stooges to the United States and for using the oil money disproportionately for themselves.</p>
<p>Wahhabi Islam was an ally of the West during the Cold War, against Soviet influence in the Middle East, particularly in Egypt, Syria, Iraq, and South Yemen—and ultimately in Afghanistan. After the success of the Iranian revolution in 1979, the Khomeinists hoped to unify the diverse Islamic movements under their control. In response, the United States encouraged the Wahhabi establishment as a counterforce within Islam that might attract young radicals, not to Iran, where they would be used against the West, but to jihad in Afghanistan, where they could be enrolled against the Soviet Union.</p>
<p>You describe a power struggle between these two versions of political Islam throughout the 1980s and 1990s.</p>
<p>Yes, and this has to be understood in the light of U.S. policy. Clearly, through the 1980s there was a strategy of containment, which was designed around Iran so that the Islamic revolution would not spread. Saddam Hussein—who then, we have to remember, was the darling of the West and the darling of conservative Arab states—attacked Iran with the West’s blessing on September 22, 1980. That led to an eight-year trench war, which was absolutely awful, between Iran and Iraq. And simultaneously, there was the jihad in Afghanistan, which was supposed to distract radical revolutionary Muslim youth from attacking the West.</p>
<p>From one point of view, the strategy worked spectacularly well. In 1988 Khomeini had, as he said himself, “to drink from the poisoned chalice,” i.e., he had to sign a cease-fire treaty with Saddam Hussein. And on February 15, 1989, Gorbachev decided to pull out of Afghanistan, which sounded the death knell for the Soviet empire. Everyone focuses on fall of the Berlin Wall, which took place the same year. But there would have been no bringing down of the Berlin Wall had there not been a Soviet pullout that signaled a clear military defeat of the seemingly invincible Red Army.</p>
<p>When I was kid in France, when I wouldn’t eat my soup or whatever, people told me, “You have to be good, otherwise the Soviets in 48 hours can reach you!” The Red Army was seen as a threat. They had been equipped with tanks that could roam all over the flat plains of Central Europe. But they proved inefficient on the very different terrain of Afghanistan. And the shoulder-launched Stinger missiles kept Russian planes out of the skies.</p>
<p>Afghanistan was crucial. I think that historians of the Cold War have downplayed it because they focus on Europe. But the test was Afghanistan. Afghanistan was the Vietnam of the Soviet Union. It was a Vietnam that led to the demise of the entire Soviet empire, which was not the case for the real Vietnam, from which the United States recovered even though it was weakened significantly.</p>
<p>In 1989, then, U.S. policymakers believed that this issue of radical Islam was under control. My contention would be—and I know this is difficult for an American audience to accept—that to a large extent, 9/11 was the “chickens coming home to roost.” That is, it was the outcome of this cheap war in Afghanistan. The United States thought the Afghan jihad was a bargain because no American kids died there; it was only those bearded guys who were freedom fighters, who had no mothers, who would not come to the mall and protest; no Vietnam War mothers. And it was a bargain because the cost of the war was $1.2 billion a year, half of which was covered by the Saudis and the Kuwaitis. Six hundred million dollars a year to topple the Soviet Union was peanuts.</p>
<p>But the war in Afghanistan proved to be a turning point for the Islamist movement. Those who had fought there believed that there was no time anymore for an alliance between the pious middle classes and the young urban revolutionaries. They argued that the Islamist movement should mimic the Afghan jihad experience, seeking to implement something similar in Egypt, in Bosnia, and so on, a sort of guerrilla warfare to seize power.</p>
<p>For their part, the pious middle classes were frightened out of the movement by the violence of the radical youth. Gradually, they sought a new type of alliance with the secular middle classes against authoritarian regimes. So on the one hand, we have bin Laden, who engaged in ultra-terrorism—terrorism as a means to mobilize people through spectacular violence that then is transmitted by the media. And on the other hand, there is the Turkish experiment. In the Justice and Development Party founded by Recep Tayyip Erdogan, you have a core group who in the old days were allied with the radicals, but who have now severed their ties with them, finding common cause with the secular middle classes on the basis of an anti-authoritarian program. The result is a hybrid party, led by former Islamists who now say their goal is democracy, getting into the European Union, and so on. They have to be taken at their word, and we’ll see what happens next. Will they continue to meld with the upwardly mobile secular middle classes, or will they be driven back toward radical violence?</p>
<p>We in the West should be very careful in our analysis. I do not believe that political Islam is a unified movement. On the contrary, it continues to be racked with internal strife and contradictions. We have to assess those contradictions very clearly if we want to understand what we are dealing with.</p>
<p>Does that make you optimistic about the decline of radical Islam?</p>
<p>It’s not the decline of radical Islam. It’s the decline of Islamism as a movement that was able to reconcile the deprived, radical youth and the middle classes. My contention is that the key group within this cluster was the pious middle classes. And they are now seeking alliances with secular middle classes, as in Turkey. Then the radicals are marginalized. That is why they engage in spectacular violence, in order to mobilize those around them. This is a very volatile situation, especially given the potential war on Iraq. Depending upon how the war is managed, those pious middle classes may revert to an alliance with the radicals—if, for instance, the war with Iraq is perceived as a war against Islam—or, on the contrary, they may cling to their newfound alliance with the secular middle classes.</p>
<p>And your prediction is?</p>
<p>I don’t know. I think it will largely depend on how the war is implemented.</p>
<p>&#160;Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam by Gilles Kepel, Anthony Roberts (Translator) Harvard University Press; (April 2002)&#160; 416 pages; 20.97, Hardcover</p>
<p>Source NotesCopyright - 2003 by the author or Christianity Today International/Books &amp; Culture magazine.</p>
<p>Click here for reprint information on Books &amp; Culture.</p>
<p>May/June 2003, Vol. 9, No. 3, Page 7</p> | false | 1 | 1984 french scholar gilles kepel published pathbreaking study modern islamist movements issued following year slightly updated edition english translation muslim extremism egypt prophet pharaoh univ california press kepel professor middle east studies institute political studies paris revisited subject important book jihad trail political islam published last year harvard university press michael cromartie spoke kepel december commentators book suggested paint overly optimistic picture future many people really understand saying issue optimistic pessimistic issue trying realistic taking place muslim world today descriptive yes may perceived optimistic 911 many commentatorswho became instant experts issuehave described muslim world irredeemably violent characterized deepseated animosity west mistake tree forest making distinctions particularly difficult job 25 years probably first scholar west write book contemporary islamist movements muslim extremism egypt wrote mid1980s political islam nothing new ive always tried look cold blood today signs increasing openness democratization really alternative whole muslim world slide back stone age lagging behind everywhere created anything terms advancement science scientists increasingly poor upward social mobility oil nothing else oil unevenly distributed big challenge facing say political islam twopronged outset one hand khomeinists behind 1979 revolution iran hand wahhabis whose influence strongest saudi arabia two kinds political islam different well khomeinism needed mobilize impoverished masses order achieve aim toppling shahs system saddam hussein attacked iran year revolution impoverished masses sent death iraqi minefields much thing happened french revolution sansculottes revolution sent italy pillage loot would estranged political center france khomeinists mobilize downtrodden masses bring revolution outset movement socially revolutionary parlance contrast wahhabis never social revolutionaries still social conservatives understanding religion favors dominance central arabian peninsula bedouins used legitimize possession oil money saudi royal family accomplish needed two things first needed close alliance united states deal done fdr met ibn saud yalta conference february 1945 time needed buy peace local constituency used islam means pretending exceedingly pious uncompromising religious matters deflected criticism stooges united states using oil money disproportionately wahhabi islam ally west cold war soviet influence middle east particularly egypt syria iraq south yemenand ultimately afghanistan success iranian revolution 1979 khomeinists hoped unify diverse islamic movements control response united states encouraged wahhabi establishment counterforce within islam might attract young radicals iran would used west jihad afghanistan could enrolled soviet union describe power struggle two versions political islam throughout 1980s 1990s yes understood light us policy clearly 1980s strategy containment designed around iran islamic revolution would spread saddam husseinwho remember darling west darling conservative arab statesattacked iran wests blessing september 22 1980 led eightyear trench war absolutely awful iran iraq simultaneously jihad afghanistan supposed distract radical revolutionary muslim youth attacking west one point view strategy worked spectacularly well 1988 khomeini said drink poisoned chalice ie sign ceasefire treaty saddam hussein february 15 1989 gorbachev decided pull afghanistan sounded death knell soviet empire everyone focuses fall berlin wall took place year would bringing berlin wall soviet pullout signaled clear military defeat seemingly invincible red army kid france wouldnt eat soup whatever people told good otherwise soviets 48 hours reach red army seen threat equipped tanks could roam flat plains central europe proved inefficient different terrain afghanistan shoulderlaunched stinger missiles kept russian planes skies afghanistan crucial think historians cold war downplayed focus europe test afghanistan afghanistan vietnam soviet union vietnam led demise entire soviet empire case real vietnam united states recovered even though weakened significantly 1989 us policymakers believed issue radical islam control contention would beand know difficult american audience acceptthat large extent 911 chickens coming home roost outcome cheap war afghanistan united states thought afghan jihad bargain american kids died bearded guys freedom fighters mothers would come mall protest vietnam war mothers bargain cost war 12 billion year half covered saudis kuwaitis six hundred million dollars year topple soviet union peanuts war afghanistan proved turning point islamist movement fought believed time anymore alliance pious middle classes young urban revolutionaries argued islamist movement mimic afghan jihad experience seeking implement something similar egypt bosnia sort guerrilla warfare seize power part pious middle classes frightened movement violence radical youth gradually sought new type alliance secular middle classes authoritarian regimes one hand bin laden engaged ultraterrorismterrorism means mobilize people spectacular violence transmitted media hand turkish experiment justice development party founded recep tayyip erdogan core group old days allied radicals severed ties finding common cause secular middle classes basis antiauthoritarian program result hybrid party led former islamists say goal democracy getting european union taken word well see happens next continue meld upwardly mobile secular middle classes driven back toward radical violence west careful analysis believe political islam unified movement contrary continues racked internal strife contradictions assess contradictions clearly want understand dealing make optimistic decline radical islam decline radical islam decline islamism movement able reconcile deprived radical youth middle classes contention key group within cluster pious middle classes seeking alliances secular middle classes turkey radicals marginalized engage spectacular violence order mobilize around volatile situation especially given potential war iraq depending upon war managed pious middle classes may revert alliance radicalsif instance war iraq perceived war islamor contrary may cling newfound alliance secular middle classes prediction dont know think largely depend war implemented 160jihad trail political islam gilles kepel anthony roberts translator harvard university press april 2002160 416 pages 2097 hardcover source notescopyright 2003 author christianity today internationalbooks amp culture magazine click reprint information books amp culture mayjune 2003 vol 9 3 page 7 | 881 |
<p>This essay draws from Mr. Kurtz’s new book, <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/312807/burn-down-suburbs-stanley-kurtz" type="external">Spreading the Wealth: How Obama Is Robbing the Suburbs to Pay for the Cities</a>.</p>
<p>President Obama is not a fan of America’s suburbs. Indeed, he intends to abolish them. With suburban voters set to be the swing constituency of the 2012 election, the administration’s plans for this segment of the electorate deserve scrutiny. Obama is a longtime supporter of “regionalism,” the idea that the suburbs should be folded into the cities, merging schools, housing, transportation, and above all taxation. To this end, the president has already put programs in place designed to push the country toward a sweeping social transformation in a possible second term. The goal: income equalization via a massive redistribution of suburban tax money to the cities.</p>
<p>Obama’s plans to undercut the political and economic independence of America’s suburbs reach back decades. The community organizers who trained him in the mid-1980s blamed the plight of cities on taxpayer “flight” to suburbia. Beginning in the mid-1990s, Obama’s mentors at the Gamaliel Foundation (a community-organizing network Obama helped found) formally dedicated their efforts to the budding fight against suburban “sprawl.” From his positions on the boards of a couple of left-leaning Chicago foundations, Obama channeled substantial financial support to these efforts. On entering politics, he served as a dedicated ally of his mentors’ anti-suburban activism.</p>
<p>The alliance endures. One of Obama’s original trainers, Mike Kruglik, has hived off a new organization called Building One America, which continues Gamaliel’s anti-suburban crusade under another name. Kruglik and his close allies, David Rusk and Myron Orfield, intellectual leaders of the “anti-sprawl” movement, have been quietly working with the Obama administration for years on an ambitious program of social reform.</p>
<p>In July of 2011, Kruglik’s Building One America held a conference at the White House. Orfield and Rusk made presentations, and afterwards Kruglik personally met with the president in the Oval Office. The ultimate goal of the movement led by Kruglik, Rusk, and Orfield is quite literally to abolish the suburbs. Knowing that this could never happen through outright annexation by nearby cities, they’ve developed ways to coax suburbs to slowly forfeit their independence.</p>
<p>One approach is to force suburban residents into densely packed cities by blocking development on the outskirts of metropolitan areas, and by discouraging driving with a blizzard of taxes, fees, and regulations. Step two is to move the poor out of cities by imposing low-income-housing quotas on development in middle-class suburbs. Step three is to export the controversial “regional tax-base sharing” scheme currently in place in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area to the rest of the country. Under this program, a portion of suburban tax money flows into a common regional pot, which is then effectively redistributed to urban, and a few less well-off “inner-ring” suburban, municipalities.</p>
<p>The Obama administration, stocked with “regionalist” appointees, has been advancing this ambitious plan quietly for the past four years. Efforts to discourage driving and to press development into densely packed cities are justified by reference to fears of global warming. Leaders of the crusade against “sprawl” very consciously use environmental concerns as a cover for their redistributive schemes.</p>
<p>The centerpiece of the Obama administration’s anti-suburban plans is a little-known and seemingly modest program called the Sustainable Communities Initiative. The “regional planning grants” funded under this initiative—many of them in battleground states like Florida, Virginia, and Ohio—are set to recommend redistributive policies, as well as transportation and development plans, designed to undercut America’s suburbs. Few have noticed this because the program’s goals are muffled in the impenetrable jargon of “sustainability,” while its recommendations are to be unveiled only in a possible second Obama term.</p>
<p>Obama’s former community-organizing mentors and colleagues want the administration to condition future federal aid on state adherence to the recommendations served up by these anti-suburban planning commissions. That would quickly turn an apparently modest set of regional-planning grants into a lever for sweeping social change.</p>
<p>In light of Obama’s unbroken history of collaboration with his organizing mentors on this anti-suburban project, and his proven willingness to impose ambitious policy agendas on the country through heavy-handed regulation, this project seems likely to advance.</p>
<p>A second and equally ambitious facet of Obama’s anti-suburban blueprint involves the work of Kruglik’s Building One America. Traditionally, Alinskyite community organizers mobilize leftist church groups. Kruglik’s group goes a step further by organizing not only the religious left but politicians from relatively less-well-off inner-ring suburbs. The goal is to build coalitions between urban and inner-ring suburban state legislators, in a bid to force regional tax-base sharing on middle-class suburbanites. That is how the practice came to Minnesota.</p>
<p>The July 2011 White House conference, gathering inner-ring suburban politicians for presentations by Rusk and Orfield, was an effort to place the prestige of the Obama administration behind Kruglik’s organizing efforts. A multi-state battle over regional tax-base “sharing,” abetted by the president, would usher in divisive class warfare on a scale likely to dwarf the puny efforts of Occupy Wall Street.</p>
<p>Obama’s little-known plans to undermine the political and economic autonomy of America’s suburbs constitute a policy initiative similar in ambition to health-care reform, the stimulus, or “cap-and-trade.” Obama’s anti-suburban plans also supply the missing link that explains his administration’s overall policy architecture.</p>
<p>Since the failure of Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty and the collapse of federal urban policy, leftist theorists of community organizing have advocated a series of moves designed to quietly redistribute tax money to the cities. Health-care reform and federal infrastructure spending (as in the stimulus) are backed by organizers as the best ways to reconstitute an urban policy without directly calling it that. A campaign against suburban “sprawl” under the guise of environmentalism is the next move. Open calls for suburban tax-base “sharing” are the final and most controversial link in the chain of a reconstituted and redistributive urban policy. President Obama is following this plan.</p>
<p>Middle-class suburban supporters of the president take note. It isn’t just the pocketbooks of the “1 percent” he’s after; it’s yours.</p>
<p>Stanley Kurtz is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and the author of <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/redirect/amazon.p?j=1595230920" type="external">Spreading the Wealth: How Obama is Robbing the Suburbs to Pay for the Cities</a>.</p> | false | 1 | essay draws mr kurtzs new book spreading wealth obama robbing suburbs pay cities president obama fan americas suburbs indeed intends abolish suburban voters set swing constituency 2012 election administrations plans segment electorate deserve scrutiny obama longtime supporter regionalism idea suburbs folded cities merging schools housing transportation taxation end president already put programs place designed push country toward sweeping social transformation possible second term goal income equalization via massive redistribution suburban tax money cities obamas plans undercut political economic independence americas suburbs reach back decades community organizers trained mid1980s blamed plight cities taxpayer flight suburbia beginning mid1990s obamas mentors gamaliel foundation communityorganizing network obama helped found formally dedicated efforts budding fight suburban sprawl positions boards couple leftleaning chicago foundations obama channeled substantial financial support efforts entering politics served dedicated ally mentors antisuburban activism alliance endures one obamas original trainers mike kruglik hived new organization called building one america continues gamaliels antisuburban crusade another name kruglik close allies david rusk myron orfield intellectual leaders antisprawl movement quietly working obama administration years ambitious program social reform july 2011 krugliks building one america held conference white house orfield rusk made presentations afterwards kruglik personally met president oval office ultimate goal movement led kruglik rusk orfield quite literally abolish suburbs knowing could never happen outright annexation nearby cities theyve developed ways coax suburbs slowly forfeit independence one approach force suburban residents densely packed cities blocking development outskirts metropolitan areas discouraging driving blizzard taxes fees regulations step two move poor cities imposing lowincomehousing quotas development middleclass suburbs step three export controversial regional taxbase sharing scheme currently place minneapolisst paul area rest country program portion suburban tax money flows common regional pot effectively redistributed urban less welloff innerring suburban municipalities obama administration stocked regionalist appointees advancing ambitious plan quietly past four years efforts discourage driving press development densely packed cities justified reference fears global warming leaders crusade sprawl consciously use environmental concerns cover redistributive schemes centerpiece obama administrations antisuburban plans littleknown seemingly modest program called sustainable communities initiative regional planning grants funded initiativemany battleground states like florida virginia ohioare set recommend redistributive policies well transportation development plans designed undercut americas suburbs noticed programs goals muffled impenetrable jargon sustainability recommendations unveiled possible second obama term obamas former communityorganizing mentors colleagues want administration condition future federal aid state adherence recommendations served antisuburban planning commissions would quickly turn apparently modest set regionalplanning grants lever sweeping social change light obamas unbroken history collaboration organizing mentors antisuburban project proven willingness impose ambitious policy agendas country heavyhanded regulation project seems likely advance second equally ambitious facet obamas antisuburban blueprint involves work krugliks building one america traditionally alinskyite community organizers mobilize leftist church groups krugliks group goes step organizing religious left politicians relatively lesswelloff innerring suburbs goal build coalitions urban innerring suburban state legislators bid force regional taxbase sharing middleclass suburbanites practice came minnesota july 2011 white house conference gathering innerring suburban politicians presentations rusk orfield effort place prestige obama administration behind krugliks organizing efforts multistate battle regional taxbase sharing abetted president would usher divisive class warfare scale likely dwarf puny efforts occupy wall street obamas littleknown plans undermine political economic autonomy americas suburbs constitute policy initiative similar ambition healthcare reform stimulus capandtrade obamas antisuburban plans also supply missing link explains administrations overall policy architecture since failure lyndon johnsons war poverty collapse federal urban policy leftist theorists community organizing advocated series moves designed quietly redistribute tax money cities healthcare reform federal infrastructure spending stimulus backed organizers best ways reconstitute urban policy without directly calling campaign suburban sprawl guise environmentalism next move open calls suburban taxbase sharing final controversial link chain reconstituted redistributive urban policy president obama following plan middleclass suburban supporters president take note isnt pocketbooks 1 percent hes stanley kurtz senior fellow ethics public policy center author spreading wealth obama robbing suburbs pay cities | 631 |
<p>WASHINGTON (AP) — Vice President Mike Pence is making his fourth visit to Israel, returning to a region he's visited "a million times" in his heart.</p>
<p>An evangelical Christian with strong ties to the Holy Land, Pence this time comes packing two key policy decisions in his bags that have long been top priorities for him: designating Jerusalem as Israel's capital and curtailing aid for Palestinians.</p>
<p />
<p>Pence departed as scheduled Friday evening as U.S. lawmakers sought to avert a federal government shutdown at midnight. Alyssa Farah, a Pence spokeswoman, said the trip was "integral to America's national security and diplomatic objectives" and would go on as scheduled. Pence was set to depart Friday evening, and Air Force Two was expected to land in Ireland for a refueling stop early Saturday en route to Cairo.</p>
<p>During a stopover in Ireland, Pence greeted US soldiers at Shannon Airport in Ireland hours after the federal government shutdown. Pence told troops: "We'll get this thing figured out in Washington."</p>
<p>He told the soldiers to "stay focused on your mission."</p>
<p>Pence told reporters that "we have soldiers that are headed down range to Kuwait for six months in a critical theater to serve the country, and yet because of Democrats in the Senate, they have anxiety about their pay."</p>
<p>He said: "It's disappointing to every American that Democrats would shut down the government at a time when we have troops in harms way."</p>
<p />
<p>Since his days in Congress a decade ago, Pence has played a role in pushing both for the shift in U.S. policy related to the capital and for placing limits on funding for Palestinian causes long criticized by Israel.</p>
<p>Traveling to Israel just as Palestinians have condemned recent decisions by President Donald Trump's administration, Pence will arrive in the region as a longtime stalwart supporter of Israel who has questioned the notion of the U.S. serving as an "honest broker" in the stalled peace process.</p>
<p>"The United States certainly wants to be honest, but we don't want to be a broker," Pence once told the Christian Broadcasting Network in 2010. "A broker doesn't take sides. A broker negotiates between parties of equals."</p>
<p>The vice president will hold four days of meetings in Egypt, Jordan and Israel during his visit, the first to the region by a senior administration official since Trump announced plans in December to designate Jerusalem as Israel's capital and begin the process of moving the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv, angering Palestinian leaders.</p>
<p>His trip will also follow Tuesday's announcement that the U.S. is withholding $65 million of a planned $125 million funding installment to the U.N. Relief and Works Agency, which provides health care, education and social services to Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon.</p>
<p>Both decisions have come as Trump has expressed frustration over a lack of progress in restarting peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, who withdrew plans to meet with Pence during his visit to the Middle East.</p>
<p>Senior White House officials said security issues, countering terrorism and efforts to push back against Iran would figure prominently during Pence's trip, which concludes on Tuesday. But the vice president also is expected to face questions about Israel's future.</p>
<p>On the embassy, Pence played a steady role in pushing for the shift in U.S. policy. The decision upended past U.S. views that Jerusalem's status should be decided in negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, who claim east Jerusalem as the capital of their future state.</p>
<p>Pence had wanted the Trump administration to convey "a clear-cut policy" on Jerusalem after the president asked him last summer to visit the Middle East, White House officials have said.</p>
<p>Pence discussed the issue with Jewish and evangelical leaders in the months leading up to the decision and advocated for the plan within the administration. But he noted to religious leaders late last year that the decision was the president's alone and would fulfill a commitment from the 2016 campaign.</p>
<p>Pence has long aligned himself with Israel.</p>
<p>In Congress, he pushed for limiting U.S. aid to the Palestinian Authority during the presidency of George W. Bush, warning the funding could be redirected to groups like the militant Hamas movement, which controls Gaza.</p>
<p>He was a vocal advocate for Israel's security fence and co-sponsored the Jerusalem Embassy and Recognition Act in 2011 to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's undivided capital. Veteran House members recall Pence's role as a staunch ally of Israeli causes and his steadfast support for moving the embassy to Jerusalem at times when few were talking about the issue.</p>
<p>As Indiana's governor, Pence signed a bill requiring the state to divest from any business that engaged in the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement — a grassroots international boycott movement against Israel.</p>
<p>Kenneth Weinstein, CEO of the Hudson Institute, a conservative think tank, said it has been "central to his political life from the absolute outset, from when he first ran for Congress — it's something that's central to who he is, to what he believes in."</p>
<p>Pence traveled to Israel for the first time as an Indiana congressman in January 2004, joining a delegation from the Jewish Federation of Greater Indianapolis. He placed a wreath at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial and visited the Western Wall, both of which are on Pence's itinerary again next week, and he had a private meeting with then-Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.</p>
<p>Doug Rose, a philanthropist in Indianapolis, flew with Pence on his 2004 trip to Israel and recalled him being deeply affected by the experience. "How could you not be moved?" Rose said of their site visits.</p>
<p>Pence told the Indiana Jewish Post and Opinion after his 2004 trip that he was often asked if he had been to Israel before, "and my response was, 'Only in my dreams.' I was raised an evangelical Christian and tried to read the Bible every day, so in my mind and in my heart I have been there a million times."</p>
<p>Trump's decision on Jerusalem has drawn protests from Middle Eastern leaders and prompted Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to pull out of a planned meeting with Pence in the biblical West Bank town of Bethlehem. Administration officials said Pence is not expected to meet with Palestinian leaders during the trip.</p>
<p>Pence remains popular with evangelical voters in the U.S., a large and influential constituency that helped propel Trump to victory in last year's election. American evangelicals, especially the older generation, have a strong affinity for Israel, drawn both on spiritual grounds and a genuine love for the modern-day country and the Jewish people.</p>
<p>"From our very first meeting, I knew this was a man deeply committed to standing with Israel," said the Rev. John Hagee, founder and chairman of Christians United for Israel, whose organization helped pay for a portion of Pence's trip to Israel with family members in 2014.</p>
<p>Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein, the U.S.-born founder and president of the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews, a charity that raises tens of millions of dollars for Israeli causes from American evangelicals, said Pence's upcoming visit should go over well with evangelicals and help shore up their support for the Trump administration.</p>
<p>"He's an extension of evangelicalism and evangelical feelings for Israel, and its history," Eckstein said. "Trump doesn't have that history. Pence has that history of being pro-Israel."</p>
<p>This story is <a href="http://newsroom.ap.org/search/?query=byline:%22KEN%20THOMAS%20and%20TOM%20LoBIANCO%22&amp;mediaType=text&amp;st=keyword&amp;sortOrder=newest" type="external">By KEN THOMAS and TOM LoBIANCO</a>, Associated Press___</p>
<p>Associated Press writer Josef Federman in Jerusalem contributed to this report.</p> | false | 1 | washington ap vice president mike pence making fourth visit israel returning region hes visited million times heart evangelical christian strong ties holy land pence time comes packing two key policy decisions bags long top priorities designating jerusalem israels capital curtailing aid palestinians pence departed scheduled friday evening us lawmakers sought avert federal government shutdown midnight alyssa farah pence spokeswoman said trip integral americas national security diplomatic objectives would go scheduled pence set depart friday evening air force two expected land ireland refueling stop early saturday en route cairo stopover ireland pence greeted us soldiers shannon airport ireland hours federal government shutdown pence told troops well get thing figured washington told soldiers stay focused mission pence told reporters soldiers headed range kuwait six months critical theater serve country yet democrats senate anxiety pay said disappointing every american democrats would shut government time troops harms way since days congress decade ago pence played role pushing shift us policy related capital placing limits funding palestinian causes long criticized israel traveling israel palestinians condemned recent decisions president donald trumps administration pence arrive region longtime stalwart supporter israel questioned notion us serving honest broker stalled peace process united states certainly wants honest dont want broker pence told christian broadcasting network 2010 broker doesnt take sides broker negotiates parties equals vice president hold four days meetings egypt jordan israel visit first region senior administration official since trump announced plans december designate jerusalem israels capital begin process moving us embassy tel aviv angering palestinian leaders trip also follow tuesdays announcement us withholding 65 million planned 125 million funding installment un relief works agency provides health care education social services palestinians west bank gaza strip jordan syria lebanon decisions come trump expressed frustration lack progress restarting peace negotiations israel palestinians withdrew plans meet pence visit middle east senior white house officials said security issues countering terrorism efforts push back iran would figure prominently pences trip concludes tuesday vice president also expected face questions israels future embassy pence played steady role pushing shift us policy decision upended past us views jerusalems status decided negotiations israel palestinians claim east jerusalem capital future state pence wanted trump administration convey clearcut policy jerusalem president asked last summer visit middle east white house officials said pence discussed issue jewish evangelical leaders months leading decision advocated plan within administration noted religious leaders late last year decision presidents alone would fulfill commitment 2016 campaign pence long aligned israel congress pushed limiting us aid palestinian authority presidency george w bush warning funding could redirected groups like militant hamas movement controls gaza vocal advocate israels security fence cosponsored jerusalem embassy recognition act 2011 recognize jerusalem israels undivided capital veteran house members recall pences role staunch ally israeli causes steadfast support moving embassy jerusalem times talking issue indianas governor pence signed bill requiring state divest business engaged boycott divestment sanctions movement grassroots international boycott movement israel kenneth weinstein ceo hudson institute conservative think tank said central political life absolute outset first ran congress something thats central believes pence traveled israel first time indiana congressman january 2004 joining delegation jewish federation greater indianapolis placed wreath yad vashem holocaust memorial visited western wall pences itinerary next week private meeting thenisraeli prime minister ariel sharon doug rose philanthropist indianapolis flew pence 2004 trip israel recalled deeply affected experience could moved rose said site visits pence told indiana jewish post opinion 2004 trip often asked israel response dreams raised evangelical christian tried read bible every day mind heart million times trumps decision jerusalem drawn protests middle eastern leaders prompted palestinian president mahmoud abbas pull planned meeting pence biblical west bank town bethlehem administration officials said pence expected meet palestinian leaders trip pence remains popular evangelical voters us large influential constituency helped propel trump victory last years election american evangelicals especially older generation strong affinity israel drawn spiritual grounds genuine love modernday country jewish people first meeting knew man deeply committed standing israel said rev john hagee founder chairman christians united israel whose organization helped pay portion pences trip israel family members 2014 rabbi yechiel eckstein usborn founder president international fellowship christians jews charity raises tens millions dollars israeli causes american evangelicals said pences upcoming visit go well evangelicals help shore support trump administration hes extension evangelicalism evangelical feelings israel history eckstein said trump doesnt history pence history proisrael story ken thomas tom lobianco associated press___ associated press writer josef federman jerusalem contributed report | 731 |
<p>WASHINGTON — A Republican bill to repeal Obamacare appeared doomed late Monday when Sen. Susan Collins said she would vote against the measure, despite last-minute revisions and a hearing held to sway reluctant GOP lawmakers.</p>
<p>Collins, R-Maine, said the bill makes “sweeping changes and cuts in the Medicaid program.”</p>
<p>“This would have a devastating impact to a program that has been on the books for 50 years and provides health care to our most vulnerable citizens, including disabled children and low-income seniors,” she said in a statement.</p>
<p>Her announcement came after the release of a partial analysis of the bill by the Congressional Budget Office, which said millions would lose coverage under it. The CBO told Senate leaders that a full analysis would not be available by this week, when the chamber had been expected to vote.</p>
<p>Collins’ decision made her the third Republican to oppose the measure, along with Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Rand Paul, R-Ky., killing the bill unless one of them flips back in the coming days.</p>
<p>Collins’ announcement came during a Senate hearing on the bill.</p>
<p>The hearing was immediately interrupted when protesters, including many in wheelchairs, erupted into a chant: “Don’t touch the Medicaid, save our liberty.” It was then postponed as members of the Capitol Police arrested those who refused to stop disrupting the proceedings.</p>
<p>The protests underscored the emotions on both sides of the debate on the <a href="" type="internal">GOP repeal effort to curb spending and replace the Affordable Care Act</a>, commonly known as Obamacare, passed by Democrats in 2010.</p>
<p>Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, opened the hearing 20 minutes late and warned lawmakers and audience members to refrain from outbursts that make “good fodder” for television or Twitter.</p>
<p>But the ranking Democrat, Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, called the hearing an “abomination” that was hastily thrown together.</p>
<p>First public airing</p>
<p>The hearing was the first public airing since the bill was introduced this month by Sens. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and Bill Cassidy, R-La., and joined by co-sponsors Sens. Dean Heller, R-Nev., and Ron Johnson, R-Wis.</p>
<p>Employer and individual mandates would be eliminated, and states would be given waivers on regulations and flexibility in spending the federal money. The bill would also end the Medicaid expansion embraced by Nevada and 31 other states and the District of Columbia and repackage and distribute some of those funds for subsidies and Medicaid to states under a block grant system.</p>
<p>“I believe our plan is the best path forward,” Heller said.</p>
<p>Heller said Nevadans face higher premiums and fewer choices under Obamacare. He said the bill would give states more flexibility to serve “Medicaid populations as they see fit.”</p>
<p>Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval, a Republican, has <a href="" type="internal">joined a bipartisan group of governors who oppose the bill</a> because of Medicaid cuts.</p>
<p>But Graham warned: “Medicaid is on an unsustainable path.”</p>
<p>Sen. Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii, who has stage 4 kidney cancer, said the bill lacks “compassion” for people with long-term illness because it would cap coverage.</p>
<p>Hirono said the bill “treats health care like a commodity that can be bought or sold.”</p>
<p>Dick Woodruff with the American Cancer Society said the bill would push insurance companies to offer basic plans that would put cancer patients and survivors at risk of inadequate treatment.</p>
<p>Trump turns up pressure</p>
<p>President Donald Trump on Monday pressured Republican lawmakers to support the bill.</p>
<p>“Alaska, Arizona, Maine and Kentucky are big winners in the Healthcare proposal,” he wrote on Twitter. “7 years of Repeal &amp;Replace and some Senators not there.”</p>
<p>Last week, <a href="" type="internal">McCain said he would vote “no”</a>and denounced the partisan process used to ram the health care bill through the Senate.</p>
<p>Paul, R-Ky., said Monday he would vote against the revised bill, just hours before Collins announced her opposition.</p>
<p>Sen. Lisa Murkowsi, R-Alaska, who <a href="" type="internal">voted against a repeal bill in July</a>, voiced concerns about Medicaid cuts to her state. She remained uncommitted Monday.</p>
<p>Cassidy acknowledged that sponsors made changes to formulas in the bill that would give Hawaii and Alaska more funds because of their low population and high cost of living.</p>
<p>But as tweaks were made to appease moderates, conservatives like Sens. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Mike Hill, R-Utah, said they were still reviewing the legislation.</p>
<p>And Graham told the Senate hearing he was getting pushback from GOP colleagues “because I leave the taxes in place.”</p>
<p>Republicans control the Senate with a razor-thin 52-48 majority. They need 50 votes, plus a tiebreaker by Vice President Mike Pence, to pass the legislation under budget rules that expire on Saturday.</p>
<p>When the rule expires, 60 votes would be needed to clear parliamentary hurdles and cut off debate to end a filibuster.</p>
<p>Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., wants to bring the repeal bill to the Senate floor this week. An administration official said that could occur as early as Wednesday.</p>
<p>But McConnell may not call for a vote if he believes it will fail as previous Obamacare repeal bills did in July.</p>
<p>Democrats are united in their opposition. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev., said the bill would roll back the Medicaid gains in the Silver State under Sandoval.</p>
<p>Bipartisan approach urged</p>
<p>Sandoval and the bipartisan group of governors have urged the Senate to shelve the bill and seek a bipartisan approach to shoring up individual insurance markets.</p>
<p>The Nevada governor reiterated his opposition again last week, citing cuts in Medicaid and the potential loss of coverage for Nevadans who became eligible under the expansion — roughly 300,000 people.</p>
<p>Independent analysis shows Nevada could also lose $2 billion from 2020 to 2026 because of Medicaid cuts in the bill, according to Avalere Health, a private consulting firm.</p>
<p>States, like Nevada, would also see arbitrary caps on Medicaid coverage for programs, including maternity, disabilities and those for the elderly under the bill, said Cindy Mann, the former deputy administrator and director of the Center for Medicaid and CHIP Services.</p>
<p>Mann said the bipartisan group of governors was correct in seeking a bipartisan step forward, because many states would suffer under the reshuffling of Medicaid spending.</p>
<p>“You could say it creates a one-size-fits-all funding formula,” Mann said.</p>
<p>In Pennsylvania, passage of the GOP bill would give the state only two years to create a new health care system, said Teresa Miller, the acting secretary for the Department of Human Services in that state.</p>
<p>That is too short a period, she said, noting it took the state four years to implement Obamacare.</p>
<p>“We have had less than two weeks to analyze this bill,” Miller said.</p>
<p>Contact Gary Martin at 202-662-7390 or [email protected]. Follow <a href="https://twitter.com/garymartindc" type="external">@garymartindc</a> on Twitter.</p>
<p>Key provisions of health-care bill</p>
<p>— Repeals Obamacare individual and employer mandates.</p>
<p>— Repeals Obamacare medical device tax.</p>
<p>— Gives states flexibility to wave Obamacare regulations on insurance coverage.</p>
<p>— Redistributes Medicaid expansion funds through block grants to all 50 states.</p>
<p /> | false | 1 | washington republican bill repeal obamacare appeared doomed late monday sen susan collins said would vote measure despite lastminute revisions hearing held sway reluctant gop lawmakers collins rmaine said bill makes sweeping changes cuts medicaid program would devastating impact program books 50 years provides health care vulnerable citizens including disabled children lowincome seniors said statement announcement came release partial analysis bill congressional budget office said millions would lose coverage cbo told senate leaders full analysis would available week chamber expected vote collins decision made third republican oppose measure along sens john mccain rariz rand paul rky killing bill unless one flips back coming days collins announcement came senate hearing bill hearing immediately interrupted protesters including many wheelchairs erupted chant dont touch medicaid save liberty postponed members capitol police arrested refused stop disrupting proceedings protests underscored emotions sides debate gop repeal effort curb spending replace affordable care act commonly known obamacare passed democrats 2010 senate finance committee chairman orrin hatch rutah opened hearing 20 minutes late warned lawmakers audience members refrain outbursts make good fodder television twitter ranking democrat sen ron wyden oregon called hearing abomination hastily thrown together first public airing hearing first public airing since bill introduced month sens lindsey graham rsc bill cassidy rla joined cosponsors sens dean heller rnev ron johnson rwis employer individual mandates would eliminated states would given waivers regulations flexibility spending federal money bill would also end medicaid expansion embraced nevada 31 states district columbia repackage distribute funds subsidies medicaid states block grant system believe plan best path forward heller said heller said nevadans face higher premiums fewer choices obamacare said bill would give states flexibility serve medicaid populations see fit nevada gov brian sandoval republican joined bipartisan group governors oppose bill medicaid cuts graham warned medicaid unsustainable path sen mazie hirono dhawaii stage 4 kidney cancer said bill lacks compassion people longterm illness would cap coverage hirono said bill treats health care like commodity bought sold dick woodruff american cancer society said bill would push insurance companies offer basic plans would put cancer patients survivors risk inadequate treatment trump turns pressure president donald trump monday pressured republican lawmakers support bill alaska arizona maine kentucky big winners healthcare proposal wrote twitter 7 years repeal ampreplace senators last week mccain said would vote noand denounced partisan process used ram health care bill senate paul rky said monday would vote revised bill hours collins announced opposition sen lisa murkowsi ralaska voted repeal bill july voiced concerns medicaid cuts state remained uncommitted monday cassidy acknowledged sponsors made changes formulas bill would give hawaii alaska funds low population high cost living tweaks made appease moderates conservatives like sens ted cruz rtexas mike hill rutah said still reviewing legislation graham told senate hearing getting pushback gop colleagues leave taxes place republicans control senate razorthin 5248 majority need 50 votes plus tiebreaker vice president mike pence pass legislation budget rules expire saturday rule expires 60 votes would needed clear parliamentary hurdles cut debate end filibuster senate majority leader mitch mcconnell rky wants bring repeal bill senate floor week administration official said could occur early wednesday mcconnell may call vote believes fail previous obamacare repeal bills july democrats united opposition sen catherine cortez masto dnev said bill would roll back medicaid gains silver state sandoval bipartisan approach urged sandoval bipartisan group governors urged senate shelve bill seek bipartisan approach shoring individual insurance markets nevada governor reiterated opposition last week citing cuts medicaid potential loss coverage nevadans became eligible expansion roughly 300000 people independent analysis shows nevada could also lose 2 billion 2020 2026 medicaid cuts bill according avalere health private consulting firm states like nevada would also see arbitrary caps medicaid coverage programs including maternity disabilities elderly bill said cindy mann former deputy administrator director center medicaid chip services mann said bipartisan group governors correct seeking bipartisan step forward many states would suffer reshuffling medicaid spending could say creates onesizefitsall funding formula mann said pennsylvania passage gop bill would give state two years create new health care system said teresa miller acting secretary department human services state short period said noting took state four years implement obamacare less two weeks analyze bill miller said contact gary martin 2026627390 gmartinreviewjournalcom follow garymartindc twitter key provisions healthcare bill repeals obamacare individual employer mandates repeals obamacare medical device tax gives states flexibility wave obamacare regulations insurance coverage redistributes medicaid expansion funds block grants 50 states | 730 |
<p>This Saturday marks the end of the second year of Russia’s military operation in Syria. It’s seen some setbacks, a few major victories, the potential to end the bloody conflict and the risk of rapid descent into a conflict between Russia and the US.</p>
<p>Russia’s campaign in Syria was officially launched on September 30, 2015, following several weeks of preparing a base of operations near Latakia and transporting military assets there.</p>
<p>Read more</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/361144-russia-syria-campaign-anniversary/" type="external" /></p>
<p>Acting on a request from the Syrian government, Moscow said its involvement was necessary to prevent jihadist forces from taking over the country and turning it into a major hotbed of terrorism, which would threaten Russia as well as other countries.</p>
<p>RT takes a look at major events that happened over the second year of the Syria campaign.</p>
<p>In September 2016, Syrian government forces with Russian air support began an operation to capture Aleppo, once Syria’s manufacturing capital. The city at the time was divided into roughly equal parts, with the western half controlled by Damascus forces and the eastern part held by several armed groups opposing them. Among the militants on the so-call ‘rebel’ side was a significant presence of hardcore jihadists from the group best-known as Al-Nusra Front.</p>
<p>The intermingling of the groups was a constant source of tension between the US and Russia, with Washington accusing Moscow of targeting “moderate” groups in Aleppo, and Moscow complaining that the US was unable to pressure “good” rebels to stay clear of “bad” terrorists. This failure was cited by Russia as a major factor leading to a collapse of a <a href="https://www.rt.com/op-edge/358906-geneva-truce-syria-plan-lavrov-kerry/" type="external">ceasefire</a> agreed by the two nations under the Obama administration, which led to the Aleppo offensive.</p>
<p>The nature of urban fighting combined with the rebel groups’ reluctance to <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/362895-aleppo-rebels-hostage-civilians/" type="external">allow civilians to leave</a> their part of the city resulted in a heavy death toll. The blame for the civilian casualties was squarely laid on Russia by Western politicians and mainstream media, with terms like “war crimes” and “barbarism” <a href="https://www.rt.com/op-edge/363036-aleppo-disaster-world-war-kerry/" type="external">used liberally</a>.</p>
<p>Read more</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/370364-anissa-aleppo-twitter-shelling/" type="external" /></p>
<p>The accusatory coverage or operation rose to a crescendo in December 2016, when so-called ‘ <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/371250-aleppo-journalist-suicide-vest/" type="external">civilian journalists</a>’ bombarded Western audiences with ‘last goodbyes from the Russia-destroyed Aleppo’. The desperate call proved to be ridiculous, as days or weeks later the same people were safely evacuated from the city.</p>
<p>The reality of Aleppo months after its capture by the Syrian Army is that hundreds of thousands of displaced people <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/399414-syria-refugees-return-home/" type="external">returned there</a>, despite residual problems any city that endured years of battles would have.</p>
<p>While gaining ground in the west of Syria, Damascus forces suffered a setback in Palmyra, an ancient and culturally-significant city in the central part of the country. The terrorist group Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) amassed a strong force and <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/369931-isis-regroups-attacks-palmyra/" type="external">took back</a> the city, which it had lost in March 2016.</p>
<p>The liberation of Palmyra was a key achievement for Russia’s campaign in 2016, so losing Palmyra back to the same jihadists was a humiliation, even if it only lasted for several months. In March, Damascus was able to free up enough forces previously engaged in the Aleppo siege to push IS out of Palmyra.</p>
<p>Read more</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/402042-syria-deir-ezzor-siege-break/" type="external" /></p>
<p>The current focus for Damascus and Russia is Deir ez-Zor governorate in the east of Syria. The eponymous provincial capital remained under IS siege for years, with the militants controlling the rural part of the province and outskirts of the city, and the government loyalists holding the center. With supply lines cut by the blockade, the garrison had to rely on high-altitude airdrops to continue fighting.</p>
<p>The blockade was finally lifted in early September 2017, a development that Russia considers a turning point for defeating IS in Syria. At the moment, some 87 percent of the Syrian territory is under control of Damascus, according to the <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/404153-syria-liberated-isis-russia/" type="external">estimate</a> of the Russian Defense Ministry.</p>
<p>The Islamist group still controls parts of Raqqa, a city considered its ‘Syrian capital’, but it is expected to fall in the hands of US-backed predominantly Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) before year’s end.</p>
<p>The Deir ez-Zor offensive also marked the most significant loss by the Russian military in its modern history. Lieutenant-General Valery Asapov, the senior member in the group of Russian advisers helping the Syrian Army, was killed along with two aides in shelling. This increased the number of Russian troops killed during the operation reported by the Defense Ministry to 35.</p>
<p>[embedded content]</p>
<p>While IS remains a credible threat in some parts of Syria and does not hesitate to poke both troops loyal to Damascus and the Kurdish militias, the group’s attention has apparently shifted to other parts of the world such as Libya. And with this common enemy all but defeated, the future becomes uncertain over whether other parties of the conflict can overcome their differences, especially with the Americans joining the action full-swing.</p>
<p>US President Donald Trump’s many broken election promises included changing the Obama-era policy on Syria and striking a deal with Russia to defeat IS together. What happened instead is more US involvement in Syria and an increasing risk of an armed conflict with Russia.</p>
<p>The new US administration’s Syria campaign started with an incident in Khan Shaykhun, a small town in Idlib governorate controlled by the rebels.</p>
<p>The incident was described by the White House as a chemical weapons attack by the Syrian government, with the media uncritically supporting <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/384419-us-russia-damascus-chemical-narratives/" type="external">the narrative</a> while dismissing evidence and arguments <a href="https://www.rt.com/usa/384800-syria-gas-professor-addendum/" type="external">to the contrary</a>. So far, no on-site inspection of the alleged attack site by international inspectors has been conducted.</p>
<p>Read more</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/usa/383975-brian-williams-syria-airstrike-beautiful/" type="external" /></p>
<p>Trump milked the incident to get a moment of almost universal domestic praise, when he ordered a barrage of Tomahawk missiles to obliterate the airbase from which the supposed attack was launched. He even bragged about it to visiting Chinese President Xi Jinping, who didn’t comment on whether he appreciated the <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/386792-us-strike-syria-dinner-entertainment/" type="external">after-dinner entertainment</a>.</p>
<p>The Tomahawk show of force reportedly had a minimal effect on Damascus military capabilities. It also paved the way for much stronger US presence on the ground in Syria. Under Obama it was limited to small-scale missions of special operations forces, but Trump allowed the Pentagon to <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/379977-us-marines-syria-raqqa/" type="external">send in the US Marines</a> along with artillery and other heavy weapons, de facto occupying part of Syria.</p>
<p>It’s not like the flights of the American-led coalition through Syrian airspace were any more legal, but the mew deployment made US disregard for international law even more glaring.</p>
<p>The Americans are propping up the Syrian Democratic Force, a coalition of militias dominated by Kurdish fighters, which the US chose over Turks to lay a siege on Raqqa. The decision further strained Washington’s relations with its NATO ally, which sees any <a href="https://www.rt.com/usa/360194-obama-arming-kurds-syria/" type="external">empowerment of Kurds</a> in Syria or Iraq as an indirect support of Kurdish guerrillas in its own territory. American support of Kurdish militias is nothing new, but Trump’s move seems to have alienated Ankara enough for it to imply that Turkey may <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/404181-turks-brag-russian-sam/" type="external">need to shoot down</a> American-made warplanes.</p>
<p>America’s support of militias in Syria goes beyond just arms and training. Over the past few months, American forces have attacked troops loyal to Damascus on several occasions for allegedly violating borders of US-controlled zones.</p>
<p>Read more</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/391150-coalition-strike-syria-forces/" type="external" /></p>
<p>More importantly, the SDF has its own agenda, which goes beyond defeating IS, and it puts it at odds with the Syrian Army. <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/402995-syria-us-deir-ez-zor-oil/" type="external">Oilfields in Deir ez-Zor</a> governorate may still be under jihadist control, but whichever side manages to capture them will have better chances of keeping them and profiting from extraction in the future.</p>
<p>The tension between the local players apparently spills out on their foreign backers. The tone of the Russian Defense Ministry reports on the Syrian campaign has been turning increasingly hostile towards the US this month. Moscow <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/404010-us-nusra-idlib-offensive/" type="external">laid the blame</a> on Washington for triggering last week’s surprise jihadist offensive from Idlib governorate, which put three dozen Russian military police troops at risk of being captured or killed.</p>
<p>Russian media reported that the accusation came after intelligence on the units’ positions, which Russia reported to the US, was shared with a “moderate” group and later leaked to the Islamists.</p>
<p>The Russian military said SDF shillings of positions of the Syrian army in Deir ez-Zor endangered Russian military advisors embedded there and <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/404040-russian-mod-sdf-syria/" type="external">threatened retaliation</a>. And a senior Russian diplomat <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/404510-syria-russia-general-usa/" type="external">attributed the death</a> of the Russian General to American “hypocrisy”, with Washington rejecting the assentation.</p>
<p><a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2017/09/18/politics/russia-us-syria-bomb-deir-ezzor/index.html" type="external">Some reports</a> indicate that American troops on the ground could have been killed by Russian warplanes, an allegation that <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/sep/17/syria-russian-airstrike-wounds-six-us-backed-fighters" type="external">Moscow denies</a>.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, the risk of a direct military confrontation between Russia and the US in Syria seems to be rising.</p>
<p>On the bright side, dramatic changes in attitudes are possible in the Syrian conflict, as evidenced by Russia’s rapprochement with Turkey. Last year the two nations seemed to be on the brink of a shooting war, after Turkey shot down a Russian warplane in November 2015. Now Moscow and Ankara seem to have overcome their differences and are working together with Iran on stopping the war in Syria.</p>
<p>Read more</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/404951-putin-erdogan-ankara-meeting/" type="external" /></p>
<p>The spectacular transformation was evidenced during the last days of the battle for Aleppo. It was the trilateral agreement between Russia, Turkey and Iran that allowed the negotiation of an end to hostilities there and an evacuation of those unwilling to live under Damascus control.</p>
<p>Later the same deal-makers negotiated so-called de-escalation zones, an ongoing mechanism meant to curb violence in Syria and eventually lead to a country-wide truce.</p>
<p>The plan is progressing, with some rough moments like the latest jihadist offensive from Idlib, but it seems to have succeeded in curbing the violence in Syria. Some observers say it amounts to a partitioning of the country, an allegation that Moscow <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/395860-russia-us-syria-cooperation/" type="external">strongly denies</a>.</p>
<p>Russia says stopping the violence and reducing humanitarian suffering is necessary to give the Syrians a chance to talk out how they want to live.</p> | false | 1 | saturday marks end second year russias military operation syria seen setbacks major victories potential end bloody conflict risk rapid descent conflict russia us russias campaign syria officially launched september 30 2015 following several weeks preparing base operations near latakia transporting military assets read acting request syrian government moscow said involvement necessary prevent jihadist forces taking country turning major hotbed terrorism would threaten russia well countries rt takes look major events happened second year syria campaign september 2016 syrian government forces russian air support began operation capture aleppo syrias manufacturing capital city time divided roughly equal parts western half controlled damascus forces eastern part held several armed groups opposing among militants socall rebel side significant presence hardcore jihadists group bestknown alnusra front intermingling groups constant source tension us russia washington accusing moscow targeting moderate groups aleppo moscow complaining us unable pressure good rebels stay clear bad terrorists failure cited russia major factor leading collapse ceasefire agreed two nations obama administration led aleppo offensive nature urban fighting combined rebel groups reluctance allow civilians leave part city resulted heavy death toll blame civilian casualties squarely laid russia western politicians mainstream media terms like war crimes barbarism used liberally read accusatory coverage operation rose crescendo december 2016 socalled civilian journalists bombarded western audiences last goodbyes russiadestroyed aleppo desperate call proved ridiculous days weeks later people safely evacuated city reality aleppo months capture syrian army hundreds thousands displaced people returned despite residual problems city endured years battles would gaining ground west syria damascus forces suffered setback palmyra ancient culturallysignificant city central part country terrorist group islamic state formerly isisisil amassed strong force took back city lost march 2016 liberation palmyra key achievement russias campaign 2016 losing palmyra back jihadists humiliation even lasted several months march damascus able free enough forces previously engaged aleppo siege push palmyra read current focus damascus russia deir ezzor governorate east syria eponymous provincial capital remained siege years militants controlling rural part province outskirts city government loyalists holding center supply lines cut blockade garrison rely highaltitude airdrops continue fighting blockade finally lifted early september 2017 development russia considers turning point defeating syria moment 87 percent syrian territory control damascus according estimate russian defense ministry islamist group still controls parts raqqa city considered syrian capital expected fall hands usbacked predominantly kurdish syrian democratic forces sdf years end deir ezzor offensive also marked significant loss russian military modern history lieutenantgeneral valery asapov senior member group russian advisers helping syrian army killed along two aides shelling increased number russian troops killed operation reported defense ministry 35 embedded content remains credible threat parts syria hesitate poke troops loyal damascus kurdish militias groups attention apparently shifted parts world libya common enemy defeated future becomes uncertain whether parties conflict overcome differences especially americans joining action fullswing us president donald trumps many broken election promises included changing obamaera policy syria striking deal russia defeat together happened instead us involvement syria increasing risk armed conflict russia new us administrations syria campaign started incident khan shaykhun small town idlib governorate controlled rebels incident described white house chemical weapons attack syrian government media uncritically supporting narrative dismissing evidence arguments contrary far onsite inspection alleged attack site international inspectors conducted read trump milked incident get moment almost universal domestic praise ordered barrage tomahawk missiles obliterate airbase supposed attack launched even bragged visiting chinese president xi jinping didnt comment whether appreciated afterdinner entertainment tomahawk show force reportedly minimal effect damascus military capabilities also paved way much stronger us presence ground syria obama limited smallscale missions special operations forces trump allowed pentagon send us marines along artillery heavy weapons de facto occupying part syria like flights americanled coalition syrian airspace legal mew deployment made us disregard international law even glaring americans propping syrian democratic force coalition militias dominated kurdish fighters us chose turks lay siege raqqa decision strained washingtons relations nato ally sees empowerment kurds syria iraq indirect support kurdish guerrillas territory american support kurdish militias nothing new trumps move seems alienated ankara enough imply turkey may need shoot americanmade warplanes americas support militias syria goes beyond arms training past months american forces attacked troops loyal damascus several occasions allegedly violating borders uscontrolled zones read importantly sdf agenda goes beyond defeating puts odds syrian army oilfields deir ezzor governorate may still jihadist control whichever side manages capture better chances keeping profiting extraction future tension local players apparently spills foreign backers tone russian defense ministry reports syrian campaign turning increasingly hostile towards us month moscow laid blame washington triggering last weeks surprise jihadist offensive idlib governorate put three dozen russian military police troops risk captured killed russian media reported accusation came intelligence units positions russia reported us shared moderate group later leaked islamists russian military said sdf shillings positions syrian army deir ezzor endangered russian military advisors embedded threatened retaliation senior russian diplomat attributed death russian general american hypocrisy washington rejecting assentation reports indicate american troops ground could killed russian warplanes allegation moscow denies nevertheless risk direct military confrontation russia us syria seems rising bright side dramatic changes attitudes possible syrian conflict evidenced russias rapprochement turkey last year two nations seemed brink shooting war turkey shot russian warplane november 2015 moscow ankara seem overcome differences working together iran stopping war syria read spectacular transformation evidenced last days battle aleppo trilateral agreement russia turkey iran allowed negotiation end hostilities evacuation unwilling live damascus control later dealmakers negotiated socalled deescalation zones ongoing mechanism meant curb violence syria eventually lead countrywide truce plan progressing rough moments like latest jihadist offensive idlib seems succeeded curbing violence syria observers say amounts partitioning country allegation moscow strongly denies russia says stopping violence reducing humanitarian suffering necessary give syrians chance talk want live | 941 |
<p />
<p>The terms “conspiracy theorist” and “conspiracy nut” are used frequently to discredit a perceived adversary using emotional rather than logical appeals. It’s important for the sake of true argument that we define the term “conspiracy” and use it appropriately, not as an ad hominem attack on someone whose point of view we don’t share.</p>
<p>According to my Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary, the word “conspiracy” derives from the Latin “conspirare,” which means literally “to breathe together” in the sense of agreeing to commit a crime. The primary definition is “planning and acting together secretly, especially for a harmful or unlawful purpose, such as murder or treason.”</p>
<p>It was in this sense that Mark Twain astutely observed, “A conspiracy is nothing but a secret agreement of a number of men for the pursuance of policies which they dare not admit in public.”</p>
<p>Conspiracies are common. If they weren’t, police stations would not need conspiracy units to investigate and prosecute crimes such as “conspiracy to import cocaine” or any other collusion on the part of two or more people to subvert the law.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, too many people smugly chide “conspiracy theories” as if they imagine that such a derisive characterization reflects superior intellect—whether or not they know anything about the issue in question. It’s a pitiful display of ego inflation and intellectual dishonesty, yet it appears to be a common approach preferred by those either short on information and critical thinking skills or harboring a hidden agenda.</p>
<p>Here are a few examples of past “conspiracy theories” that have been commonly derided but were later determined to be credible:</p>
<p><a href="http://www.npr.org/2012/02/12/145472726/when-the-bankers-plotted-to-overthrow-fdr" type="external">1933 Business Plot</a>: &#160;Smedley Butler, a decorated United States Marine Corps major general, who wrote a book called <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0082GYYNI/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=B0082GYYNI&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=forepolijour-20&amp;linkId=ZQ7NB4MWC5QJCE6U" type="external">War is a Racket</a>, testified before a congressional committee that a group of powerful industrialists, who had tried to recruit him, were planning to form a fascist veterans’ group that intended to assassinate Franklin Roosevelt and overthrow the government in a coup. While news media at the time belittled Butler and called the affair a hoax, the congressional committee determined that Butler’s allegations were credible, although no-one was prosecuted.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.c-span.org/video/?317955-1/book-discussion-operation-paperclip" type="external">Project Paperclip</a>: &#160;After “winning” World War II, the US imported hundreds of Nazis and their families through “Project Paperclip,” so-named because ID photos were clipped to paper dossiers. It was set up by an agency within the Office of Strategic Services, predecessor of the CIA. Along with creating false identities and political biographies, Paperclip operatives expunged or altered Nazi records and other criminal histories in order to illegally circumvent President Truman’s edict that prohibited Nazis from obtaining security clearances. Thus, high-level Nazis waltzed into sensitive positions of authority and secrecy in the US military-industrial establishment, including the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), major corporations, and universities. These Germans were conveniently referred to as “former Nazis,” but “former” was commonly just a euphemism for “active” and “ardent.”</p>
<p>Consider the irony of the United States’ moon mission. In order to successfully land men on the lunar surface and return them to Earth, the US depended almost exclusively on Nazis. A notable example was rocket scientist Wernher von Braun, a member of the Allgemeine SS, who would eventually lead the US space program. Von Braun had exploited concentration camp labor in Germany to build V-2 rockets at Peenemünde, and German aviation doctors’ gruesome and often fatal experiments at Dachau and other prisons afforded information that would help keep American astronauts alive in space.</p>
<p>While many Americans would prefer to call it a conspiracy theory, the United States defeated the Nazi organization in Germany only to transplant that ideology directly into the US after the war, and not just among members of the lay population but, more significantly, among members of the very “military-industrial complex” that President Eisenhower (a five-star general during WWII) had presciently warned the nation about in his <a href="http://beallyoucanbe.us/?p=246" type="external">1961 message</a> of leave-taking and farewell.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IygchZRJVXM" type="external">Operation Northwoods</a>: &#160;Declassified documents revealed that in 1962 the CIA was planning to execute false flag terrorist attacks, such as killing random American citizens and blowing up civilian targets, including a US airliner and ship, in order to blame Castro and justify invading Cuba.</p>
<p><a href="http://whatreallyhappened.com/RANCHO/CRASH/TWA/TONKIN.html" type="external">Gulf of Tonkin</a>: &#160;President Lyndon Johnson used a contrived version of this 1964 event to justify escalation of the Vietnam War. It was claimed that Vietnamese gunboats had fired on the USS Maddox. It never happened—or at best was grossly distorted and overblown—yet the story served to prompt Congress to pass the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which provided the public justification Johnson needed to attack North Vietnam. This led to the deaths of about two million Vietnamese people and fifty thousand Americans.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i46RI2twVao" type="external">MK-ULTRA</a>: &#160;As its code name suggests, MK-ULTRA was a mind control program run by the Office of Scientific Intelligence for the ostensible purpose of discovering ways to glean information from Communist spies although its applications were undoubtedly more far-reaching. It employed various methodologies including sensory deprivation and isolation, sexual abuse, and the administration of powerful psychotropic drugs such as LSD to unwitting subjects, including military personnel, prisoners, and college students. Many of them suffered serious consequences. One biochemist, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/27/us/family-of-frank-olson-man-drugged-by-cia-plans-suit.html?_r=1&amp;" type="external">Frank Olson</a>, who was secretly slipped a strong dose of LSD at a CIA meeting, suffered a severe psychotic break and died when, for whatever reason, he plummeted from his apartment window to the pavement below. Such revelations came to light in 1975 during hearings by the congressional Church Committee (Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities) and the presidential Rockefeller Commission. These investigations were hindered by CIA Director Richard Helms who in 1973 had ordered the MK-ULTRA files destroyed.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDCfTIapds0" type="external">Operation Mockingbird</a>: This was a CIA media control program exposed by the Church Committee in 1975. It revealed the CIA’s efforts from the 1950s through the 1970s to pay well-known foreign and domestic journalists from “reputable” media agencies such as the Washington Post, Time Magazine, Newsweek, the Miami Herald, the New York Times, the New York Herald Tribune, Miami News, and CBS, among others, to publish CIA propaganda, manipulating the news by planting stories in domestic and foreign news outlets. During the hearings, Senator Church asked an agency representative, “Do you have any people paid by the CIA who are working for television networks?” The speaker eyed his lawyer then replied, “This I think gets into the details, Mr. Chairman, that I’d like to get into in executive session.” In other words, he didn’t want to admit the truth publicly. He gave the same response when asked if the CIA planted stories with the major wire services United Press International (UPI) and the Associated Press (AP). In his 1997 book, Virtual Government —&#160;in the chapter “’And Now a Word from Our Sponsor – The CIA’: The Birth of Operation Mockingbird, the Takeover of the Corporate Press &amp; the Programming of Public Opinion” — Alex Constantine claims that during the 1950s “some 3,000 salaried and contract CIA employees were eventually engaged in propaganda efforts.” I’m curious to know what the estimate would be today.</p>
<p>CIA Drug Smuggling: It’s no longer a secret that clandestine arms of US Intelligence have profited from running drugs for many years. I first became aware of the issue when a Vietnam veteran claimed he had helped load opium cultivated in Laos onto military transport planes. The opium was turned into heroin and shipped around the world, sometimes in the visceral cavities of dead soldiers. A Hollywood version of these events is portrayed in the film <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qp2YTmdjnC4" type="external">Air America</a>, but the movie is based on historical truth. When the US military presence in Southeast Asia declined and the focus shifted to Central America, cocaine became the new revenue source. Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6dHqP9wc3k" type="external">Gary Webb</a> ran a well-documented three-part series in the San Jose Mercury News called “Dark Alliance” alleging that traffickers with US intelligence ties had marketed the cocaine in Los Angeles and other cities where it was turned into the new and highly addictive form known as “crack,” inflicting a scourge that claimed the lives and freedom of thousands. One guy I met in Compton who had been arrested for crack possession described the drug this way: “It doesn’t really get you high,” he said. “You just want more.” Webb’s allegations were confirmed by an LAPD Narcotics Officer and whistleblower, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UT5MY3C86bk" type="external">Michael Ruppert</a>, and the story received additional confirmation from CIA contract pilot <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-9VYoo_z300" type="external">Terry Reed</a>, whose story is revealed in his 1994 book <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1561712493/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=1561712493&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=forepolijour-20&amp;linkId=TQ6RUQESOA3HPHSA" type="external">Compromised: Clinton, Bush and the CIA</a>. According to Reed, the sale of cocaine was used to finance the Contras in Central America when congressional funding was blocked by the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boland_Amendment" type="external">Boland Amendment</a>. He claimed the operation was run out of Mena, Arkansas when Bill Clinton was governor. Military cargo planes were flown to Central America with military hardware, he said, and then returned to Mena loaded with coke.</p>
<p>I could add to the list, and it would be a long one. The Iran-Contra scandal, Watergate, the FBI’s Counter Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO), the Tuskegee syphilis experiment—there is no shortage of crimes that were planned and committed by two or more people and thus constituted conspiracy. Conspiracies happen, and before any crime is solved it spawns theories. There are people who look at these theories rationally using logic and discernment, and there are others who are illogical, engaging in fallacious, emotion-based thinking and jumping to unjustified conclusions based on little or no evidence. The term “conspiracy theorist,” however, has been manipulated to suggest only those in the latter category.</p>
<p>The John F. Kennedy assassination provides a good example of how the term “conspiracy” has been misapplied to disparage people who find fault with official versions of major events. After Kennedy was murdered, very few people questioned the Warren Commission’s verdict that Lee Oswald had shot the president unassisted, and anyone who challenged that belief was branded a “conspiracy nut” (or buff) unworthy of respect or consideration. Forty years later, a 2003 Gallup poll revealed that 75% of the US population believed there had been a conspiracy to kill JFK.</p>
<p>Apparently some people have a psychological need to protect themselves from unpleasant realities, so it’s easier for them to label others as conspiracy nuts than to assimilate hard but discomforting facts. In the case of the John Kennedy assassination, even a congressional committee, the <a href="http://www.archives.gov/research/jfk/select-committee-report/" type="external">House Select Committee on Assassinations</a>, concluded in 1979 that there had been a conspiracy to kill John Kennedy. They tried to soften that reality by calling it a “limited conspiracy” as if Oswald’s drunken cousin had helped him and not elements of US Intelligence, but the fact remains that the US government has officially admitted there was a conspiracy to assassinate Kennedy. “Conspiracy theorists” were finally vindicated, but I’ve never heard anyone apologize for disparaging their names and questioning their sanity.</p>
<p>“9/11,” of course, is the current topic that yields the most accusations of conspiracy nuttiness. Anyone who challenges the 9/11 Commission’s conclusions are branded “conspiracy theorists” (or nuts, wackos or kooks) as were their predecessors when JFK was killed.</p>
<p>History repeats itself.</p>
<p>One of the strange truths about the 9/11 affair is that members of the 9/11 Commission also called the event a conspiracy. That alone shows the term is being intentionally manipulated. In the Commission’s view, the conspirators were exclusively fanatical Muslims, but somehow that investigative body has been exempt from accusations of conspiracy theorizing even though they called the event a conspiracy. Apparently one must challenge the official version of events to qualify as a “conspiracy theorist.”</p>
<p>I asked <a href="http://jimmarrs.com/" type="external">Jim Marrs</a>, the popular author and critic of various official versions of history, what he considered to be the origin of “conspiracy” as a derogatory term and how it has been manipulated: “The term ‘conspiracy theory’ was consciously submitted to assets of the CIA back in a document from the 1960s to be used to counter factual information that was continually being made public regarding the Kennedy assassination. From there, these assets, including media personalities, pundits, academics and government officials, expanded the term to become a pejorative for any statements not complying with the Establishment line,” Marrs said. “However, its repetitive overuse, plus the fact that the 9/11 attacks obviously involved a conspiracy, today has lessened the impact of the term.”</p>
<p>Many critics of the 9/11 Commission report make some valid points, and it’s not fair to simply dismiss them as conspiracy theorists when the very people they’re countering also claim there was a conspiracy. The question is simply: whose conspiracy was it?</p>
<p>Even officials tasked with investigating 9/11 knew there was plenty of deception involved. Senior Counsel to the 9/11 Commission, John Farmer, said on page four of his book <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002RSF8D2/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=B002RSF8D2&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=forepolijour-20&amp;linkId=CYQTPQUDZKBMDYXZ" type="external">The Ground Truth</a>, “At some level of government, at some point in time, there was an agreement not to tell the people the truth about what happened.” In their book <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000JMKNFG/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=B000JMKNFG&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=forepolijour-20&amp;linkId=F733V5XLS2C2EHCR" type="external">Without Precedent: The Inside Story of the 9/11 Commission</a>, the two co-chairs of the 9/11 Commission, Lee Hamilton and Thomas Kean, outlined reasons they believe the government established the Commission in a manner that ensured its failure. These reasons included delay in initiating the proceedings, too short a deadline for the scope of the work, insufficient funding, and lack of cooperation by politicians and key government agencies including the Department of Defense, the Federal Aviation Administration, and NORAD. “So there were all kinds of reasons we thought we were set up to fail,” the chairmen said.</p>
<p>How much clearer can they be?</p>
<p>Conspiracies exist. They have always existed, and not wanting them to be true does not invalidate their existence. I think it’s time we reject the intentional misappropriation of the term “conspiracy” by forces attempting to manipulate public opinion and restore the term to its original and proper meaning. As long as we observe logic and reason, there is no intellectual dishonor in contemplating and discussing conspiracies, and doing so is imperative if we wish to retain what’s left of our liberties.</p>
<p>A version of this article was originally published at <a href="http://www.opednews.com/" type="external">OpEdNews.com</a>.</p>
<p>[Correction, Oct. 28, 2014: An earlier version of this article mistakenly stated that&#160;a chapter title of&#160;Alex Constantine’s 1997 book&#160;Virtual Government is “Mockingbird: The Subversion of The Free Press by the CIA”. The chapter is titled “‘And Now a Word from Our Sponsor – The CIA’: The Birth of Operation Mockingbird, the Takeover of the Corporate Press &amp; the Programming of Public Opinion.” The text has been revised to correct the error.]</p> | false | 1 | terms conspiracy theorist conspiracy nut used frequently discredit perceived adversary using emotional rather logical appeals important sake true argument define term conspiracy use appropriately ad hominem attack someone whose point view dont share according websters unabridged dictionary word conspiracy derives latin conspirare means literally breathe together sense agreeing commit crime primary definition planning acting together secretly especially harmful unlawful purpose murder treason sense mark twain astutely observed conspiracy nothing secret agreement number men pursuance policies dare admit public conspiracies common werent police stations would need conspiracy units investigate prosecute crimes conspiracy import cocaine collusion part two people subvert law unfortunately many people smugly chide conspiracy theories imagine derisive characterization reflects superior intellectwhether know anything issue question pitiful display ego inflation intellectual dishonesty yet appears common approach preferred either short information critical thinking skills harboring hidden agenda examples past conspiracy theories commonly derided later determined credible 1933 business plot 160smedley butler decorated united states marine corps major general wrote book called war racket testified congressional committee group powerful industrialists tried recruit planning form fascist veterans group intended assassinate franklin roosevelt overthrow government coup news media time belittled butler called affair hoax congressional committee determined butlers allegations credible although noone prosecuted project paperclip 160after winning world war ii us imported hundreds nazis families project paperclip sonamed id photos clipped paper dossiers set agency within office strategic services predecessor cia along creating false identities political biographies paperclip operatives expunged altered nazi records criminal histories order illegally circumvent president trumans edict prohibited nazis obtaining security clearances thus highlevel nazis waltzed sensitive positions authority secrecy us militaryindustrial establishment including national aeronautics space administration nasa major corporations universities germans conveniently referred former nazis former commonly euphemism active ardent consider irony united states moon mission order successfully land men lunar surface return earth us depended almost exclusively nazis notable example rocket scientist wernher von braun member allgemeine ss would eventually lead us space program von braun exploited concentration camp labor germany build v2 rockets peenemünde german aviation doctors gruesome often fatal experiments dachau prisons afforded information would help keep american astronauts alive space many americans would prefer call conspiracy theory united states defeated nazi organization germany transplant ideology directly us war among members lay population significantly among members militaryindustrial complex president eisenhower fivestar general wwii presciently warned nation 1961 message leavetaking farewell operation northwoods 160declassified documents revealed 1962 cia planning execute false flag terrorist attacks killing random american citizens blowing civilian targets including us airliner ship order blame castro justify invading cuba gulf tonkin 160president lyndon johnson used contrived version 1964 event justify escalation vietnam war claimed vietnamese gunboats fired uss maddox never happenedor best grossly distorted overblownyet story served prompt congress pass gulf tonkin resolution provided public justification johnson needed attack north vietnam led deaths two million vietnamese people fifty thousand americans mkultra 160as code name suggests mkultra mind control program run office scientific intelligence ostensible purpose discovering ways glean information communist spies although applications undoubtedly farreaching employed various methodologies including sensory deprivation isolation sexual abuse administration powerful psychotropic drugs lsd unwitting subjects including military personnel prisoners college students many suffered serious consequences one biochemist frank olson secretly slipped strong dose lsd cia meeting suffered severe psychotic break died whatever reason plummeted apartment window pavement revelations came light 1975 hearings congressional church committee select committee study governmental operations respect intelligence activities presidential rockefeller commission investigations hindered cia director richard helms 1973 ordered mkultra files destroyed operation mockingbird cia media control program exposed church committee 1975 revealed cias efforts 1950s 1970s pay wellknown foreign domestic journalists reputable media agencies washington post time magazine newsweek miami herald new york times new york herald tribune miami news cbs among others publish cia propaganda manipulating news planting stories domestic foreign news outlets hearings senator church asked agency representative people paid cia working television networks speaker eyed lawyer replied think gets details mr chairman id like get executive session words didnt want admit truth publicly gave response asked cia planted stories major wire services united press international upi associated press ap 1997 book virtual government 160in chapter word sponsor cia birth operation mockingbird takeover corporate press amp programming public opinion alex constantine claims 1950s 3000 salaried contract cia employees eventually engaged propaganda efforts im curious know estimate would today cia drug smuggling longer secret clandestine arms us intelligence profited running drugs many years first became aware issue vietnam veteran claimed helped load opium cultivated laos onto military transport planes opium turned heroin shipped around world sometimes visceral cavities dead soldiers hollywood version events portrayed film air america movie based historical truth us military presence southeast asia declined focus shifted central america cocaine became new revenue source pulitzer prizewinning journalist gary webb ran welldocumented threepart series san jose mercury news called dark alliance alleging traffickers us intelligence ties marketed cocaine los angeles cities turned new highly addictive form known crack inflicting scourge claimed lives freedom thousands one guy met compton arrested crack possession described drug way doesnt really get high said want webbs allegations confirmed lapd narcotics officer whistleblower michael ruppert story received additional confirmation cia contract pilot terry reed whose story revealed 1994 book compromised clinton bush cia according reed sale cocaine used finance contras central america congressional funding blocked boland amendment claimed operation run mena arkansas bill clinton governor military cargo planes flown central america military hardware said returned mena loaded coke could add list would long one irancontra scandal watergate fbis counter intelligence program cointelpro tuskegee syphilis experimentthere shortage crimes planned committed two people thus constituted conspiracy conspiracies happen crime solved spawns theories people look theories rationally using logic discernment others illogical engaging fallacious emotionbased thinking jumping unjustified conclusions based little evidence term conspiracy theorist however manipulated suggest latter category john f kennedy assassination provides good example term conspiracy misapplied disparage people find fault official versions major events kennedy murdered people questioned warren commissions verdict lee oswald shot president unassisted anyone challenged belief branded conspiracy nut buff unworthy respect consideration forty years later 2003 gallup poll revealed 75 us population believed conspiracy kill jfk apparently people psychological need protect unpleasant realities easier label others conspiracy nuts assimilate hard discomforting facts case john kennedy assassination even congressional committee house select committee assassinations concluded 1979 conspiracy kill john kennedy tried soften reality calling limited conspiracy oswalds drunken cousin helped elements us intelligence fact remains us government officially admitted conspiracy assassinate kennedy conspiracy theorists finally vindicated ive never heard anyone apologize disparaging names questioning sanity 911 course current topic yields accusations conspiracy nuttiness anyone challenges 911 commissions conclusions branded conspiracy theorists nuts wackos kooks predecessors jfk killed history repeats one strange truths 911 affair members 911 commission also called event conspiracy alone shows term intentionally manipulated commissions view conspirators exclusively fanatical muslims somehow investigative body exempt accusations conspiracy theorizing even though called event conspiracy apparently one must challenge official version events qualify conspiracy theorist asked jim marrs popular author critic various official versions history considered origin conspiracy derogatory term manipulated term conspiracy theory consciously submitted assets cia back document 1960s used counter factual information continually made public regarding kennedy assassination assets including media personalities pundits academics government officials expanded term become pejorative statements complying establishment line marrs said however repetitive overuse plus fact 911 attacks obviously involved conspiracy today lessened impact term many critics 911 commission report make valid points fair simply dismiss conspiracy theorists people theyre countering also claim conspiracy question simply whose conspiracy even officials tasked investigating 911 knew plenty deception involved senior counsel 911 commission john farmer said page four book ground truth level government point time agreement tell people truth happened book without precedent inside story 911 commission two cochairs 911 commission lee hamilton thomas kean outlined reasons believe government established commission manner ensured failure reasons included delay initiating proceedings short deadline scope work insufficient funding lack cooperation politicians key government agencies including department defense federal aviation administration norad kinds reasons thought set fail chairmen said much clearer conspiracies exist always existed wanting true invalidate existence think time reject intentional misappropriation term conspiracy forces attempting manipulate public opinion restore term original proper meaning long observe logic reason intellectual dishonor contemplating discussing conspiracies imperative wish retain whats left liberties version article originally published opednewscom correction oct 28 2014 earlier version article mistakenly stated that160a chapter title of160alex constantines 1997 book160virtual government mockingbird subversion free press cia chapter titled word sponsor cia birth operation mockingbird takeover corporate press amp programming public opinion text revised correct error | 1,406 |
<p />
<p>Mustafa Tamimi was a 28-year-old resident of the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh. His meticulously trimmed beard served as the centerpiece of his handsome face.</p>
<p>In December 2009, when an Israeli soldier shot him from a short distance with a tear gas canister, half of Mustafa’s face went missing. More soldiers laughed as his horrified family tried to accompany him to a nearby hospital, according to activists present at the scene. Only the mother was finally able to obtain a special permit from the Israeli military, which allowed her to be with her son.</p>
<p>Mustafa’s crime? He, along with Palestinian, Israeli and international peace activists, protested the besiegement of Nabi Saleh by the illegal Jewish settlement of Halamish. Halamish has existed since 1977 and drastically grown in size and population ever since, taking over privately-owned Palestinian land. As of late, Nabi Saleh has been struggling for mere survival as its fresh water spring has also been seized by settlers under the watchful eye of the Israeli army.</p>
<p>Mustafa died so that the village of Nabi Saleh could live. The struggle will continue for years.</p>
<p>A young man may now be gone, but he also left behind a legacy which has become the cornerstone of the augmenting international solidarity with Palestinians around the globe.</p>
<p>The struggle for justice in Palestine is ultimately between a Palestinian – protesting, with a rock or rifle in hand – and an Israeli, often equipped with the latest killing technology the arms industry has to offer. The former fights for basic rights – land, water, freedom, equality and such – while the latter is determined to intimidate, silence, imprison, and, when compelled, commit murder or even large scale massacres to prolong Israeli occupation and military dominance over Palestinians.</p>
<p>Things are not always so clear-cut, of course. Some Palestinians have learned with time the benefits of co-existing with the occupation. Some Israelis have jointly struggled with Palestinians against the inhumanity of the occupation, the brutality of the military and the illegality of the land seizure.</p>
<p>One such Israeli is Tamar Fleishman, of Machsomwatch. She is simply indefatigable. Her mission is to document the daily violations committed by the Israeli army at a series of checkpoints extending between Ramallah (in the West Bank) and Jerusalem. Showing a complete disregard for international law, and even the official foreign policy of the United States, Israel has insisted that the entirety of Jerusalem is Israel’s eternal capital. But illegally occupied East Jerusalem – or al-Quds – has been the beating heart of Palestinian national, religious and even intellectual identity for many generations. To split the heart from the body, Israel has been choking occupied East Jerusalem since 1967, encircling it with illegal Jewish settlements, Jewish-only bypass roads, and a dizzying checkpoint structure intended to create a permanent divorce between the West Bank and a city that Palestinians see as their future capital.</p>
<p>Armed with a camera and her own willpower, Tamar is relentless. She knows by name all the tired-looking children who sell tea in plastic cups, newspapers and gum at all the checkpoints. She narrates their stories of humiliation, pain and struggle. She tells of the people crammed between glass walls, barbed wire and blocks of cement. As long as these women and men keep the checkpoints populated, Jerusalem will maintain its historic attachment with the rest of Palestine.</p>
<p>And Tamar, the habitual visitor of these very spots, will resume her daily toil to convey the stories that capture the essence of this enduring conflict.</p>
<p>But without the numerous media outlets that challenge the inherent pro-Israeli bias, censorship and apathy of mainstream media, Mustafa’s story and Tamar’s photos would have remained confined to Nabi Saleh, or some checkpoint manned by cruel soldiers.</p>
<p>In fact, the story of Palestine is getting more than a good share of coverage in old and new alternative media outlets. More, 2011 has concluded on a positive note as far as media coverage of this conflict is concerned. In an article entitled, ‘The media consensus on Israel is collapsing’, Jordan Michael Smith reveals that “slowly but unmistakably, space is opening up among the commentariat for new, critical ideas about Israel and its relationship to the United States” (salon.com, December 21). While Smith rightly credits the academics Tony Judt, Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer for “expanding the permissible,” the pressure on mainstream media has been obstinately championed by numerous individuals from all walks of life. It is they, who, for many years, refused to subscribe to the convenient narrative that venerates and vindicates Israel – not only at the expense of Palestinians, but also at the expense of the United States’ foreign policy.</p>
<p>The popular solidarity movement continues to score new victories with each passing day. Israel’s attempt at countering its gains seems to achieve little more than inviting controversy, which actually recruits more support for Palestinian rights.</p>
<p>One platform that has become very successful in recent years, and particularity so in 2011, was the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement.</p>
<p>“The BDS movement is growing relentless,” wrote Eric Walberg, author and editor at al-Ahram Weekly. His ‘BDS Updates’ regularly highlight the overwhelming success of the worldwide initiative that is partly modeled on the triumphant anti-Apartheid movement of South Africa. His year-ender updates for 2011 included the cancelation of an Israel tour by the famous musician Natacha Atlas (though sadly, not all artists were so principled). Walberg also reported that “in a wonderfully shocking divestment move, Israeli powers-that-be are furious at BNP Paribas for shutting down its operations in Israel. (They) believe the bank’s board of directors caved to pressure groups, in the first case in years of a foreign bank leaving Israel…” Such reports are now stable items crowding social media channels on a regular basis.</p>
<p>True, 2011 had its share of tragedy. Human lives were lost in Palestine. But hope was also sustained by the sacrifices of numerous ‘ordinary’ people who collectively managed to achieve many hard-earned feats. It is these numerous small victories that will make it difficult for Israel to continue with its futile campaign to occupy and dominate a people so determinately entrenched in their land – from the small village of Nabi Saleh to the proud Palestinian city of al-Quds.</p> | false | 1 | mustafa tamimi 28yearold resident west bank village nabi saleh meticulously trimmed beard served centerpiece handsome face december 2009 israeli soldier shot short distance tear gas canister half mustafas face went missing soldiers laughed horrified family tried accompany nearby hospital according activists present scene mother finally able obtain special permit israeli military allowed son mustafas crime along palestinian israeli international peace activists protested besiegement nabi saleh illegal jewish settlement halamish halamish existed since 1977 drastically grown size population ever since taking privatelyowned palestinian land late nabi saleh struggling mere survival fresh water spring also seized settlers watchful eye israeli army mustafa died village nabi saleh could live struggle continue years young man may gone also left behind legacy become cornerstone augmenting international solidarity palestinians around globe struggle justice palestine ultimately palestinian protesting rock rifle hand israeli often equipped latest killing technology arms industry offer former fights basic rights land water freedom equality latter determined intimidate silence imprison compelled commit murder even large scale massacres prolong israeli occupation military dominance palestinians things always clearcut course palestinians learned time benefits coexisting occupation israelis jointly struggled palestinians inhumanity occupation brutality military illegality land seizure one israeli tamar fleishman machsomwatch simply indefatigable mission document daily violations committed israeli army series checkpoints extending ramallah west bank jerusalem showing complete disregard international law even official foreign policy united states israel insisted entirety jerusalem israels eternal capital illegally occupied east jerusalem alquds beating heart palestinian national religious even intellectual identity many generations split heart body israel choking occupied east jerusalem since 1967 encircling illegal jewish settlements jewishonly bypass roads dizzying checkpoint structure intended create permanent divorce west bank city palestinians see future capital armed camera willpower tamar relentless knows name tiredlooking children sell tea plastic cups newspapers gum checkpoints narrates stories humiliation pain struggle tells people crammed glass walls barbed wire blocks cement long women men keep checkpoints populated jerusalem maintain historic attachment rest palestine tamar habitual visitor spots resume daily toil convey stories capture essence enduring conflict without numerous media outlets challenge inherent proisraeli bias censorship apathy mainstream media mustafas story tamars photos would remained confined nabi saleh checkpoint manned cruel soldiers fact story palestine getting good share coverage old new alternative media outlets 2011 concluded positive note far media coverage conflict concerned article entitled media consensus israel collapsing jordan michael smith reveals slowly unmistakably space opening among commentariat new critical ideas israel relationship united states saloncom december 21 smith rightly credits academics tony judt stephen walt john mearsheimer expanding permissible pressure mainstream media obstinately championed numerous individuals walks life many years refused subscribe convenient narrative venerates vindicates israel expense palestinians also expense united states foreign policy popular solidarity movement continues score new victories passing day israels attempt countering gains seems achieve little inviting controversy actually recruits support palestinian rights one platform become successful recent years particularity 2011 boycott divestment sanctions bds movement bds movement growing relentless wrote eric walberg author editor alahram weekly bds updates regularly highlight overwhelming success worldwide initiative partly modeled triumphant antiapartheid movement south africa yearender updates 2011 included cancelation israel tour famous musician natacha atlas though sadly artists principled walberg also reported wonderfully shocking divestment move israeli powersthatbe furious bnp paribas shutting operations israel believe banks board directors caved pressure groups first case years foreign bank leaving israel reports stable items crowding social media channels regular basis true 2011 share tragedy human lives lost palestine hope also sustained sacrifices numerous ordinary people collectively managed achieve many hardearned feats numerous small victories make difficult israel continue futile campaign occupy dominate people determinately entrenched land small village nabi saleh proud palestinian city alquds | 599 |
<p>Perhaps the surest proof of Winston Churchill’s theorem that “history is written by the victors” comes from none other than Adolf Hitler: “Who, after all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?” the German Fuhrer said by way of a chilling corollary, effectively paving the way for the most insidious ethnic cleansing of the modern era. Between 1915 and 1918, an estimated 1.5 million Armenians living in Ottoman Turkey had been rounded up and either marched to their deaths or murdered outright.</p>
<p>But “history” —&#160;as in the public study of past events, and the way they are positioned and discussed by society at large —&#160;has been ambiguous about the Armenian Genocide. Even that label is a point of contention among contemporary Turks, who resist the “G word” (coined in 1944 by Polish lawyer Raphael Lemkin to describe Germany’s systematic murder of Jewish citizens) as a legal definition that, they say, should not retroactively apply to conflicts in their own past —&#160;conflicts which time has given those now in power plenty of time to obscure, re-write or otherwise justify.</p>
<p>A century later, as the sons and daughters of Armenian descent (“orphans” might be more accurate) still struggle to reclaim the narrative of what happened to them as a people, filmmaker <a href="http://variety.com/t/joe-berlinger/" type="external">Joe Berlinger</a>’s “Intent to Destroy: Death, Denial &amp; Depiction” delivers a lucid, elegant (insofar as that is possible) and reasonably level-headed analysis of the issues that have clouded conversation around the Armenian Genocide. But this is no turgid, black-and-white PBS special (a format that serves its purpose with docs like Andrew Goldberg’s 2006 “The Armenian Genocide”), nor is it a sobering collection of talking-head witnesses (à la Claude Lanzmann’s incomparable Holocaust survivor project, “Shoah”). Rather, Berlinger — who co-directed the terrific “Paradise Lost” and “Metallica: Some Kind of Monster” docs — focuses less on historical particulars than the subsequent tug-of-war to define the genocide, especially as regards Hollywood’s role in such representation.</p>
<p>Several years ago, Berlinger was approached by a wealthy Armenian producer about making a straightforward nonfiction film about the genocide, which he declined. But a few months later, after getting wind that a massive, Kirk Kerkorian-backed feature film called “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/the-promise/" type="external">The Promise</a>” was underway, a light went off: Berlinger pitched the idea of “embedding” himself with the production —&#160;a first-of-its-kind, blockbuster-scale independent film about the Armenian Genocide, conceived as “Doctor Zhivago” set against the horrific backdrop of Turkish atrocity.</p>
<p>Except “ <a href="http://variety.com/2017/film/global/madrid-ramps-up-efforts-to-lure-production-1202437843/" type="external">The Promise</a>” never lived up to its promise. While well cast (with the likes of Oscar Isaac and Christian Bale) and respectably overseen by “Hotel Rwanda” helmer Terry George, the film muddies its history with melodrama, earning back just $8.2 million of its estimated $90 million budget. That meant Berlinger’s film —&#160;which plays like a glossy DVD extra at times —&#160;had a problem. As a broader look at the Armenian Genocide, it has the classiest recreation footage imaginable (clips from “The Promise,” paired with voiceover from a pre-production table read); but as a vérité record of a landmark film production … well, “The Promise” was a bust. And bizarrely enough, Berlinger ignores most of what might be interesting.</p>
<p>Why did George, Isaac and Bale agree to make the film? Were they personally invested in the subject, or was this just an opportunistic paycheck for them? And considering the enormous pushback anything that remotely touches on the Armenian Genocide receives from all fronts, where is the Turkish pushback on “The Promise”? (I speak from experience, since no subject generates more hate mail and threats&#160;—&#160;a lesson I learned when reviewing the documentary “Screamers” about Armenian band System of a Down during my first days at Variety.</p>
<p>In addition to reminding that the plight of persecuted Armenians was one of America’s top causes in the first quarter of the 20th century, Berlinger reveals through telegrams and evidence how Robert P. Skinner, U.S. Ambassador to Turkey, succeeded in pressuring MGM (via the State Department) into scrapping an adaptation of “The Forty Days of Musa Dagh” in 1935 (the same battle inspired the climax of “The Promise”). But the closest anyone in “Intent to Destroy” comes to suggesting similar obstacles is when a crew member claims that no one even considered shooting the film in Turkey — whereas revisionist counter-salvo “The Ottoman Lieutenant,” starring Josh Hartnett (a 2017 release never mentioned here),&#160;took full advantage of Turkish locations.</p>
<p>Still, there are hints of conflict (check the IMDb page for “The Promise,” and you can see how an organized group of Turks has succeeded in sabotaging the movie’s user score), reflected in a paranoid on-set interview with actor Daniel Giménez Cacho, who reveals how the Turkish ambassador supplied him with a book called “Turks and Armenians” by controversial historian — and vocal genocide refuter —&#160;Justin McCarthy, whom Berlinger invites to share his position in the film. However “balanced” that decision may seem, the trouble with giving airtime to denialists is that it introduces doubt into the discussion of world events, suggesting that there can be “two sides” to any issue —&#160;which in this case, typically comes with a “they started it”-style justification, in which Armenian Christians are accused of conspiring with Russians and acting like terrorists against Turkish Muslims, effectively necessitating their own exile and extermination. (Trust me, the Turkish “side” is adequately represented elsewhere, taught as history and publicly reinforced by the country’s political advantage on the world stage, strong-arming even U.S. presidents and ambassadors into submission —&#160;including former diplomat John Marshall Evans, who was reprimanded and forced to make a public retraction after publicly using the word “genocide,” but allowed to speak his mind freely here.)</p>
<p>Whereas the documentary material related to “The Promise” looks good, but adds little (apart from a congratulatory behind-the-scenes souvenir for all involved in the production), interviews with director <a href="http://variety.com/t/atom-egoyan/" type="external">Atom Egoyan</a> paint a different picture about the making of his 2002 film “Ararat.” In the film’s most eloquent interview, Egoyan candidly explains how Turkish activists attempted to intimidate him into abandoning the project. Like “The Promise,” “Ararat” also would have been more powerful if only it were a better film, although it shares Berlinger’s interest in the challenges, borth artistic and political, in depicting such an event.</p> | false | 1 | perhaps surest proof winston churchills theorem history written victors comes none adolf hitler speaks today annihilation armenians german fuhrer said way chilling corollary effectively paving way insidious ethnic cleansing modern era 1915 1918 estimated 15 million armenians living ottoman turkey rounded either marched deaths murdered outright history 160as public study past events way positioned discussed society large 160has ambiguous armenian genocide even label point contention among contemporary turks resist g word coined 1944 polish lawyer raphael lemkin describe germanys systematic murder jewish citizens legal definition say retroactively apply conflicts past 160conflicts time given power plenty time obscure rewrite otherwise justify century later sons daughters armenian descent orphans might accurate still struggle reclaim narrative happened people filmmaker joe berlingers intent destroy death denial amp depiction delivers lucid elegant insofar possible reasonably levelheaded analysis issues clouded conversation around armenian genocide turgid blackandwhite pbs special format serves purpose docs like andrew goldbergs 2006 armenian genocide sobering collection talkinghead witnesses à la claude lanzmanns incomparable holocaust survivor project shoah rather berlinger codirected terrific paradise lost metallica kind monster docs focuses less historical particulars subsequent tugofwar define genocide especially regards hollywoods role representation several years ago berlinger approached wealthy armenian producer making straightforward nonfiction film genocide declined months later getting wind massive kirk kerkorianbacked feature film called promise underway light went berlinger pitched idea embedding production 160a firstofitskind blockbusterscale independent film armenian genocide conceived doctor zhivago set horrific backdrop turkish atrocity except promise never lived promise well cast likes oscar isaac christian bale respectably overseen hotel rwanda helmer terry george film muddies history melodrama earning back 82 million estimated 90 million budget meant berlingers film 160which plays like glossy dvd extra times 160had problem broader look armenian genocide classiest recreation footage imaginable clips promise paired voiceover preproduction table read vérité record landmark film production well promise bust bizarrely enough berlinger ignores might interesting george isaac bale agree make film personally invested subject opportunistic paycheck considering enormous pushback anything remotely touches armenian genocide receives fronts turkish pushback promise speak experience since subject generates hate mail threats160160a lesson learned reviewing documentary screamers armenian band system first days variety addition reminding plight persecuted armenians one americas top causes first quarter 20th century berlinger reveals telegrams evidence robert p skinner us ambassador turkey succeeded pressuring mgm via state department scrapping adaptation forty days musa dagh 1935 battle inspired climax promise closest anyone intent destroy comes suggesting similar obstacles crew member claims one even considered shooting film turkey whereas revisionist countersalvo ottoman lieutenant starring josh hartnett 2017 release never mentioned here160took full advantage turkish locations still hints conflict check imdb page promise see organized group turks succeeded sabotaging movies user score reflected paranoid onset interview actor daniel giménez cacho reveals turkish ambassador supplied book called turks armenians controversial historian vocal genocide refuter 160justin mccarthy berlinger invites share position film however balanced decision may seem trouble giving airtime denialists introduces doubt discussion world events suggesting two sides issue 160which case typically comes started itstyle justification armenian christians accused conspiring russians acting like terrorists turkish muslims effectively necessitating exile extermination trust turkish side adequately represented elsewhere taught history publicly reinforced countrys political advantage world stage strongarming even us presidents ambassadors submission 160including former diplomat john marshall evans reprimanded forced make public retraction publicly using word genocide allowed speak mind freely whereas documentary material related promise looks good adds little apart congratulatory behindthescenes souvenir involved production interviews director atom egoyan paint different picture making 2002 film ararat films eloquent interview egoyan candidly explains turkish activists attempted intimidate abandoning project like promise ararat also would powerful better film although shares berlingers interest challenges borth artistic political depicting event | 604 |
<p>Below&#160;is an article&#160;by EPPC Senior Fellow Peter Wehner&#160;for the University of Virginia’s Miller Center.&#160;Done in the form of a memorandum to the next president, it offers a way&#160;to think about, and the elements that might&#160;comprise, an Opportunity Agenda. Our politics these days&#160;is largely&#160;devoid of a serious discussion of policies, including ones that would promote opportunity and upward mobility. The Miller Center&#160;( <a href="https://twitter.com/miller_center" type="external">@Miller_Center</a>), through its <a href="http://firstyear2017.org/about" type="external">First Year Project</a>,&#160;on whose advisory council Mr. Wehner serves,&#160;is offering a corrective. This is his&#160;contribution to that effort.</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>TO: The President-Elect</p>
<p>FROM: Peter Wehner</p>
<p>SUBJECT:&#160;Opportunity Agenda/Your First Year</p>
<p>DATE: November 9, 2016</p>
<p>As you think about your first year in office, there will be many issues competing for your time and attention. I would urge you to focus as much of your energy and political capital as possible on constructing an opportunity agenda, by which I mean an agenda that allows people to rise in life based on merit, talent, and hard work; that doesn’t guarantee success but does ensure the system isn’t rigged and everyone has a fair chance to succeed; and that allows people to increase their living standards and flourish regardless of the circumstances of their birth.</p>
<p>The need is urgent, the time and political circumstances are right, and the nation is longing for uplift, for a positive agenda, for a way forward. You can provide it.</p>
<p>In laying out the case for an opportunity agenda, it might be best to begin at the beginning. The concept of an opportunity society, the chance to pursue the American dream, is fundamental to America’s self-conception and has deep roots in American history.</p>
<p>America has always been a beacon for people looking for a fresh start, and has always offered to those who do not begin the race of life with an advantage the hope that they can nonetheless succeed and prosper. The animating ideals of our founding documents include the proposition that we are all created equal and endowed by our Creator with “certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” The greatest interpreter of the founders, Abraham Lincoln, spoke about a government “whose leading object is to elevate the condition of men—to lift artificial weights from all shoulders, to clear the paths of laudable pursuit for all, to afford all an unfettered start and a fair chance, in the race of life.” So this idea of opportunity is one that has deep resonance with the American people; it is like a thread running through our history.</p>
<p>For a variety of complicated reasons, we have badly fallen short of this “leading object” of government in our time. Some of the reasons have to do with structural economic changes (e.g., globalization and advances in technology), community dysfunction, and family instability. Some have to do with the failure to modernize our institutions to adapt to contemporary challenges. And some have to do with misguided policies and missed opportunities by both parties.</p>
<p>Whatever the precise explanations and apportionment of blame, here’s what we know: many European countries now have as much social mobility as, and more opportunity than, the United States. Today, a child’s future depends on parental income more in America than it does in Canada and parts of Europe.</p>
<p>Middle-class Americans have been working harder and longer hours, yet their wages are stagnant. (The median family income, adjusted for inflation, was lower in 2013 than it was in 1989, and in 80 percent of the counties in America, the median income is lower today than it was 15 years ago.) Ordinary Americans have experienced a rise in the cost of living, particularly in the areas of health care (which has doubled in constant dollars since 1988) and college tuition (which has tripled over the last three decades). In sum: the middle class in America has been losing ground for a generation.</p>
<p>Younger workers are finding it more difficult to launch than ever. For example, in 2014 more than a third of Americans between the ages of 18 and 31 were living in their parent’s home.</p>
<p>As for the poor, according to recent data, 14 million people live in extremely poor neighborhoods, 5 million more than before the downturn and more than twice as many as in 2000. Of those residents, 6.3 million were poor. “Put differently,”&#160; <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/research/u-s-concentrated-poverty-in-the-wake-of-the-great-recession/" type="external">according to one study</a>, “13.5 percent of the nation’s poor population faced the double burden of being poor in a very poor place”—an increase from the last decade. “If you are born poor [in America],” note Isabel Sawhill and Ron Haskins of the Brookings Institution, “you are likely to stay that way.”</p>
<p>There is clearly a cognitive dissonance between where we are and how we like to think of ourselves—as the land of opportunity. We are falling well short of our aspirations. As a result, Americans are feeling frustrated and uneasy, insecure and pessimistic. Only about a quarter of the&#160; <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/direction_of_country-902.html" type="external">American people believe</a>&#160;the country is on the right track. Two-thirds of Americans believe it is harder for them to reach the American dream than it was for their parents.</p>
<p>These perceptions are grounded in certain realities—income inequality rising, social mobility stalled, and poverty entrenched. These difficulties require a national response, and there is a moral imperative to offer one.</p>
<p>There is also a political opening for you to act—both because new presidents are usually given a great deal of deference to enact their agenda and because Americans, after the bitter and brutal campaign of 2016, will be thirsting for the chief executive to govern in a serious way that will address pressing problems. Indeed, the fact that there is something of an “opportunity crisis” in America helps explain the widespread distemper we see among Americans and which clearly bled into the campaign.</p>
<p>As you think about how to approach this issue, take note of what the late Andrew Kohut of the Pew Research Center said: “What the public wants is not a war on the rich, but more policies that promote opportunity.”</p>
<p>When thinking about an opportunity agenda, the place to start is with economic growth. After a 40-year period of high growth—averaging 3.5 percent per year from 1960 to 2000—we have seen a rapid deceleration. During your predecessor’s two terms, there was not a single year of 3 percent GDP growth. Tepid growth is the enemy of an opportunity society.</p>
<p>Getting us on the right track requires several things, beginning with remaking a tax code that impedes growth by penalizing investment and innovation and encouraging cronyism. We need to broaden the base, flatten and lower the rates, clean out and get rid of many existing deductions—excluding mortgage interest and charitable giving—and lift burdens off middle-class families. (I know you have legitimate concerns about the deficit and debt, which is why this approach—broadening the base and getting rid of some existing deductions—can help offset the revenue loss from lower and flatter rates.)</p>
<p>Immigration has always been part of the American recipe for growth, but can only remain so with serious reforms. We need rethink our definition of family reunification, which is currently too expansive, and to emphasize visas for the high-skill workers our economy requires. We should model our approach after Canada and Australia, whose immigration policies advance their economic interests. David Brooks of the&#160;New York Timesexplains how we should approach the issue: “The immigration system should turn into a talent recruiting system, a relentless effort to get the world’s most gifted and driven people to move to our shores.”</p>
<p>We’re experiencing what Walter Russell Mead calls “the energy revolution of the 21st century,” which&#160; <a href="http://www.thegwpf.com/walter-russell-mead-the-energy-revolution-and-its-biggest-losers/" type="external">he argues</a>&#160;has the capacity to be a genuine game changer based on new discoveries and new technologies (hydraulic fracturing and other extraction technology). “The United States is better supplied with fossil fuels than any other country on earth,” according to Mead. “Canada and the United States are each richer in oil than Iraq, Iran, and Saudi Arabia combined.”</p>
<p>This energy revolution has the potential to be a jobs revolution, including substantial growth in high-income jobs for blue-collar workers. Alongside investments in alternative energy sources, you need to pursue policies to keep this “energy revolution” going—including lifting the ban on American crude-oil exports, allowing more fossil-fuel exploration on federal lands, and encouraging investment in our oil and gas transportation infrastructure.</p>
<p>The kind of economic growth that reforms like these could encourage is an essential prerequisite for a revival of opportunity in America. But it is only a beginning. To help those most in need benefit from growth, much more is required.</p>
<p>Education must lay at the heart of a renewed opportunity agenda. Too few of our students are being well served by our current education system, but students from poor families are suffering by far the most. So the members of our society most in need of a good education are stuck in the worst-run and most dysfunctional schools and denied any promising alternatives.</p>
<p>Some combination of public-school reform and private-school choice will be essential to ending the intergenerational cycle of poverty and failure. We need to permit more choice and variety, greater accountability and merit pay, more choice in school curricula, greater transparency, and expanded online learning opportunities and home schooling. We need to reform teacher preparation programs, empower principals, and do away with the policy of “last in, first out.”</p>
<p>Chester E. Finn Jr. and Michael Brickman argue for further innovations, such as choices among individual school courses and course providers, tax-sheltered scholarship programs to cover private-school tuitions, and even debit card–style savings accounts that parents can tap for their children’s education. K-12 education is not primarily a federal responsibility, but the federal government can help lift obstacles to such reforms, and this must be a high priority.</p>
<p>The federal government has a greater role in higher education, especially given its role in helping millions finance their tuition. A college degree remains a crucial ticket to the middle class. Yet the higher education system is fundamentally broken—outmoded, far too expensive, and much too difficult to access.</p>
<p>The goal needs to be to subject the higher education system to the kinds of consumer pressures that would compel it to offer better choices at lower costs. What does that mean concretely? Along with investments in skills training and alternatives to college, in higher education we need more flexibility in accreditation to let more players into the field; more data about outcomes to enable consumers to make better informed choices; and reforms of the student loan system, to restrain the inflationary pressure that drives costs up and allows failures to survive. Rather than thinking about the federal government as a big bank that funds ever-higher tuition costs, we should think about it as an enabler of dynamism and constructive competition.</p>
<p>When it comes to helping less-skilled Americans who are finding it difficult to find meaningful work and raise a family, Michael Strain of the American Enterprise Institute makes a persuasive case for four proposals:</p>
<p>The eligibility rules for a number of our key public-assistance programs, especially Medicaid but also the Earned Income Tax Credit, are designed in ways that discourage higher-paying work, since benefits diminish or disappear abruptly as income rises. They therefore discourage investments in the kind of self-improvement often necessary to obtain such work. These and other social programs must be structured to encourage recipients to make more productive use of their talents.</p>
<p>Scott Winship of the Manhattan Institute recommends ways to extend the lessons of the 1990s welfare reform to the rest of the federal safety net by block-granting means-tested programs and sending them to the states, thereby encouraging independence, experimentation, and flexibility while requiring work and time limits for most—but not all—beneficiaries.</p>
<p>“Poverty produces family instability,” sociologist Robert Putnam has written, “and family instability in turn produces poverty.” Estimates show that if America had the same percentage of single parents today as we did in 1970, the child poverty rate would be 30 percent less. Encouraging family formation and marital permanence is something government has a very poor record in doing. Many things have been tried; few have succeeded. But there are some steps worth taking.</p>
<p>At a bare minimum, we should remove marriage penalties in the tax code and disincentives to marry in welfare programs. It doesn’t make sense to encourage behavior that is harmful to society and children. To narrow the “growing marriage divide” between less-educated and better-educated Americans, scholars W. Bradford Wilcox, Nicholas H. Wolfinger, and Charles E. Stokes&#160; <a href="http://www.futureofchildren.org/publications/docs/marriagedivide.pdf" type="external">encourage experimenting</a>&#160;with a range of public and private strategies. They claim that some relationship education programs—for example, the Oklahoma Marriage Initiative and Supporting Father Involvement—have improved the quality and stability of low-income parents’ relationships and the emotional welfare of children whose parents have participated in them.</p>
<p>Local civic initiatives designed to strengthen family life already exist, such as First Things First in Chattanooga, TN, a promising local civic initiative that provides education on marriage, fatherhood, and parenting. “Programs like this need to be scrutinized and, if they prove to be effective, replicated across the country,” according to Wilcox, Wolfinger, and Stokes.</p>
<p>The same can be said about programs such as the Nurse-Family Partnership, in which nurses visit first-time, low-income mothers to provide information on nutrition and parenting as a way to increase school readiness of at-risk kids.</p>
<p>There are other areas to look at, including criminal justice reform, encouraging financial literacy and mentoring to low-income families, improving infant and child health, and supporting public service campaigns to discourage teen pregnancy and encourage what’s been called the “success sequence,” meaning young adults are encouraged to pursue education, work, marriage, and parenthood in that order. An agenda geared to enabling growth, improving education, and strengthening our safety-net programs would be a strong start on the path to greater opportunity.</p>
<p>The United States is an exceptional nation, but you will soon become president of a country in which too many citizens are facing hardships and struggles. More than 45 million Americans live below the poverty line. For many others, the American dream seems out of their reach. They believe our politics is broken, opportunities are elusive, and the playing field isn’t fair.</p>
<p>Your presidency should be about rebuilding America through economic growth and widespread prosperity; to help us once again become a thriving, dynamic, forward-looking nation; and to reform and modernize government at every level to help Americans create a better life for themselves and their children.</p>
<p>You should stand for the politics of the common good—and an agenda, like the one sketched out above, that is economically inclusive and morally compelling; that helps workers, families, and those who are struggling; and that smashes down barriers to social mobility.</p>
<p>In advancing this agenda, keep several things in mind. First, the federal government’s role isn’t to ensure success; it is to give people a fair shot at success. Second, approach your task with energy but also some degree of modesty in terms of what the federal government—and your administration—can achieve.</p>
<p>There is a great deal we still do not know and need to learn. So my last bit of counsel to you is to always be open to experimentation, to reexamine your assumptions and test your theories against reality, and to be ruthlessly empirical in your approach. Learn as you go.</p>
<p>John F. Kennedy, after defeating Richard Nixon in 1960, said, “The margin is narrow, but the responsibility is clear.” So is yours. I wish you every success.</p>
<p>Peter Wehner is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. He writes widely on political, cultural, religious, and national security issues. In 2015 he was named a contributing opinion writer for the New York Times. Wehner served in the Reagan and George H.&#160;W. Bush administrations prior to becoming deputy director of speechwriting for President George W. Bush. In 2002, he was asked to head the Office of Strategic Initiatives, where he generated policy ideas, reached out to public intellectuals, published op-eds and essays, and provided counsel on a range of domestic and international issues. He was also a senior advisor to the Romney-Ryan 2012 presidential campaign.</p> | false | 1 | below160is article160by eppc senior fellow peter wehner160for university virginias miller center160done form memorandum next president offers way160to think elements might160comprise opportunity agenda politics days160is largely160devoid serious discussion policies including ones would promote opportunity upward mobility miller center160 miller_center first year project160on whose advisory council mr wehner serves160is offering corrective his160contribution effort 160 presidentelect peter wehner subject160opportunity agendayour first year date november 9 2016 think first year office many issues competing time attention would urge focus much energy political capital possible constructing opportunity agenda mean agenda allows people rise life based merit talent hard work doesnt guarantee success ensure system isnt rigged everyone fair chance succeed allows people increase living standards flourish regardless circumstances birth need urgent time political circumstances right nation longing uplift positive agenda way forward provide laying case opportunity agenda might best begin beginning concept opportunity society chance pursue american dream fundamental americas selfconception deep roots american history america always beacon people looking fresh start always offered begin race life advantage hope nonetheless succeed prosper animating ideals founding documents include proposition created equal endowed creator certain unalienable rights among life liberty pursuit happiness greatest interpreter founders abraham lincoln spoke government whose leading object elevate condition mento lift artificial weights shoulders clear paths laudable pursuit afford unfettered start fair chance race life idea opportunity one deep resonance american people like thread running history variety complicated reasons badly fallen short leading object government time reasons structural economic changes eg globalization advances technology community dysfunction family instability failure modernize institutions adapt contemporary challenges misguided policies missed opportunities parties whatever precise explanations apportionment blame heres know many european countries much social mobility opportunity united states today childs future depends parental income america canada parts europe middleclass americans working harder longer hours yet wages stagnant median family income adjusted inflation lower 2013 1989 80 percent counties america median income lower today 15 years ago ordinary americans experienced rise cost living particularly areas health care doubled constant dollars since 1988 college tuition tripled last three decades sum middle class america losing ground generation younger workers finding difficult launch ever example 2014 third americans ages 18 31 living parents home poor according recent data 14 million people live extremely poor neighborhoods 5 million downturn twice many 2000 residents 63 million poor put differently160 according one study 135 percent nations poor population faced double burden poor poor placean increase last decade born poor america note isabel sawhill ron haskins brookings institution likely stay way clearly cognitive dissonance like think ourselvesas land opportunity falling well short aspirations result americans feeling frustrated uneasy insecure pessimistic quarter the160 american people believe160the country right track twothirds americans believe harder reach american dream parents perceptions grounded certain realitiesincome inequality rising social mobility stalled poverty entrenched difficulties require national response moral imperative offer one also political opening actboth new presidents usually given great deal deference enact agenda americans bitter brutal campaign 2016 thirsting chief executive govern serious way address pressing problems indeed fact something opportunity crisis america helps explain widespread distemper see among americans clearly bled campaign think approach issue take note late andrew kohut pew research center said public wants war rich policies promote opportunity thinking opportunity agenda place start economic growth 40year period high growthaveraging 35 percent per year 1960 2000we seen rapid deceleration predecessors two terms single year 3 percent gdp growth tepid growth enemy opportunity society getting us right track requires several things beginning remaking tax code impedes growth penalizing investment innovation encouraging cronyism need broaden base flatten lower rates clean get rid many existing deductionsexcluding mortgage interest charitable givingand lift burdens middleclass families know legitimate concerns deficit debt approachbroadening base getting rid existing deductionscan help offset revenue loss lower flatter rates immigration always part american recipe growth remain serious reforms need rethink definition family reunification currently expansive emphasize visas highskill workers economy requires model approach canada australia whose immigration policies advance economic interests david brooks the160new york timesexplains approach issue immigration system turn talent recruiting system relentless effort get worlds gifted driven people move shores experiencing walter russell mead calls energy revolution 21st century which160 argues160has capacity genuine game changer based new discoveries new technologies hydraulic fracturing extraction technology united states better supplied fossil fuels country earth according mead canada united states richer oil iraq iran saudi arabia combined energy revolution potential jobs revolution including substantial growth highincome jobs bluecollar workers alongside investments alternative energy sources need pursue policies keep energy revolution goingincluding lifting ban american crudeoil exports allowing fossilfuel exploration federal lands encouraging investment oil gas transportation infrastructure kind economic growth reforms like could encourage essential prerequisite revival opportunity america beginning help need benefit growth much required education must lay heart renewed opportunity agenda students well served current education system students poor families suffering far members society need good education stuck worstrun dysfunctional schools denied promising alternatives combination publicschool reform privateschool choice essential ending intergenerational cycle poverty failure need permit choice variety greater accountability merit pay choice school curricula greater transparency expanded online learning opportunities home schooling need reform teacher preparation programs empower principals away policy last first chester e finn jr michael brickman argue innovations choices among individual school courses course providers taxsheltered scholarship programs cover privateschool tuitions even debit cardstyle savings accounts parents tap childrens education k12 education primarily federal responsibility federal government help lift obstacles reforms must high priority federal government greater role higher education especially given role helping millions finance tuition college degree remains crucial ticket middle class yet higher education system fundamentally brokenoutmoded far expensive much difficult access goal needs subject higher education system kinds consumer pressures would compel offer better choices lower costs mean concretely along investments skills training alternatives college higher education need flexibility accreditation let players field data outcomes enable consumers make better informed choices reforms student loan system restrain inflationary pressure drives costs allows failures survive rather thinking federal government big bank funds everhigher tuition costs think enabler dynamism constructive competition comes helping lessskilled americans finding difficult find meaningful work raise family michael strain american enterprise institute makes persuasive case four proposals eligibility rules number key publicassistance programs especially medicaid also earned income tax credit designed ways discourage higherpaying work since benefits diminish disappear abruptly income rises therefore discourage investments kind selfimprovement often necessary obtain work social programs must structured encourage recipients make productive use talents scott winship manhattan institute recommends ways extend lessons 1990s welfare reform rest federal safety net blockgranting meanstested programs sending states thereby encouraging independence experimentation flexibility requiring work time limits mostbut allbeneficiaries poverty produces family instability sociologist robert putnam written family instability turn produces poverty estimates show america percentage single parents today 1970 child poverty rate would 30 percent less encouraging family formation marital permanence something government poor record many things tried succeeded steps worth taking bare minimum remove marriage penalties tax code disincentives marry welfare programs doesnt make sense encourage behavior harmful society children narrow growing marriage divide lesseducated bettereducated americans scholars w bradford wilcox nicholas h wolfinger charles e stokes160 encourage experimenting160with range public private strategies claim relationship education programsfor example oklahoma marriage initiative supporting father involvementhave improved quality stability lowincome parents relationships emotional welfare children whose parents participated local civic initiatives designed strengthen family life already exist first things first chattanooga tn promising local civic initiative provides education marriage fatherhood parenting programs like need scrutinized prove effective replicated across country according wilcox wolfinger stokes said programs nursefamily partnership nurses visit firsttime lowincome mothers provide information nutrition parenting way increase school readiness atrisk kids areas look including criminal justice reform encouraging financial literacy mentoring lowincome families improving infant child health supporting public service campaigns discourage teen pregnancy encourage whats called success sequence meaning young adults encouraged pursue education work marriage parenthood order agenda geared enabling growth improving education strengthening safetynet programs would strong start path greater opportunity united states exceptional nation soon become president country many citizens facing hardships struggles 45 million americans live poverty line many others american dream seems reach believe politics broken opportunities elusive playing field isnt fair presidency rebuilding america economic growth widespread prosperity help us become thriving dynamic forwardlooking nation reform modernize government every level help americans create better life children stand politics common goodand agenda like one sketched economically inclusive morally compelling helps workers families struggling smashes barriers social mobility advancing agenda keep several things mind first federal governments role isnt ensure success give people fair shot success second approach task energy also degree modesty terms federal governmentand administrationcan achieve great deal still know need learn last bit counsel always open experimentation reexamine assumptions test theories reality ruthlessly empirical approach learn go john f kennedy defeating richard nixon 1960 said margin narrow responsibility clear wish every success peter wehner senior fellow ethics public policy center writes widely political cultural religious national security issues 2015 named contributing opinion writer new york times wehner served reagan george h160w bush administrations prior becoming deputy director speechwriting president george w bush 2002 asked head office strategic initiatives generated policy ideas reached public intellectuals published opeds essays provided counsel range domestic international issues also senior advisor romneyryan 2012 presidential campaign | 1,511 |
<p>Barack Obama has an accountability problem. It’s not simply that during the 2008 campaign he made extravagant promises to heal the planet, slow the rise of the oceans, end political divisions in America, and usher in an era of hope and change. It’s that as a candidate and in the early days of his presidency, Obama and his top aides made a series of very specific promises on a range of issues.</p>
<p>As a candidate, Obama promised to create five million new energy jobs alone, claimed that by the end of his first term his health care plan would “bring down premiums by $2,500 for the typical family,” and guaranteed that his financial rescue plan would help “stop foreclosures.” As president-elect, Obama informed us that he had asked two of his top economic advisers, Christina Romer and Jared Bernstein, to conduct a “rigorous analysis” of his economic recovery plan. The report that he released predicted unemployment would not rise above 8 percent if the stimulus plan was passed. And in the first year of his presidency, Obama pledged to “cut the deficit we inherited in half by the end of my first term in office,” “lift two million Americans from poverty,” and “jolt our economy back to life.”</p>
<p>The problem for Obama is that his predictions were not only wrong; they were terribly wide of the mark. For example, since the president was sworn in, America has suffered a net decline of roughly half a million jobs. According to a study by the Kaiser Family Foundation, the average annual premium for family health coverage through an employer reached $15,073 in 2011!!an increase of 9 percent, or $1,303, over the previous year. The 9 percent increase in family premiums between 2010 and 2011 followed an increase of 3 percent between 2009 and 2010. Under Obama, the number of foreclosures was the worst in history. In addition, last year was the worst sales year on record for housing, while home values are nearly 35 percent lower than they were five years ago.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, the unemployment rate has been above 8percent for 41 consecutive months. The deficit was around $1.3 trillion the day Obama took office in the midst of the financial crisis; according to the Congressional Budget Office, in the current 2012 budget year, the deficit will be around $1.25 trillion. And a record 46 million Americans are now living in poverty.</p>
<p>In addition, during the Obama years we’ve experienced the weakest economic recovery on record. America’s credit rating was downgraded for the first time in our history. The standard of living for Americans fell more steeply than at any time since the government began recording it five decades ago. Income for American families has actually declined more following the economic recession than it did during the official recession itself.</p>
<p>Adding salt to his self-inflicted wounds, Obama, in the heady early days of his presidency, invited accountability. In February 2009, for example, the president told NBC’s Matt Lauer that if he didn’t have the economy fixed in three years, then “there’s going to be a one-term proposition.”</p>
<p>Given that Obama’s key economic promises haven’t been kept, what possible excuse can the president offer? Easy. The president’s explanation goes something like this: By the time he took office, the economic situation was far worse than anyone, including Obama, imagined. The deficit was far larger than anyone predicted. The president therefore can’t be held accountable for his failed promises. He was operating on a false set of assumptions. The crisis was much deeper than he knew when he made those promises. “We didn’t know how bad it was,” is how Obama put it last year.</p>
<p>Here’s the problem: If you go back and examine the record, you’ll find that Obama was fully aware of the depth and severity of the recession. As a candidate, for example, he said we were facing “the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.” As president-elect, Obama said we faced “a crisis unlike any we have seen in our lifetime.”</p>
<p>Prior to being sworn in, Obama knew!!in fact, he went out of his way to warn us!!that we were shedding more than half a million jobs per month, the worst job loss in over three decades. That in 2008 we had lost more jobs than in any year since the Great Depression. That manufacturing had hit a 28-year low. That the stock market had fallen almost 40 percent in less than a year. That credit markets were nearly frozen. That businesses large and small couldn’t borrow the money they needed to meet payroll and create jobs. That home foreclosures were mounting. That credit card and auto loan delinquencies were rising. That the economy was “in a global crisis.” And that he was inheriting an “enormous budget deficit!!you know, some estimates over a trillion dollars. That’s before we do anything.”</p>
<p>In other words, Barack Obama knew full well how bad things were when he promised he’d cut the deficit in half, when his economic team said that if his stimulus package passed, unemployment would not rise above 8 percent, and much of the rest.</p>
<p>What this means, then, is that Barack Obama’s only excuse for his failures is a myth and a mirage!!a manufactured, after-the-fact effort to escape accountability for his own words, his own commitments, and his own failings.</p>
<p>The “We Couldn’t Possibly Have Known How Bad It Was” narrative is an understandable one for Obama to resort to. But like so much of what the president says these days, it’s simply make-believe. The president has run out of excuses, which explains why for many Americans he’s just about run out of time.</p>
<p>Peter Wehner is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p> | false | 1 | barack obama accountability problem simply 2008 campaign made extravagant promises heal planet slow rise oceans end political divisions america usher era hope change candidate early days presidency obama top aides made series specific promises range issues candidate obama promised create five million new energy jobs alone claimed end first term health care plan would bring premiums 2500 typical family guaranteed financial rescue plan would help stop foreclosures presidentelect obama informed us asked two top economic advisers christina romer jared bernstein conduct rigorous analysis economic recovery plan report released predicted unemployment would rise 8 percent stimulus plan passed first year presidency obama pledged cut deficit inherited half end first term office lift two million americans poverty jolt economy back life problem obama predictions wrong terribly wide mark example since president sworn america suffered net decline roughly half million jobs according study kaiser family foundation average annual premium family health coverage employer reached 15073 2011an increase 9 percent 1303 previous year 9 percent increase family premiums 2010 2011 followed increase 3 percent 2009 2010 obama number foreclosures worst history addition last year worst sales year record housing home values nearly 35 percent lower five years ago meanwhile unemployment rate 8percent 41 consecutive months deficit around 13 trillion day obama took office midst financial crisis according congressional budget office current 2012 budget year deficit around 125 trillion record 46 million americans living poverty addition obama years weve experienced weakest economic recovery record americas credit rating downgraded first time history standard living americans fell steeply time since government began recording five decades ago income american families actually declined following economic recession official recession adding salt selfinflicted wounds obama heady early days presidency invited accountability february 2009 example president told nbcs matt lauer didnt economy fixed three years theres going oneterm proposition given obamas key economic promises havent kept possible excuse president offer easy presidents explanation goes something like time took office economic situation far worse anyone including obama imagined deficit far larger anyone predicted president therefore cant held accountable failed promises operating false set assumptions crisis much deeper knew made promises didnt know bad obama put last year heres problem go back examine record youll find obama fully aware depth severity recession candidate example said facing worst financial crisis since great depression presidentelect obama said faced crisis unlike seen lifetime prior sworn obama knewin fact went way warn usthat shedding half million jobs per month worst job loss three decades 2008 lost jobs year since great depression manufacturing hit 28year low stock market fallen almost 40 percent less year credit markets nearly frozen businesses large small couldnt borrow money needed meet payroll create jobs home foreclosures mounting credit card auto loan delinquencies rising economy global crisis inheriting enormous budget deficityou know estimates trillion dollars thats anything words barack obama knew full well bad things promised hed cut deficit half economic team said stimulus package passed unemployment would rise 8 percent much rest means barack obamas excuse failures myth miragea manufactured afterthefact effort escape accountability words commitments failings couldnt possibly known bad narrative understandable one obama resort like much president says days simply makebelieve president run excuses explains many americans hes run time peter wehner senior fellow ethics public policy center | 536 |
<p>CARSON CITY — At the stroke of midnight Friday, marijuana was added to the list of vices legally available in Nevada. But that is far from the only change in state law to take effect Saturday.</p>
<p>More than 300 bills passed by the 2017 Legislature and signed by Republican Gov. Brian Sandoval take effect Saturday. The number represents the bulk of new laws passed. Others took effect immediately or will in the coming months.</p>
<p>The most hyped new law is the one allowing adults 21 and older to legally buy up to an ounce of marijuana at permitted dispensaries. Nevada joins Colorado, Oregon, Washington and Alaska as states that allow regulated sales of recreational pot.</p>
<p>No less important, state workers will be cheering bigger paychecks, thanks to an additional 1 percent bump in pay approved in the session’s waning minutes. The increase is on top of the 2 percent raises Sandoval included in his general fund budget, bringing the total pay boost for most state workers to 3 percent in each of the next two years.</p>
<p>Besides budget items, laws pertaining to education, criminal justice, veterans, drivers, elections, tax credits — and even rain — also take effect Saturday. Here is a look at some of the legislation.</p>
<p>Education</p>
<p>School district applicants will be vetted more thoroughly under laws intended to prevent people formerly or currently under investigation for misconduct allegations elsewhere from being hired. The need for the measures was highlighted in a Las Vegas Review-Journal investigation into a sexual misconduct crisis within the Clark County School District.</p>
<p>Students will be taught economics and financial literacy, and programs will allow for competency-based education and high school diplomas for students with disabilities.</p>
<p>All public and private middle school, junior high and high school students will be instructed on how to administer CPR and use an external defibrillator. Students will also be taught about organ donation.</p>
<p>Students from low-income households will have more access to scholarships to attend private school under a law that expands Nevada’s Opportunity Scholarship Program. Businesses that donate money for the program receive a break on payroll tax obligations.</p>
<p>Criminal justice</p>
<p>The Nevada Division of Parole and Probation can set up independent reporting facilities for offenders on parole or probation. The centers will provide counseling, health care and employment assistance.</p>
<p>People who request a name change and have a criminal record are required to submit a full set of fingerprints with their petition. Also, anyone cited for misdemeanor domestic battery is required to submit a full set of fingerprints to the state repository.</p>
<p>Blood tests have replaced urine tests to determine whether a driver is impaired by marijuana.</p>
<p>Suicide prevention</p>
<p>Doctors and other health care professionals must take regular continuing education training on suicide prevention and awareness. Experts testified during legislative hearings that many people, particularly seniors, who attempted or committed suicide saw their primary care providers days or hours beforehand.</p>
<p>Elections</p>
<p>Third-party groups who send out information to voters about the status of their voter registrations must state clearly on mailers that the notices do not come from state or local election officials. Also, a new law changes campaign finance reporting deadlines for candidates and elected office holders to quarterly during election years and annually in nonelection years. Those reports now must also include how much a cash a candidate has on hand, as well as a breakout of expenses paid by credit or debit cards.</p>
<p>Rules of the road</p>
<p>Nevada drivers will have to give a wide berth to Department of Transportation vehicles under a law that extends to NDOT crews the same safety precautions extended to law enforcement. Drivers will have to move over if possible to give NDOT vehicles with flashing lights extra room on the roadway.</p>
<p>Slowpoke drivers in the fast lane may be ticketed under another new law intended to keep traffic flowing.</p>
<p>And driver licenses no longer have to be in color. Department of Motor Vehicles officials say new security features are available to provide better quality photos that are not in color.</p>
<p>Veterans</p>
<p>Gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender veterans and service members will receive assistance from the Department of Veterans Services to upgrade the narrative of their discharge. The law prohibits denial of eligibility based solely on their sexual orientation for any program or benefit to which they may be otherwise entitled.</p>
<p>Another law requires the Board of Regents to develop statewide standards for awarding college credits for military education, training or occupational experience.</p>
<p>Rain</p>
<p>Many people have done it for years, but now it is legal to collect precipitation off of single-family rooftop homes. Rain barrels are allowed to capture rain for nonpotable domestic use. The law also officially authorizes remote guzzlers for wildlife that have a capacity of 20,000 gallons or less, a capture area of no more than an acre, and a piping system no longer than one-quarter mile.</p>
<p>Pets in peril</p>
<p>Another law enhances protections for animals left unattended in vehicles in times of extreme heat or cold. It allows law enforcement, animal control and other public safety workers to use reasonable means to remove a pet from a vehicle without fear of civil liability.</p>
<p>Recreational pot sales begin</p>
<p>Licensed medical marijuana dispensaries that have state and local approval are allowed to sell their products for recreational purposes starting Saturday.</p>
<p>Several dispensaries, including most in downtown Las Vegas and near the Strip, planned to be open right as legal sales begin at midnight.</p>
<p>But if you live in Henderson, you’ll have to take a drive. In February, the city enacted a six-month moratorium on recreational marijuana licenses, meaning the five medical dispensaries within Henderson’s city limits will have to wait a while longer before joining the market.</p>
<p /> | false | 1 | carson city stroke midnight friday marijuana added list vices legally available nevada far change state law take effect saturday 300 bills passed 2017 legislature signed republican gov brian sandoval take effect saturday number represents bulk new laws passed others took effect immediately coming months hyped new law one allowing adults 21 older legally buy ounce marijuana permitted dispensaries nevada joins colorado oregon washington alaska states allow regulated sales recreational pot less important state workers cheering bigger paychecks thanks additional 1 percent bump pay approved sessions waning minutes increase top 2 percent raises sandoval included general fund budget bringing total pay boost state workers 3 percent next two years besides budget items laws pertaining education criminal justice veterans drivers elections tax credits even rain also take effect saturday look legislation education school district applicants vetted thoroughly laws intended prevent people formerly currently investigation misconduct allegations elsewhere hired need measures highlighted las vegas reviewjournal investigation sexual misconduct crisis within clark county school district students taught economics financial literacy programs allow competencybased education high school diplomas students disabilities public private middle school junior high high school students instructed administer cpr use external defibrillator students also taught organ donation students lowincome households access scholarships attend private school law expands nevadas opportunity scholarship program businesses donate money program receive break payroll tax obligations criminal justice nevada division parole probation set independent reporting facilities offenders parole probation centers provide counseling health care employment assistance people request name change criminal record required submit full set fingerprints petition also anyone cited misdemeanor domestic battery required submit full set fingerprints state repository blood tests replaced urine tests determine whether driver impaired marijuana suicide prevention doctors health care professionals must take regular continuing education training suicide prevention awareness experts testified legislative hearings many people particularly seniors attempted committed suicide saw primary care providers days hours beforehand elections thirdparty groups send information voters status voter registrations must state clearly mailers notices come state local election officials also new law changes campaign finance reporting deadlines candidates elected office holders quarterly election years annually nonelection years reports must also include much cash candidate hand well breakout expenses paid credit debit cards rules road nevada drivers give wide berth department transportation vehicles law extends ndot crews safety precautions extended law enforcement drivers move possible give ndot vehicles flashing lights extra room roadway slowpoke drivers fast lane may ticketed another new law intended keep traffic flowing driver licenses longer color department motor vehicles officials say new security features available provide better quality photos color veterans gay lesbian bisexual transgender veterans service members receive assistance department veterans services upgrade narrative discharge law prohibits denial eligibility based solely sexual orientation program benefit may otherwise entitled another law requires board regents develop statewide standards awarding college credits military education training occupational experience rain many people done years legal collect precipitation singlefamily rooftop homes rain barrels allowed capture rain nonpotable domestic use law also officially authorizes remote guzzlers wildlife capacity 20000 gallons less capture area acre piping system longer onequarter mile pets peril another law enhances protections animals left unattended vehicles times extreme heat cold allows law enforcement animal control public safety workers use reasonable means remove pet vehicle without fear civil liability recreational pot sales begin licensed medical marijuana dispensaries state local approval allowed sell products recreational purposes starting saturday several dispensaries including downtown las vegas near strip planned open right legal sales begin midnight live henderson youll take drive february city enacted sixmonth moratorium recreational marijuana licenses meaning five medical dispensaries within hendersons city limits wait longer joining market | 592 |
<p>That the Catholic Church, in the United States and indeed throughout the world, has become a major factor in shaping the debate over war and peace, security and freedom, is now widely acknowledged. The deep divisions within the church over its address to these central problems on the human agenda are, perhaps, less well known. They came into particularly sharp focus this past spring.</p>
<p>In the March 28 issue of the Jesuit weekly America, Andrew Reding, identified as a “hemispheric affairs analyst . . . and editor of the recently published Christianity and Revolution: Tomas Borge’s Theology of Life, said the following about Fidel Castro: “Here is one of those very rare leaders who have never sought personal enrichment, who have repeatedly risked their lives for others and who have established a system that affords preferential attention to the poor, the hungry, the naked, the homeless, the sick. Here is a lifelong crusader against racism who now seeks to extend his labors for social justice to unraveling the profoundly immoral political and economic structure that is squeezing the lifeblood out of the third-world nations. That indeed raises a provocative question: Where in the world may we find so Christian a head of state? Thus Castro’s growing links with progressive and revolutionary Christians are less a marriage of convenience than a convergence of kindred spirits. It is not so much Castro who has changed over the past decades, but the Latin American church, and with it, the possibilities for such profound transformations in Latin American Marxism and theology as are currently being witnessed in Central America, most notably in Nicaragua and El Salvador.”</p>
<p>The next week, Pope John Paul II visited Uruguay, Argentina, and Chile. At an impromptu press conference aboard his plane, the pope had this to say in response to a question about his political intentions in Chile:</p>
<p>“Yes, yes, I am not the evangelizer of democracy, I am the evangelizer of the Gospel. To the Gospel message, of course, belongs all the problems of human rights, and if democracy means human rights it also belongs to the message of the church.”</p>
<p>One hardly knows where to begin to analyze and understand the stark contrast between these two statements. Each claims Catholic warrants, but one virtually canonizes a Leninist dictator, and the other defends democracy as part of the church’s message in the modern world. Perhaps the following random reflections may cast some light on what is surely one of the crucial historical phenomena of our times.</p>
<p>First, it should be remembered that several commentators, notably our friend Richard John Neuhaus, brought heaps of opprobrium onto their heads in the early 1980s by charging that key leaders of American Christianity were, by design or accident, “consorting with the persecutors of the church of Christ” through their political activism. A reader of Against All Hope (Knopf 1986), Armando Valladares’ memoir of twenty years in the Cuban gulag, would surely qualify Fidel Castro as a persecutor of the church. Valladares goes into excruciating detail about the torments to which Christian political prisoners were subjected in Cuba, and remarks most tellingly,</p>
<p>“During those years with the purpose of forcing us to abandon our religious beliefs and to demoralize us, the Cuban communist indoctrinators repeatedly used the statements of support for Castro’s revolution made by some representatives of American Christian churches. Every time that a pamphlet was published in the United States, every time that a clergyman would write an article in support of Fidel Castro’s dictatorship, a translation would reach us, and that was worse for the Christian political prisoners than the beatings or the hunger. While we waited for the solidarity embrace from our brothers in Christ, incomprehensibly to us, those who were embraced were our tormentors.”</p>
<p>Whether book reviews from America are being declaimed to prisoners in Cuba today is not a matter on which we have immediate knowledge. But such cruelty would not be surprising. And thus it would seem that Pastor Neuhaus’s critique, far from being hyperbole, was scandalously on target. There is a terrible problem in American Catholicism’s capacity to even face, much less think through, morally wise policy toward Leninist totalitarianism. Surely the cause of peace with freedom is damaged when a man like Fidel Castro is proposed as some sort of exemplar of a “Christian head of state” in one of the most prestigious Catholic publications in the United States.</p>
<p>Second, and here the pope’s remarks are most helpful, mere anti-communism is insufficient, theologically and politically. It is necessary, but it is insufficient. The classic Catholic concept of peace-peace as dynamic, rightly ordered political community-illuminates more than what one ought to be against. It also suggests what one ought to be for. John Paul II’s three-stage argument sets the pattern here. First, the church is just that, the church, not a political lobbyist. (“I am the evangelizer of the Gospel.”) But Catholicism is neither privatistic nor quietistic. (“To the Gospel message, of course, belongs all the problems of human rights . . . .”) And, in the modern world, the church has come to understand that the mere assertion of human rights is not enough; one has to address the question of institutions of freedom. (“. . . and if democracy means human rights it also belongs to the message of the church.”)</p>
<p>Third, what is the future of the current Catholic debate on these questions? The picture is complex in the extreme. There are important figures in the National Conference of Catholic Bishops who are deeply concerned about the ideological drift of American Catholic activists and intellectuals. Some of these activists are, of course, the bishops’ own colleagues and staff members. The experience of the Nicaraguan church has been chastening here. But, again, it is not sufficient to know what one is against. And it cannot be said, at this juncture, that the majority of those who would challenge the idea that Fidel Castro or Tomás Borge somehow reflect Christian understandings of statecraft can articulate an alternative Catholic theology and politics of peace and freedom.</p>
<p>There are Catholic intellectuals, not all of them neo-conservatives by any means, who are willing to come to grips with the hard facts totalitarianism poses for the classic Catholic concept of peace and for its modern linkage to the quest for human rights and democracy. Unfortunately and unwisely, sobered Catholic liberals often dismiss things like book reviews in America as froth on the top of the kettle. Yet it is precisely to sources like America that engaged Catholics turn for ideas to inform their activism. True, one cannot expend all of one’s energies in combating ideological disinformation. But surely one precondition to a Catholic debate more adequately addressing the Janus-headed threat of war and totalitarianism is a frank confrontation with those who are, wittingly or not, “consorting with the persecutors of the church of Christ.” Maybe that’s not everyone’s tactical cup of tea. But it has to be done. And the doing of it ought not be regarded as, somehow, unsavory.</p>
<p>Historian Michael Howard once remarked that there had been two great revolutions in the twentieth century, the Bolshevik expropriation of the Russian Revolution in 1917 and the contemporary transformation of the Catholic Church from a bulwark of the ancien régime into perhaps the world’s foremost institutional defender of human rights. Howard also suggested that no small part of the human future would be determined in the encounter between these two revolutions. Perhaps even Michael Howard has failed to realize that the Catholic human rights revolution-with its immense importance for the cause of peace-is not itself a settled thing. We can be grateful, if for nothing else, to those who find “a convergence of kindred spirits” between Fidel Castro’s life and works and some forms of modern Catholic social thought, for giving us a sharp reminder of the stakes involved in the Catholic debate over peace and freedom.</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 | catholic church united states indeed throughout world become major factor shaping debate war peace security freedom widely acknowledged deep divisions within church address central problems human agenda perhaps less well known came particularly sharp focus past spring march 28 issue jesuit weekly america andrew reding identified hemispheric affairs analyst editor recently published christianity revolution tomas borges theology life said following fidel castro one rare leaders never sought personal enrichment repeatedly risked lives others established system affords preferential attention poor hungry naked homeless sick lifelong crusader racism seeks extend labors social justice unraveling profoundly immoral political economic structure squeezing lifeblood thirdworld nations indeed raises provocative question world may find christian head state thus castros growing links progressive revolutionary christians less marriage convenience convergence kindred spirits much castro changed past decades latin american church possibilities profound transformations latin american marxism theology currently witnessed central america notably nicaragua el salvador next week pope john paul ii visited uruguay argentina chile impromptu press conference aboard plane pope say response question political intentions chile yes yes evangelizer democracy evangelizer gospel gospel message course belongs problems human rights democracy means human rights also belongs message church one hardly knows begin analyze understand stark contrast two statements claims catholic warrants one virtually canonizes leninist dictator defends democracy part churchs message modern world perhaps following random reflections may cast light surely one crucial historical phenomena times first remembered several commentators notably friend richard john neuhaus brought heaps opprobrium onto heads early 1980s charging key leaders american christianity design accident consorting persecutors church christ political activism reader hope knopf 1986 armando valladares memoir twenty years cuban gulag would surely qualify fidel castro persecutor church valladares goes excruciating detail torments christian political prisoners subjected cuba remarks tellingly years purpose forcing us abandon religious beliefs demoralize us cuban communist indoctrinators repeatedly used statements support castros revolution made representatives american christian churches every time pamphlet published united states every time clergyman would write article support fidel castros dictatorship translation would reach us worse christian political prisoners beatings hunger waited solidarity embrace brothers christ incomprehensibly us embraced tormentors whether book reviews america declaimed prisoners cuba today matter immediate knowledge cruelty would surprising thus would seem pastor neuhauss critique far hyperbole scandalously target terrible problem american catholicisms capacity even face much less think morally wise policy toward leninist totalitarianism surely cause peace freedom damaged man like fidel castro proposed sort exemplar christian head state one prestigious catholic publications united states second popes remarks helpful mere anticommunism insufficient theologically politically necessary insufficient classic catholic concept peacepeace dynamic rightly ordered political communityilluminates one ought also suggests one ought john paul iis threestage argument sets pattern first church church political lobbyist evangelizer gospel catholicism neither privatistic quietistic gospel message course belongs problems human rights modern world church come understand mere assertion human rights enough one address question institutions freedom democracy means human rights also belongs message church third future current catholic debate questions picture complex extreme important figures national conference catholic bishops deeply concerned ideological drift american catholic activists intellectuals activists course bishops colleagues staff members experience nicaraguan church chastening sufficient know one said juncture majority would challenge idea fidel castro tomás borge somehow reflect christian understandings statecraft articulate alternative catholic theology politics peace freedom catholic intellectuals neoconservatives means willing come grips hard facts totalitarianism poses classic catholic concept peace modern linkage quest human rights democracy unfortunately unwisely sobered catholic liberals often dismiss things like book reviews america froth top kettle yet precisely sources like america engaged catholics turn ideas inform activism true one expend ones energies combating ideological disinformation surely one precondition catholic debate adequately addressing janusheaded threat war totalitarianism frank confrontation wittingly consorting persecutors church christ maybe thats everyones tactical cup tea done ought regarded somehow unsavory historian michael howard remarked two great revolutions twentieth century bolshevik expropriation russian revolution 1917 contemporary transformation catholic church bulwark ancien régime perhaps worlds foremost institutional defender human rights howard also suggested small part human future would determined encounter two revolutions perhaps even michael howard failed realize catholic human rights revolutionwith immense importance cause peaceis settled thing grateful nothing else find convergence kindred spirits fidel castros life works forms modern catholic social thought giving us sharp reminder stakes involved catholic debate peace freedom george weigel distinguished senior fellow ethics public policy center washington dc holds eppcs william e simon chair catholic studies | 723 |
<p>How dangerous is India's military posturing in a nuclear context?</p>
<p>From separate media reports on ‘massive’ exercises in India’s western deserts, we learn that India’s premier ‘strike’ corps, 2 Corps, and a ‘pivot’ corps, 10 Corps, are being exercised. Interestingly, media reports that carry mention of the 2 Corps exercise, ‘ <a href="http://www.tribuneindia.com/news/nation/story/71736.html" type="external">Exercise Brahmashira</a>’ (Ultimate weapon), make no mention of the other exercise, <a href="http://www.business-standard.com/article/pti-stories/army-conducts-major-defense-exercise-in-rajasthan-115042600556_1.html" type="external">Exercise Akraman</a> (Attack) II of 10 Corps, and vice versa. It would seem that the two are not interconnected, especially since 2 Corps is affiliated with India’s Western Command and 10 Crops is under is South Western (SW) Command.</p>
<p>However, this is improbable since the exercises are taking place in the same geographic area, Suratgarh sector, and the two exercises finished together. Therefore, it can be plausibly be inferred that a pivot corps and a strike crops exercised together. What are the implications?</p>
<p>‘Pivot’ corps are erstwhile ‘holding’ corps in a defensive role. India’s doctrine, now a decade old, converted these into ‘pivot’ corps, equipping each with an offensive element, termed ‘integrated battle group’ (IBG). From the name of the pivot corps exercise, Akraman II, it is evident that the 10 Corps exercise was to practice its integrated battle groups (IBG). Since the pivot corps in the semi-desert terrain has two mechanized Reorganised Plains Infantry Divisions, it is capable of sending into attack two IBGs.</p>
<p>Each of India’s three ‘strike’ corps is orbatted to one of the three geographic commands facing Pakistan. 2 Corps under Western Command is understood to operate in the developed plains sector in Punjab which Western Command faces. However, strike corps, owing to their inherent mobility, are able to move between sectors and achieve surprise by launch across the entire front. In this case, it appears that 2 Corps was put through its paces in the semi-developed terrain opposite South Western Command. This implies two options.</p>
<p>In addition to the two IBGs of the pivot corps in action, in the first option, there is also the strike corps affiliated to SW Command, 1 Corps, available for launch across its front. However, in case 2 Corps is practicing launch across SW Command frontage, in this option 1 Corps is instead held back as a countervailing force in a defensive role.</p>
<p>In the second option, along with the two pivot corps IBGs, both 1 Corps and 2 Corps are launched into semi-desert terrain opposite SW Command. In this year’s exercise, 1 Corps did not figure since India usually practices only one strike corps a year in rotation and 1 Corps exercise, Exercise Sarvada Vijay (Always Victorious) was held last year. But that 2 Corps is practicing in the terrain of the neighboring geographical command, it can supplement 1 Corps. In other words, at a maximum, two strike corps comprising their integral six IBGs and two IBGs of the pivot corps can be launched into the semi-desert terrain into Pakistan. This gives India the ability to cut Pakistan in half between Lahore and Karachi.</p>
<p>How dangerous is this in a nuclear context?</p>
<p>In the doctrine, while the initial offensives are launched by division-sized IBGs of pivot corps and of strike corps formations located closer to the border, the remainder of the strike corps mobilizes in their wake. It can use the areas already captured by IBGs for jump off into battles deeper within enemy territory.</p>
<p>While Pakistan may be able to countenance shallow thrusts by IBGs along the front with equanimity, deeper thrusts that could potentially threaten its vital areas and communication networks may be pushing the nuclear threshold a bit.</p>
<p>In this case, in the semi-developed sector, there is arguably greater space for strike corps operations without flirting inordinately with the proverbial nuclear threshold as would be the case in developed terrain, say, opposite Lahore. Therefore, if in the current exercise the strike corps is advertised as rehearsing maneuvers that ‘will allow the Army formations to break through multiple obstacles within a restricted time frame’, then the army expects sufficient space for territorial gains and attrition of Pakistani reserves without the nuclear factor intervening.</p>
<p>Pakistan has in its testing of a tactical nuclear weapons and delivery systems hinted at a lower nuclear threshold precisely to stay such operations by India’s strike corps in their tracks. India, for its part, appears to be exhibiting nonchalance by going about such exercises to indicate that it is not deterred. The two states are playing the ‘game of chicken’ which they are racing towards each other hoping the other would swerve. Through its exercises, India is depicting that it is getting into the car and visibly throwing away the wheel.</p>
<p>Unlike India’s 2004 conventional doctrine called ‘Cold Start’, the revised version of its doctrine of 2010 is not in the open domain. Therefore, it is not known if the 2010 version took into account the criticism that had greeted the 2004 version that deep operations may inordinately push Pakistan’s nuclear threshold. From the exercises just held it is not certain that the criticism has registered, especially if the second option discussed was the exercise scenario.</p>
<p>Had the doctrinal space in India been more transparent, it would have been easier to discern if its military is adequately cognizant of the nuclear reality now well into its second decade. The employment of India’s strike corps on maneuvers reminiscent of the pre-nuclear halcyon days of conventional operations in the eighties, as seen this year, does not lend confidence that India and its military are sufficiently sensitive to the onset of the nuclear age.</p> | false | 1 | dangerous indias military posturing nuclear context separate media reports massive exercises indias western deserts learn indias premier strike corps 2 corps pivot corps 10 corps exercised interestingly media reports carry mention 2 corps exercise exercise brahmashira ultimate weapon make mention exercise exercise akraman attack ii 10 corps vice versa would seem two interconnected especially since 2 corps affiliated indias western command 10 crops south western sw command however improbable since exercises taking place geographic area suratgarh sector two exercises finished together therefore plausibly inferred pivot corps strike crops exercised together implications pivot corps erstwhile holding corps defensive role indias doctrine decade old converted pivot corps equipping offensive element termed integrated battle group ibg name pivot corps exercise akraman ii evident 10 corps exercise practice integrated battle groups ibg since pivot corps semidesert terrain two mechanized reorganised plains infantry divisions capable sending attack two ibgs indias three strike corps orbatted one three geographic commands facing pakistan 2 corps western command understood operate developed plains sector punjab western command faces however strike corps owing inherent mobility able move sectors achieve surprise launch across entire front case appears 2 corps put paces semideveloped terrain opposite south western command implies two options addition two ibgs pivot corps action first option also strike corps affiliated sw command 1 corps available launch across front however case 2 corps practicing launch across sw command frontage option 1 corps instead held back countervailing force defensive role second option along two pivot corps ibgs 1 corps 2 corps launched semidesert terrain opposite sw command years exercise 1 corps figure since india usually practices one strike corps year rotation 1 corps exercise exercise sarvada vijay always victorious held last year 2 corps practicing terrain neighboring geographical command supplement 1 corps words maximum two strike corps comprising integral six ibgs two ibgs pivot corps launched semidesert terrain pakistan gives india ability cut pakistan half lahore karachi dangerous nuclear context doctrine initial offensives launched divisionsized ibgs pivot corps strike corps formations located closer border remainder strike corps mobilizes wake use areas already captured ibgs jump battles deeper within enemy territory pakistan may able countenance shallow thrusts ibgs along front equanimity deeper thrusts could potentially threaten vital areas communication networks may pushing nuclear threshold bit case semideveloped sector arguably greater space strike corps operations without flirting inordinately proverbial nuclear threshold would case developed terrain say opposite lahore therefore current exercise strike corps advertised rehearsing maneuvers allow army formations break multiple obstacles within restricted time frame army expects sufficient space territorial gains attrition pakistani reserves without nuclear factor intervening pakistan testing tactical nuclear weapons delivery systems hinted lower nuclear threshold precisely stay operations indias strike corps tracks india part appears exhibiting nonchalance going exercises indicate deterred two states playing game chicken racing towards hoping would swerve exercises india depicting getting car visibly throwing away wheel unlike indias 2004 conventional doctrine called cold start revised version doctrine 2010 open domain therefore known 2010 version took account criticism greeted 2004 version deep operations may inordinately push pakistans nuclear threshold exercises held certain criticism registered especially second option discussed exercise scenario doctrinal space india transparent would easier discern military adequately cognizant nuclear reality well second decade employment indias strike corps maneuvers reminiscent prenuclear halcyon days conventional operations eighties seen year lend confidence india military sufficiently sensitive onset nuclear age | 552 |
<p>For the first time, a drug has helped prevent heart attacks by curbing inflammation, a new and very different approach than lowering cholesterol, the focus for many years.</p>
<p>People on the drug also had surprisingly lower cancer death rates, especially from lung cancer. An anti-tumor effect is an exciting possibility, but it needs much more study because the heart experiment wasn’t intended to test that.</p>
<p>Doctors say the results on the drug, canakinumab (can-uh-KIN-yoo-mab), open a new frontier. Many heart attacks occur in people whose cholesterol is normal and whose main risk is chronic inflammation that can lead to clogged arteries.</p>
<p>“We suddenly know we can address the inflammation itself, the same way we learned almost 25 years ago that we could address cholesterol. It’s very exciting,” said the study’s leader, Dr. Paul Ridker of Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.</p>
<p>Results were published Sunday by the New England Journal of Medicine and Lancet, and presented at the European Society of Cardiology conference in Barcelona, Spain. The drug’s maker, Novartis, sponsored the study and Ridker consults for the company.</p>
<p>Statins such as Lipitor lower LDL or bad cholesterol and have been the cornerstone of preventing heart attacks along with not smoking, blood pressure control and a healthy lifestyle.</p>
<p>Yet one quarter of people who suffer a heart attack will have another one within five years, and inflammation is a culprit in half of those cases.</p>
<p>Inflammation happens after a joint is injured and swells, but similar chemical responses can occur over time throughout the body with unhealthy habits. That chronic, unseen inflammation can damage arteries and set the stage for clots.</p>
<p>Twenty years ago, Ridker helped clarify its role and patented a cheap blood test for a sign of inflammation called high-sensitivity C-reactive protein, or CRP.</p>
<p>THE STUDY</p>
<p>Canakinumab lowers CRP and is sold now under the brand name Ilaris for some rare inherited diseases.</p>
<p>The study tested it in 10,000 heart attack survivors with low cholesterol but high CRP. They got the usual heart medicines including statins and were given one of three different doses of canakinumab or a placebo as a shot every three months.</p>
<p>Those on the medium dose had a 15 percent lower chance of another heart attack, a stroke or a heart-related death over the next four years compared to people given dummy shots. About 33 people would have to be treated for five years to prevent one of these problems — a ratio that outside experts called very good.</p>
<p>The highest dose also lowered risk but not by enough to say the drug was the reason. The lowest dose had no effect.</p>
<p>Canakinumab’s benefit was comparable to Repatha, a powerful new type of cholesterol-lowering drug called a PCSK9 inhibitor. It came out two years ago and has had tepid sales, partly because many doctors hoped it would help more and due to its price — $14,000 a year.</p>
<p>It’s hard to get big reductions in risk by adding a new drug like canakinumab if people already are taking optimal medicines, said Dr. Mark Creager, director of the Dartmouth-Hitchkock heart and vascular center and past president of the American Heart Association.</p>
<p>But even a small improvement makes a huge difference considering how common heart attacks are, he said. “That’s going to save a lot of people.”</p>
<p>The best part is having a new way to help patients, said the Cleveland Clinic’s heart chief, Dr. Steven Nissen, who has consulted for Novartis without fee.</p>
<p>“For the first time we have this new target — inflammation,” Nissen said. “It’s sort of the dawning of a new era. I really think it’s that big.”</p>
<p>Inflammation also affects how cancers grow and spread. The cancer death rate was only half as large among those getting canakinumab, and death rates for lung cancer were lower in people getting the top two doses.</p>
<p>Doctors don’t think the drug prevents new cancers from developing, but that it might slow the growth of any tumors that had already started, based on other research.</p>
<p>The cancer results were unexpected and intriguing, but not consistent across all types of tumors, said Dr. Barnett Kramer, prevention chief at the National Cancer Institute. He called the lower risk for lung cancer “a promising lead” for future research, but said it comes with concern about the drug’s side effects.</p>
<p>Canakinumab raised the risk of fatal infections — about 1 of every 1,000 patients treated. Older people and diabetics were most vulnerable.</p>
<p>The drug had no effect on death rates once cancer, infection and heart risks were balanced out.</p>
<p>“The fatal infections are something to be concerned about” but overall trends are in a good direction, said Dr. David Goff of the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute.</p>
<p>The federal agency had no role in the heart attack study but sponsors one underway now testing methotrexate, a pill long used to treat cancer and rheumatoid arthritis. It may give a relatively cheap way to prevent heart attacks if it works, because canakinumab is a biotech drug that’s likely to be expensive, Goff said.</p>
<p>Novartis said it’s premature to discuss price for any use as a heart medicine. It costs as much as $200,000 now for rare diseases, and would have to prove cost-effective to justify its relatively modest benefits and risks for heart disease prevention, Dr. Robert Harrington, chairman of the department of medicine at Stanford University, wrote in a commentary in the New England journal.</p>
<p>The company said it would discuss the new results with regulators and pursue further studies on the lung cancer possibilities.</p>
<p>Drugs called NSAIDs, such as ibuprofen, fight inflammation and pain, but they can raise heart risks, which may seem confusing in light of this study. But they work in a different way, do not reduce CRP, and can affect blood clot formation.</p> | false | 1 | first time drug helped prevent heart attacks curbing inflammation new different approach lowering cholesterol focus many years people drug also surprisingly lower cancer death rates especially lung cancer antitumor effect exciting possibility needs much study heart experiment wasnt intended test doctors say results drug canakinumab canuhkinyoomab open new frontier many heart attacks occur people whose cholesterol normal whose main risk chronic inflammation lead clogged arteries suddenly know address inflammation way learned almost 25 years ago could address cholesterol exciting said studys leader dr paul ridker brigham womens hospital boston results published sunday new england journal medicine lancet presented european society cardiology conference barcelona spain drugs maker novartis sponsored study ridker consults company statins lipitor lower ldl bad cholesterol cornerstone preventing heart attacks along smoking blood pressure control healthy lifestyle yet one quarter people suffer heart attack another one within five years inflammation culprit half cases inflammation happens joint injured swells similar chemical responses occur time throughout body unhealthy habits chronic unseen inflammation damage arteries set stage clots twenty years ago ridker helped clarify role patented cheap blood test sign inflammation called highsensitivity creactive protein crp study canakinumab lowers crp sold brand name ilaris rare inherited diseases study tested 10000 heart attack survivors low cholesterol high crp got usual heart medicines including statins given one three different doses canakinumab placebo shot every three months medium dose 15 percent lower chance another heart attack stroke heartrelated death next four years compared people given dummy shots 33 people would treated five years prevent one problems ratio outside experts called good highest dose also lowered risk enough say drug reason lowest dose effect canakinumabs benefit comparable repatha powerful new type cholesterollowering drug called pcsk9 inhibitor came two years ago tepid sales partly many doctors hoped would help due price 14000 year hard get big reductions risk adding new drug like canakinumab people already taking optimal medicines said dr mark creager director dartmouthhitchkock heart vascular center past president american heart association even small improvement makes huge difference considering common heart attacks said thats going save lot people best part new way help patients said cleveland clinics heart chief dr steven nissen consulted novartis without fee first time new target inflammation nissen said sort dawning new era really think big inflammation also affects cancers grow spread cancer death rate half large among getting canakinumab death rates lung cancer lower people getting top two doses doctors dont think drug prevents new cancers developing might slow growth tumors already started based research cancer results unexpected intriguing consistent across types tumors said dr barnett kramer prevention chief national cancer institute called lower risk lung cancer promising lead future research said comes concern drugs side effects canakinumab raised risk fatal infections 1 every 1000 patients treated older people diabetics vulnerable drug effect death rates cancer infection heart risks balanced fatal infections something concerned overall trends good direction said dr david goff national heart lung blood institute federal agency role heart attack study sponsors one underway testing methotrexate pill long used treat cancer rheumatoid arthritis may give relatively cheap way prevent heart attacks works canakinumab biotech drug thats likely expensive goff said novartis said premature discuss price use heart medicine costs much 200000 rare diseases would prove costeffective justify relatively modest benefits risks heart disease prevention dr robert harrington chairman department medicine stanford university wrote commentary new england journal company said would discuss new results regulators pursue studies lung cancer possibilities drugs called nsaids ibuprofen fight inflammation pain raise heart risks may seem confusing light study work different way reduce crp affect blood clot formation | 594 |
<p />
<p>Guatemala’s civil war was, by far, Latin America’s bloodiest—leaving <a href="http://www.amnesty.org/en/for-media/press-releases/guatemalan-former-soldiers-sentenced-6060-years-massacre-2011-08-03" type="external">approximately</a> 200,000 people dead. A United Nations-supported truth commission found that more than 90 percent of the human rights violations were committed by the military, including over 600 massacres in primarily indigenous villages.</p>
<p>Since the conclusion of the war in 1996, the pursuit of accountability has not gone well.</p>
<p>This past August, a Guatemala City judge <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/aug/03/guatemala-soldiers-jailed-massacre" type="external">sentenced four former soldiers</a> to over 6,000 years in prison, for having participated in a massacre in 1982. This was a good thing, but it is nowhere near enough.</p>
<p>Earlier this month, human rights activist Jennifer Harbury (who has been outspoken on questions of accountability in Guatemala for decades), has cited that some people within Guatemala suspect former army personnel will attempt to turn amnesty into official policy.</p>
<p><a href="http://hablaguate.com/articles/10960-key-moment-to-denounce-guatemalan-military-s-attempts-to-impede-the-work-of-attorney-general-claudia-paz" type="external">Harbury has said that</a>, “within the next few weeks it is very likely that the army officers facing war crimes charges will push through a de facto amnesty, either by removing Claudia Paz, the amazing attorney general, an illegal congressional amnesty (‘punto final’), or through a court ruling canceling international human rights law.”</p>
<p>Since any of the three abovementioned developments would obviate the prospect of any former army official being held accountable for what was undoubtedly genocide, Harbury has implored people to act quickly. This includes her suggestion that people make “emergency” calls to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in the coming weeks.</p>
<p>Whether such a plan is actually in the works is not clear; such a scheme certainly would not be surprising.</p>
<p>During his campaign, Otto Peréz intimated that he might sack Attorney General Paz if he were elected president. Although <a href="http://www.insightcrime.org/insight-latest-news/item/1949-guatemalas-crime-fighting-prosecutors-job-is-safe-for-now" type="external">earlier this month</a>, Peréz publicly reiterated that he would not remove Paz from her post once he became president. Was the president-elect being disingenuous?</p>
<p>More <a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45423719/ns/world_news-americas/t/top-guatemala-prosecutor-warns-war-crimes-cases/#.Tvg9wnrf9P8" type="external">recently</a>, Paz has bravely been demanding that on-going Guatemalan genocide cases continue.</p>
<p>Even though she is not necessarily an impartial analyst of Guatemalan politics, Harbury is both knowledgeable and well-sourced—so her claims should not be discounted.</p>
<p>Conversely, it seems unlikely that current president Álvaro Colom or incoming president Peréz would try to get rid of Attorney General Paz. A Paz Attorney Generalship fits in so nicely with Pérez’s firm anti-crime stance and his forthcoming battle against drug traffickers. She is probably not going anywhere.</p>
<p>Pérez could reserve the right to remove her later for any number of reasons, like ineffectiveness or baseless allegations of corruption.</p>
<p>There is also a sad and bitter reality that that the current dialogue about amnesty in Guatemala has missed: To a great extent, former Guatemalan security personnel have already won. In Guatemala, one rarely sees justice of any kind. About two months ago, <a href="http://hablaguate.com/articles/10960-key-moment-to-denounce-guatemalan-military-s-attempts-to-impede-the-work-of-attorney-general-claudia-paz" type="external">a court ruled</a> that erstwhile Guatemalan dictator Óscar Mejía was “too sick” to face charges of war crimes. Similar judicial decisions would not be surprising.</p>
<p>Like anywhere else, holding former military personnel accountable for past atrocities or violations of international humanitarian law poses enormous challenges.</p>
<p>In spite of the progress Attorney General Claudia Paz y Paz has made, human rights supporters are going to be dissatisfied regarding Guatemalan war crimes trials and broader questions of accountability.</p>
<p>Guatemala’s impunity-laced past only helps foment on-going human violations and pervasive lawlessness which outgoing president Álvaro Colom has done nothing to address.</p>
<p>According to the US State Department, Guatemala’s <a href="https://www.osac.gov/Pages/ContentReportPDF.aspx?cid=10789" type="external">current prosecution rate</a> is somewhere between two and three percent.</p>
<p>The current White House petition that Harbury and others are pushing could be a helpful awareness-raising exercise, although it is unlikely to have a significant impact on Guatemalan or US policy.</p>
<p>Few of Guatemala’s former military men will ever be brought to justice.</p>
<p>The November election of former General Otto Peréz-Molina served as a rather sickening reminder of this. What could possibly further exemplify a resounding post-conflict “army victory” than an Otto Pérez presidency?</p>
<p>If Harbury is right and a push for amnesty is in the works, US intelligence assets in Guatemala would be well-aware of such a plan and would have probably already briefed the White House.</p>
<p>President Obama should publicly denounce any move by Guatemalan army officers for amnesty related to war crimes.</p>
<p>It is also important to remember that Guatemala’s civil war was not just a battle between a well-funded Latin American army and a leftist insurgency; that is an oversimplification. There were far more actors than that, including United States civilians and military personnel.</p>
<p>For starters and principally for ideological reasons that arose during the Cold War, the US had much to do with the Guatemalan military’s <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/inatl/daily/march99/guatemala11.htm" type="external">past</a> “successes.”</p>
<p>Through financial support, training, and other forms of assistance, President-elect Otto Pérez is a product of those mistakes.</p>
<p>President Obama called Pérez to congratulate him on his electoral victory in late November, <a href="http://iipdigital.usembassy.gov/st/english/texttrans/2011/11/20111122103158su0.1531597.html#axzz1hp7Pz5yR" type="external">but only mundane talking points were released to the public</a>.</p>
<p>One would hope President Pérez receives a tepid response when he makes his first trip to Washington, even though history suggests otherwise.</p>
<p>This article was originally published in <a href="http://www.jofr.org" type="external">The Journal of Foreign Relations</a>.</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | false | 1 | guatemalas civil war far latin americas bloodiestleaving approximately 200000 people dead united nationssupported truth commission found 90 percent human rights violations committed military including 600 massacres primarily indigenous villages since conclusion war 1996 pursuit accountability gone well past august guatemala city judge sentenced four former soldiers 6000 years prison participated massacre 1982 good thing nowhere near enough earlier month human rights activist jennifer harbury outspoken questions accountability guatemala decades cited people within guatemala suspect former army personnel attempt turn amnesty official policy harbury said within next weeks likely army officers facing war crimes charges push de facto amnesty either removing claudia paz amazing attorney general illegal congressional amnesty punto final court ruling canceling international human rights law since three abovementioned developments would obviate prospect former army official held accountable undoubtedly genocide harbury implored people act quickly includes suggestion people make emergency calls 1600 pennsylvania avenue coming weeks whether plan actually works clear scheme certainly would surprising campaign otto peréz intimated might sack attorney general paz elected president although earlier month peréz publicly reiterated would remove paz post became president presidentelect disingenuous recently paz bravely demanding ongoing guatemalan genocide cases continue even though necessarily impartial analyst guatemalan politics harbury knowledgeable wellsourcedso claims discounted conversely seems unlikely current president Álvaro colom incoming president peréz would try get rid attorney general paz paz attorney generalship fits nicely pérezs firm anticrime stance forthcoming battle drug traffickers probably going anywhere pérez could reserve right remove later number reasons like ineffectiveness baseless allegations corruption also sad bitter reality current dialogue amnesty guatemala missed great extent former guatemalan security personnel already guatemala one rarely sees justice kind two months ago court ruled erstwhile guatemalan dictator Óscar mejía sick face charges war crimes similar judicial decisions would surprising like anywhere else holding former military personnel accountable past atrocities violations international humanitarian law poses enormous challenges spite progress attorney general claudia paz paz made human rights supporters going dissatisfied regarding guatemalan war crimes trials broader questions accountability guatemalas impunitylaced past helps foment ongoing human violations pervasive lawlessness outgoing president Álvaro colom done nothing address according us state department guatemalas current prosecution rate somewhere two three percent current white house petition harbury others pushing could helpful awarenessraising exercise although unlikely significant impact guatemalan us policy guatemalas former military men ever brought justice november election former general otto perézmolina served rather sickening reminder could possibly exemplify resounding postconflict army victory otto pérez presidency harbury right push amnesty works us intelligence assets guatemala would wellaware plan would probably already briefed white house president obama publicly denounce move guatemalan army officers amnesty related war crimes also important remember guatemalas civil war battle wellfunded latin american army leftist insurgency oversimplification far actors including united states civilians military personnel starters principally ideological reasons arose cold war us much guatemalan militarys past successes financial support training forms assistance presidentelect otto pérez product mistakes president obama called pérez congratulate electoral victory late november mundane talking points released public one would hope president pérez receives tepid response makes first trip washington even though history suggests otherwise article originally published journal foreign relations 160 | 515 |
<p>By Laurence Frost and Edward Taylor</p>
<p>PARIS/FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Frankfurt’s vast auto show, which opens next week, is already getting attention of the wrong kind – for its impressive list of no-shows.</p>
<p>Besides the glaring absence of Tesla (O:) and its electric Model 3, the roster of big names staying away has grown this year to include such venerable brands as Nissan (T:), Peugeot , Fiat (MI:), Volvo, Jeep, Mitsubishi and Infiniti.</p>
<p>The uncertain fortunes of the traditional car show mirror those of an industry in flux, its incumbents threatened by emissions regulation, tech giants and the sharing economy.</p>
<p>“Car shows need a new approach,” said Patrick Koller, chief executive of Faurecia, a parts supplier with 19 billion euros ($23 billion) in global sales. “Otherwise they will disappear.”</p>
<p>Frankfurt and Paris host two of the world’s biggest shows in alternate years, punctuated by the Detroit show in January and other events in China, Japan, the U.S. and Switzerland.</p>
<p>But many of the traditional gatherings have seen visitor numbers fall since the turn of this century, when most new cars were still unveiled under their lights, framed by show girls.</p>
<p>The decline may be accelerating. Paris attendance was down 14 percent last year – with fear of attacks also weighing on tourism – and January’s Detroit show drew 9,000 fewer visitors.</p>
<p>The sense of upheaval is acute in Germany, as Frankfurt prepares for its first car show opening since the Volkswagen (DE:) emissions scandal blew up. Days before the event, Chancellor Angela Merkel was urging local officials not to ban diesels, as her re-election campaign drew opposition fire over perceived government cosiness with the industry.</p>
<p>TECH BATTLEGROUND</p>
<p>But diesel scandals are just one of the problems challenging automakers and the legendary largesse of their trade shows.</p>
<p>The emergence of tech as the main battleground for the connected, autonomous cars of the future has drawn exhibitors to competing events such as the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas and Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.</p>
<p>Footfall is becoming less important anyhow. Thanks to social media, Daimler (DE:) reckons its Mercedes-Benz innovations reach the same global audience of 1 billion whether unveiled in Frankfurt or at CES – a trade-only show closed to the public, with less than a fifth of the German event’s attendance numbers.</p>
<p>“Daimler’s media strategy has changed with the rising significance of tech,” spokeswoman Bettina Fetzer said.</p>
<p>Although Mercedes will be out in force on Frankfurt’s 200,000-square meter show floor, it is “getting more complex” to decide how and where to showcase new products, Fetzer said.</p>
<p>To counter the drift, show organizers and exhibitors are rethinking formats and scrambling to associate with events and brands outside the staid universe of the combustion engine.</p>
<p>Next week’s show will debut a New Mobility World forum with Google (NASDAQ:) and Facebook (NASDAQ:) as partners, while Mercedes hosts a conference under the banner of South by Southwest, the eclectic cultural gathering held in Texas. Rival BMW’s (DE:) program includes TED Talks-branded presentations.</p>
<p>Anxious not to be outdone, Paris show managers traveled to Las Vegas in January to discuss collaboration with CES, but came away empty-handed. “There are no discussions at this time for event expansion into Europe,” a CES spokeswoman said.</p>
<p>“These are attempts to stay relevant in the public domain,” said analyst Arndt Ellinghorst of Evercore ISI, a brokerage.</p>
<p>“The way people consume products and brands is changing,” he said. “The days when it was enough to lure consumers to shows with half-dressed girls on car bonnets are long gone.”</p>
<p>POP-UPS</p>
<p>The modernization efforts have not prevented Tesla, Nissan or another half-dozen brands from quitting the car-show circuit.</p>
<p>For several years, Tesla attended the main European shows before opting out of both Geneva and Frankfurt this year – just as the North American launch of its $35,000 Model 3 makes waves.</p>
<p>“We look for events where automobiles might be less expected,” a Tesla spokesman said, citing golf and boat shows as well as a European summer road trip with pop-up Tesla displays along the route. “We can reach a lot of people that way.”</p>
<p>Nissan’s decision to skip Frankfurt followed a “full review at global level of our event and show strategy to facilitate maximum brand visibility”, the company said.</p>
<p>Reports of the car show’s inevitable demise have been exaggerated, however.</p>
<p>As networking events up to CEO level they remain unmatched, while suppliers and new entrants are already filling gaps left by the patchier presence of some carmakers.</p>
<p>German industrial group Thyssenkrupp (DE:) is returning after a decade’s absence. “If the sector is going to change so dramatically we want to be there and show what we can do,” said Karsten Kroos, head of the company’s auto parts division.</p>
<p>Others skipping this show will be back. Instead of turning up every year, many carmakers simply want to opt in when they have something to announce.</p>
<p>“A car show is a marketing tool like any other, so it has to provide a return on investment,” Peugeot (PA:) brand chief Jean-Philippe Imparato told Reuters earlier this year. “But that doesn’t mean we won’t be in Frankfurt again before too long.”</p>
<p>($1 = 0.8376 euros)</p> | false | 1 | laurence frost edward taylor parisfrankfurt reuters frankfurts vast auto show opens next week already getting attention wrong kind impressive list noshows besides glaring absence tesla electric model 3 roster big names staying away grown year include venerable brands nissan peugeot fiat mi volvo jeep mitsubishi infiniti uncertain fortunes traditional car show mirror industry flux incumbents threatened emissions regulation tech giants sharing economy car shows need new approach said patrick koller chief executive faurecia parts supplier 19 billion euros 23 billion global sales otherwise disappear frankfurt paris host two worlds biggest shows alternate years punctuated detroit show january events china japan us switzerland many traditional gatherings seen visitor numbers fall since turn century new cars still unveiled lights framed show girls decline may accelerating paris attendance 14 percent last year fear attacks also weighing tourism januarys detroit show drew 9000 fewer visitors sense upheaval acute germany frankfurt prepares first car show opening since volkswagen de emissions scandal blew days event chancellor angela merkel urging local officials ban diesels reelection campaign drew opposition fire perceived government cosiness industry tech battleground diesel scandals one problems challenging automakers legendary largesse trade shows emergence tech main battleground connected autonomous cars future drawn exhibitors competing events consumer electronics show ces las vegas mobile world congress barcelona footfall becoming less important anyhow thanks social media daimler de reckons mercedesbenz innovations reach global audience 1 billion whether unveiled frankfurt ces tradeonly show closed public less fifth german events attendance numbers daimlers media strategy changed rising significance tech spokeswoman bettina fetzer said although mercedes force frankfurts 200000square meter show floor getting complex decide showcase new products fetzer said counter drift show organizers exhibitors rethinking formats scrambling associate events brands outside staid universe combustion engine next weeks show debut new mobility world forum google nasdaq facebook nasdaq partners mercedes hosts conference banner south southwest eclectic cultural gathering held texas rival bmws de program includes ted talksbranded presentations anxious outdone paris show managers traveled las vegas january discuss collaboration ces came away emptyhanded discussions time event expansion europe ces spokeswoman said attempts stay relevant public domain said analyst arndt ellinghorst evercore isi brokerage way people consume products brands changing said days enough lure consumers shows halfdressed girls car bonnets long gone popups modernization efforts prevented tesla nissan another halfdozen brands quitting carshow circuit several years tesla attended main european shows opting geneva frankfurt year north american launch 35000 model 3 makes waves look events automobiles might less expected tesla spokesman said citing golf boat shows well european summer road trip popup tesla displays along route reach lot people way nissans decision skip frankfurt followed full review global level event show strategy facilitate maximum brand visibility company said reports car shows inevitable demise exaggerated however networking events ceo level remain unmatched suppliers new entrants already filling gaps left patchier presence carmakers german industrial group thyssenkrupp de returning decades absence sector going change dramatically want show said karsten kroos head companys auto parts division others skipping show back instead turning every year many carmakers simply want opt something announce car show marketing tool like provide return investment peugeot pa brand chief jeanphilippe imparato told reuters earlier year doesnt mean wont frankfurt long 1 08376 euros | 532 |
<p>An Advocate for the Deprived</p>
<p>Dahiyeh, South Beirut, LEBANON — Rushing to an appointment last Saturday I passed the Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah Hassaniyeh (Mosque), which for many in my immediate Dahiyeh neighborhood is the religious institution we feel most connected to because of its long and continuing history of social and religious work in our community.</p>
<p>Nearly 18 months after the July 4th, 2010 death of Lebanon’s preeminent Islamic scholar, the Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah, but seeming more like three months ago, the ‘Fadlallah Hassaniyeh’ is an ever active beehive of social work and religious study and truly a working people’s institution.</p>
<p>It is also the manifestation of Sayed Fadlallah’s achievement’s for and commitments to all in our community: Shia, Sunni, Christians and non-believers.</p>
<p>Unaware that it was the 12th day of the lunar month of Rabih el Awwal, the Prophet Mohammad bin Abdillah’s birthday, I was surprised by all the activity saturating the surrounding streets and the hundreds of school children in celebratory clothes doing various activities enjoying the festivity with their families.</p>
<p>Suddenly a gaggle of pre-teen friends from our neighborhood ran up to me and pulled me to the front of the vast ornate Fadlallah Mosque and to the tables in front where children were distributing small cloth-wrapped candies in celebration. When night descends, which is early these days, the children might be given fireworks by their parents, as was common in the past.&#160; Yet given so much uncertainly these days in the region and in Lebanon, even relatively mild explosive noises cause my neighbors to hustle their flocks inside and avoid balconies and windows until they understand what the noise was all about.</p>
<p>By then too late for my appointment, I postponed it and entered the Mosque and sat on a bench near the burial chamber (Maqam) of Ayatollah Fadlallah.&#160; I reflected on what he meant to Muslims and Christians in Lebanon and to all people of good will around the world and to me personally.&#160; I had the honor to meet with him several times and to count his son Ali, who has succeeded him in much of his work, as my friend.&#160; &#160;As I sat close to the Maqam, I was surprised to see members of our community still arriving to his resting place, leaning forward and speaking privately to him and pledging to follow his progressive teachings, fatwas, and examples. Some, inspired by his life’s work took vows to become better people in their relations with others.</p>
<p>I also still recall vividly his funeral and the untold thousands who came to our neighborhood to join his funeral procession on July 6, 2010.</p>
<p>Friends carried his body around our neighborhood. &#160;They then marched to the spot of&#160;the 1985 CIA-Saudi assassination attempt, which killed 90, mainly school children and women, and wounded more than 250, before returning to Imam Rida Mosque where he was laid to rest. Tens of thousands of mourners gathered at the mosque for prayer services before the funeral procession.</p>
<p>From all across the region delegations arrived and every Lebanese political and religious leader attended except the small minded Maronite Cardinal Patriarch Sfeir, who took umbrage at Fadallah’s positive views about one person-one vote democracy.&#160; Sayeed Fadlallah did not favor Lebanon being ruled by the current archaic French colonial legacy of parceling out political power based on the undemocratic confessional formulae of the 1943 Paris installed National Pact.</p>
<p>His passing shocked and saddened the region and the loss of his advocacy of dialogue, respect and unity among all religions is incalculable. Justice for Palestine and ending the Zionist occupation was part of his unwavering lifelong work.&#160; Some media outlets reported that shortly before he died, and upon being asked by a medical attendant a few days ago if he needed anything, he replied, “Only the end of the Zionist occupation of Palestine.”</p>
<p>I recalled the morning of July 4, Zeinab, the nurse on duty at the blood donor’s clinic at Bahman Hospital, a block from my home in Haret Hreik, had just instructed me to remain sitting for five minutes and to drink the juice she gave me before I returned to south Beirut’s blazing sun.</p>
<p>A companion and I had each just donated a pint of blood in response to an appeal from friends who worked in the Translation Office of Fadlallah. He had been hospitalized for the past 12 days but on Friday his stomach bleeding had increased dramatically, related to complications from a liver problem he had been treated for over the past several years. Sayeed Fadallah also suffered from diabetes and high blood pressure.</p>
<p>As we waited, Zeinab returned, tears in her eyes, and simply said, “The Sayeed has passed away.”&#160; And she disappeared. So did my Shia hijabed companion, and as it seemed, everyone from the floor.</p>
<p>I decided to walk down the stairs to the main level and could hear sobs&#160;from hospital staff on each floor, now seemingly darkened with each level eerier than the preceding one as I descended.</p>
<p>As I left the main entrance of Bahman&#160;hospital, I was thinking about some of&#160;the more than a dozen meetings I had the honor to attend with Grand Ayatolah Fadlallah and some of his staff over the past three years. Such as those who regularly visited him from the Washington DC based Council for the National Interest and one visit that I had arranged for former President Jimmy Carter.</p>
<p>Suddenly there was&#160;movement for two blocks in front&#160;and along the side streets adjacent to Bahman, a state of the art and science Hospital operated by Fadlallah’s Al Marbarrat Charity. This hospital was among hundreds of civil buildings in Haret Hreik and South Beirut that Israel had bombed in July of 2006. The Fadlallah home was also reduced to rubble.</p>
<p>“How did these guys get here so fast?” I wondered, for it was only minutes since the Majaa (religious guide) to millions in the Middle East had died. Some security units, dressed in black shirts, caps and trousers, walkie-talkies in their left hands, others in civilian clothes, quickly placed traffic barriers in the area. They politely asked that all vehicles including motorcycles be relocated a least two blocks away.</p>
<p>Some, from their appearance, obviously war toughened fighters, wept&#160;and consoled men and women who began arriving at the hospital to pay their respects,&#160;first in twos and threes and then streams.</p>
<p>The loudspeakers from the Hassanayn Mosque, where every Friday Fadlallah for the past nearly 20 years delivered sermons to tens of thousands of faithful, Muslim and Christian alike, began broadcasting religious music and Koranic verses to our shocked and grief-stricken neighborhood. During the night of the 27th day of Ramadan, known as Laylat al-Kadr, (according to the Al Kadar Sura in the Koran, this is the day that the Angel Gabriel came down from heaven and the beginning of&#160; the revelation of the Koran) more than 50,000 filled Fadlallah’s Mosque and surrounding streets.</p>
<p>“The father, the leader, the marjaa, the guide, the human being is gone. Sayyed Fadlallah has died this morning,” senior aide Ayatollah Abdullah al-Ghurayfi told a hastily called&#160; news conference, at the hospital, joined&#160; by the late cleric’s sons, Sayyed Ali Fadlallah and Jaafar, who, like nearly everyone else in attendance,&#160; could not hold back tears.</p>
<p>The&#160;sweltering evening of July 5th, an American delegation was given by his family and Hezbollah security the rare honor of viewing the body of Lebanon’s senior Shia cleric inside his Mosque near where he would be buried at 1:30 p.m. the following afternoon. The group met a wide spectrum of Lebanon’s&#160;political and resistance leadership, but was not joined by anyone from the US Embassy since their government would boycott Lebanon’s national day of mourning&#160;and the burial of this Washington branded “Terrorist.”&#160; It was in 1995, that then President Bill Clinton, at the urging of AIPAC and facing a re-election campaign, so designated him. Former President Carter promised during a visit in June of 2009 that he would contact President Obama immediately about this travesty but was unable to have his name removed before the Sayeed’s death.</p>
<p /> | false | 1 | advocate deprived dahiyeh south beirut lebanon rushing appointment last saturday passed mohammad hussein fadlallah hassaniyeh mosque many immediate dahiyeh neighborhood religious institution feel connected long continuing history social religious work community nearly 18 months july 4th 2010 death lebanons preeminent islamic scholar grand ayatollah mohammad hussein fadlallah seeming like three months ago fadlallah hassaniyeh ever active beehive social work religious study truly working peoples institution also manifestation sayed fadlallahs achievements commitments community shia sunni christians nonbelievers unaware 12th day lunar month rabih el awwal prophet mohammad bin abdillahs birthday surprised activity saturating surrounding streets hundreds school children celebratory clothes various activities enjoying festivity families suddenly gaggle preteen friends neighborhood ran pulled front vast ornate fadlallah mosque tables front children distributing small clothwrapped candies celebration night descends early days children might given fireworks parents common past160 yet given much uncertainly days region lebanon even relatively mild explosive noises cause neighbors hustle flocks inside avoid balconies windows understand noise late appointment postponed entered mosque sat bench near burial chamber maqam ayatollah fadlallah160 reflected meant muslims christians lebanon people good around world personally160 honor meet several times count son ali succeeded much work friend160 160as sat close maqam surprised see members community still arriving resting place leaning forward speaking privately pledging follow progressive teachings fatwas examples inspired lifes work took vows become better people relations others also still recall vividly funeral untold thousands came neighborhood join funeral procession july 6 2010 friends carried body around neighborhood 160they marched spot of160the 1985 ciasaudi assassination attempt killed 90 mainly school children women wounded 250 returning imam rida mosque laid rest tens thousands mourners gathered mosque prayer services funeral procession across region delegations arrived every lebanese political religious leader attended except small minded maronite cardinal patriarch sfeir took umbrage fadallahs positive views one personone vote democracy160 sayeed fadlallah favor lebanon ruled current archaic french colonial legacy parceling political power based undemocratic confessional formulae 1943 paris installed national pact passing shocked saddened region loss advocacy dialogue respect unity among religions incalculable justice palestine ending zionist occupation part unwavering lifelong work160 media outlets reported shortly died upon asked medical attendant days ago needed anything replied end zionist occupation palestine recalled morning july 4 zeinab nurse duty blood donors clinic bahman hospital block home haret hreik instructed remain sitting five minutes drink juice gave returned south beiruts blazing sun companion donated pint blood response appeal friends worked translation office fadlallah hospitalized past 12 days friday stomach bleeding increased dramatically related complications liver problem treated past several years sayeed fadallah also suffered diabetes high blood pressure waited zeinab returned tears eyes simply said sayeed passed away160 disappeared shia hijabed companion seemed everyone floor decided walk stairs main level could hear sobs160from hospital staff floor seemingly darkened level eerier preceding one descended left main entrance bahman160hospital thinking of160the dozen meetings honor attend grand ayatolah fadlallah staff past three years regularly visited washington dc based council national interest one visit arranged former president jimmy carter suddenly was160movement two blocks front160and along side streets adjacent bahman state art science hospital operated fadlallahs al marbarrat charity hospital among hundreds civil buildings haret hreik south beirut israel bombed july 2006 fadlallah home also reduced rubble guys get fast wondered minutes since majaa religious guide millions middle east died security units dressed black shirts caps trousers walkietalkies left hands others civilian clothes quickly placed traffic barriers area politely asked vehicles including motorcycles relocated least two blocks away appearance obviously war toughened fighters wept160and consoled men women began arriving hospital pay respects160first twos threes streams loudspeakers hassanayn mosque every friday fadlallah past nearly 20 years delivered sermons tens thousands faithful muslim christian alike began broadcasting religious music koranic verses shocked griefstricken neighborhood night 27th day ramadan known laylat alkadr according al kadar sura koran day angel gabriel came heaven beginning of160 revelation koran 50000 filled fadlallahs mosque surrounding streets father leader marjaa guide human gone sayyed fadlallah died morning senior aide ayatollah abdullah alghurayfi told hastily called160 news conference hospital joined160 late clerics sons sayyed ali fadlallah jaafar like nearly everyone else attendance160 could hold back tears the160sweltering evening july 5th american delegation given family hezbollah security rare honor viewing body lebanons senior shia cleric inside mosque near would buried 130 pm following afternoon group met wide spectrum lebanons160political resistance leadership joined anyone us embassy since government would boycott lebanons national day mourning160and burial washington branded terrorist160 1995 president bill clinton urging aipac facing reelection campaign designated former president carter promised visit june 2009 would contact president obama immediately travesty unable name removed sayeeds death | 758 |
<p>By Mitch Phillips</p>
<p>LONDON (Reuters) – The man who helped expose Russia’s massive doping regime says the International Olympic Committee (IOC) is still in denial over the performance-enhancing drug use and would rather sweep it under the carpet than take meaningful action.</p>
<p>American Bryan Fogel, director of the documentary film Icarus, told Reuters that IOC president Thomas Bach had “betrayed clean athletes the world over by his failure to act decisively” and that the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) was “crippled by its mandate with no ability to take action”.</p>
<p>Russia repeated its regular denials of Fogel’s accusations that it orchestrated mass doping. WADA dismissed his comments about its powers and the IOC declined to comment.</p>
<p>Fogel had set out to make a film showing the impact of self-administered performance-enhancing drugs on his amateur cycling efforts, but during the research he was introduced to Grigory Rodchenkov, the former head of Russia’s anti-doping program.</p>
<p>Fogel said that after a few conversations he realized he had stumbled across a story on an entirely different level as Rodchenkov gave details on the depths and complexity of doping in his homeland.</p>
<p>“What he told me, and showed me, was jaw-dropping, astonishing, frightening and worrying,” Fogel told Reuters.</p>
<p>His account, first published in the New York Times, led to the establishment of Canadian lawyer Richard McLaren’s independent report for WADA, which backed up his account.</p>
<p>Rodchenkov fled Russia and is now in hiding in the United States. He said he was in fear of his life after two other senior former Russian anti-doping officials, Nikita Kamayev and Vyacheslav Sinev, died suddenly within weeks of each other in February 2016. Last week a Russian warrant was issued for Rodchenkov’s arrest.</p>
<p>The story of Rodchenkov’s relationship with Fogel and how, in fear of his life, he left his family and friends behind, is documented in the film now available on Netflix (NASDAQ:).</p>
<p>It gives details of what it says is a massive government doping project, alleging secret service involvement and describing an intricate program of sample-swapping and bottle-tampering at the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics.</p>
<p>One scene shows WADA officials Olivier Niggli, Beckie Scott and Christiane Ayotte and the IOC’s Athletes’ Commission Chair Claudia Bokel reacting with shock at Rodchenkov’s account, including details of what drugs dozens of athletes had been taking.</p>
<p>HUGELY FRUSTRATED</p>
<p>Almost 18 months on, however, Fogel is frustrated by what he considers to be a lack of meaningful action, with his main ire directed at the IOC’s failure to ban Russia completely from the 2016 Rio Olympics.</p>
<p>“I quickly learned that the IOC would like nothing more than to sweep this under the carpet. Even after Richard McLaren’s report proved beyond a reasonable doubt that everything Grigory had said was true and showed the scale of the fraud, the IOC wasn’t willing to acknowledge it,” Fogel said.</p>
<p>“To fob the decision (on banning Russia) off to the (individual sports) federations was a punch in the face to Olympic values and to every clean athlete. Their (the IOC’s) goal was simply to find a way to make the problem go away.”</p>
<p>Asked about the comments, the IOC said: “Mr Fogel is currently trying to promote his film and therefore we would make no response.”</p>
<p>The Olympics governing body has, however, previously tried to explain its role in the process, emphasizing that McLaren’s report never had the authority to bring anti-doping cases against individual athletes.</p>
<p>The IOC is reanalyzing all 254 urine samples collected from Russian athletes at Sochi, while the 63 re-tested blood samples collected from Russian athletes there were all negative.</p>
<p>Bach said last month that he had not watched the Icarus film.</p>
<p>Foden was full of praise for McLaren, who worked closely with Rodchenkov during the presentation of his evidence, but said WADA’s structure and the fact that it is 50-percent funded by the IOC left it powerless.</p>
<p>“Essentially the IOC owns WADA and they (WADA) have no power – all they can do is observe and report,” he said.</p>
<p>“In WADA there are good people trying to do the right thing. But you have an organization essentially hamstrung by its mandate. They (WADA) can find a million crimes but without the authority to act they are a crippled organization.”</p>
<p>MCLAREN’S MANDATE</p>
<p>Fogel cited the fact that 95 of the 96 athletes named by McLaren had been cleared as evidence of WADA and the IOC’s failings but WADA director general Niggli told Reuters that view was a misunderstanding of the situation.</p>
<p>“It is important to keep in focus that McLaren’s mandate was finding out about the system,” he told Reuters. “He gave us the names but he and we said from day one there probably wouldn’t be enough evidence for an individual anti-doping violation.</p>
<p>“At that stage his mandate was finished but to say nothing is happening is totally wrong.”</p>
<p>Niggli also said WADA had a new set of compliance standards and the sanctions process would soon be carried out by an independent body – probably the Court of Arbitration for Sport – and no longer by national bodies or federations.</p>
<p>“I think that shows there is a will from both sides to do the right thing,” he said.</p>
<p>Fogel also had stinging criticism for the Russian authorities.</p>
<p>“Grigory took extraordinary risks and had to leave everything behind,” he said. “They’ve seized his assets, tried to take his daughter’s apartment that he had bought for her and they are trying to take his wife’s property.</p>
<p>“This film is truly a window into how Russia operates, putting sport aside. It shows what the country is prepared to do to guarantee its influence in a geo-political situation.”</p>
<p>Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Reuters the Russian government “decisively rejected” the accusations.</p>
<p>“We have said many times that the state was never involved and cannot be involved in any sports doping,” he said.</p>
<p>“We don’t know why Rodchenkov fears for his life, but we do know that he is on the international wanted list for crimes that he purportedly committed in Moscow.”</p>
<p>Dmitry Svishchev, who serves on the Russian parliament’s sport and physical culture committee and is the president of the country’s curling federation, said Rodchenkov was the person who should be facing punishment.</p>
<p>“There were unfortunately many cases in which some athletes tried to achieve results dishonestly, there are cases like these all over the world, but it’s insanity to say that there was a state program,” he said. “This is all Rodchenkov’s fantasy.”</p> | false | 1 | mitch phillips london reuters man helped expose russias massive doping regime says international olympic committee ioc still denial performanceenhancing drug use would rather sweep carpet take meaningful action american bryan fogel director documentary film icarus told reuters ioc president thomas bach betrayed clean athletes world failure act decisively world antidoping agency wada crippled mandate ability take action russia repeated regular denials fogels accusations orchestrated mass doping wada dismissed comments powers ioc declined comment fogel set make film showing impact selfadministered performanceenhancing drugs amateur cycling efforts research introduced grigory rodchenkov former head russias antidoping program fogel said conversations realized stumbled across story entirely different level rodchenkov gave details depths complexity doping homeland told showed jawdropping astonishing frightening worrying fogel told reuters account first published new york times led establishment canadian lawyer richard mclarens independent report wada backed account rodchenkov fled russia hiding united states said fear life two senior former russian antidoping officials nikita kamayev vyacheslav sinev died suddenly within weeks february 2016 last week russian warrant issued rodchenkovs arrest story rodchenkovs relationship fogel fear life left family friends behind documented film available netflix nasdaq gives details says massive government doping project alleging secret service involvement describing intricate program sampleswapping bottletampering 2014 sochi winter olympics one scene shows wada officials olivier niggli beckie scott christiane ayotte iocs athletes commission chair claudia bokel reacting shock rodchenkovs account including details drugs dozens athletes taking hugely frustrated almost 18 months however fogel frustrated considers lack meaningful action main ire directed iocs failure ban russia completely 2016 rio olympics quickly learned ioc would like nothing sweep carpet even richard mclarens report proved beyond reasonable doubt everything grigory said true showed scale fraud ioc wasnt willing acknowledge fogel said fob decision banning russia individual sports federations punch face olympic values every clean athlete iocs goal simply find way make problem go away asked comments ioc said mr fogel currently trying promote film therefore would make response olympics governing body however previously tried explain role process emphasizing mclarens report never authority bring antidoping cases individual athletes ioc reanalyzing 254 urine samples collected russian athletes sochi 63 retested blood samples collected russian athletes negative bach said last month watched icarus film foden full praise mclaren worked closely rodchenkov presentation evidence said wadas structure fact 50percent funded ioc left powerless essentially ioc owns wada wada power observe report said wada good people trying right thing organization essentially hamstrung mandate wada find million crimes without authority act crippled organization mclarens mandate fogel cited fact 95 96 athletes named mclaren cleared evidence wada iocs failings wada director general niggli told reuters view misunderstanding situation important keep focus mclarens mandate finding system told reuters gave us names said day one probably wouldnt enough evidence individual antidoping violation stage mandate finished say nothing happening totally wrong niggli also said wada new set compliance standards sanctions process would soon carried independent body probably court arbitration sport longer national bodies federations think shows sides right thing said fogel also stinging criticism russian authorities grigory took extraordinary risks leave everything behind said theyve seized assets tried take daughters apartment bought trying take wifes property film truly window russia operates putting sport aside shows country prepared guarantee influence geopolitical situation kremlin spokesman dmitry peskov told reuters russian government decisively rejected accusations said many times state never involved involved sports doping said dont know rodchenkov fears life know international wanted list crimes purportedly committed moscow dmitry svishchev serves russian parliaments sport physical culture committee president countrys curling federation said rodchenkov person facing punishment unfortunately many cases athletes tried achieve results dishonestly cases like world insanity say state program said rodchenkovs fantasy | 603 |
<p>Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke said none of the 22 national monuments under review by the Trump administration should be eliminated outright, but he is recommending boundary reductions at a “handful” of sites he declined to name.</p>
<p>Zinke told The Associated Press that unspecified boundary adjustments for some monuments designated over the past two decades were included in the report he submitted to President Donald Trump on Thursday.</p>
<p>None of the federally controlled sites would revert to new ownership, he said, while public access for uses such as hunting, fishing or grazing would be maintained or restored.</p>
<p>Two Obama-era national monuments in Nevada — <a href="" type="internal">Gold Butte</a> in northeastern Clark County and Basin and Range in remote Lincoln and Nye counties — are among those reviewed by Zinke over the past four months.</p>
<p>A White House official confirmed on background that Trump had received Zinke’s recommendations and said the president was reviewing them “to determine the best path forward for the American people.”</p>
<p>The Washington Post reported Thursday that Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah and Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument in Oregon are on the list of sites Zinke wants downsized. In June, Zinke called for an unspecified boundary reduction for the 1.4 million-acre Bears Ears National Monument in Utah.</p>
<p>The Interior Department announced the completion of the review in a press release Thursday. It linked to a summary of the report that did not mention any monuments by name or include specifics about Zinke’s recommendations.</p>
<p>Frustrated monument advocates seized on the lack of information released so far.</p>
<p>“This entire exercise was allegedly to bring transparency and the public into the process of protecting our cultural and natural resources,” Rep. Dina Titus, D-Nev., said. “Secretary Zinke and President Trump have instead created more questions than answers and are ignoring the years of hard work by thousands advocating for the creation of Gold Butte, Basin and Range and monuments across the United States.”</p>
<p>Patrick Donnelly, Nevada state director for the Center for Biological Diversity, said the exercise was “a sham” from the start.</p>
<p>“Secretary Zinke is ending this review just like it began and has proceeded throughout: veiled in secrecy and ignoring the public,” Donnelly said. “Nevadans have clearly stated that they support Gold Butte and Basin and Range national monuments, and this administration has no choice but to respect the will of the people.”</p>
<p>The Tucson, Arizona-based environmental group filed a Freedom of Information Act request Thursday for Zinke’s report to the president. Earlier this month, the group sued the administration for failing to respond to its public record requests for Zinke’s emails, schedule and other documents associated with the review.</p>
<p>Zinke, who was in Montana Thursday for a briefing on wildfires burning across the Northern Rockies and Pacific Northwest, declined to say whether portions of the monuments he wants changed would be opened up to oil and gas drilling, mining, logging and other industries for which Trump has advocated.</p>
<p>Instead, he spoke of protecting tribal interests and historical land grants, pointing to monuments in New Mexico, where Hispanic ranchers have opposed two monuments proclaimed by President Barack Obama.</p>
<p>If Trump adopts the recommendations, it would quiet some of the worst fears of his opponents, who warned that vast public lands and marine areas could be lost to states or private interests.</p>
<p>But significant reductions in the size of the monuments, especially those created by Obama, would mark the latest in a string of actions where Trump has sought to erode his Democratic predecessor’s legacy.</p>
<p>The recommendations cap an unprecedented review launched by executive order on April 26 and based on a belief that the century-old Antiquities Act had been misused by past presidents to create oversized monuments that hinder energy development, grazing and other uses.</p>
<p>The review raised alarm among conservationists who said protections could be lost for areas that are home to ancient cliff dwellings, towering sequoia trees, deep canyons and ocean habitats. They’ve vowed to file lawsuits if Trump attempts any changes that would reduce the size of monuments or rescind their designations.</p>
<p>Zinke had previously announced that he would recommend that no changes be made to six national monuments: Grand Canyon-Parashant in northwestern Arizona, just across the border from Nevada; Canyons of the Ancients in Colorado; Craters of the Moon in Idaho; Hanford Reach in Washington; Sand to Snow in Southern California; and Upper Missouri River Breaks in Montana.</p>
<p>Contact Henry Brean at [email protected] or 702-383-0350. Follow <a href="https://twitter.com/RefriedBrean" type="external">@RefriedBrean</a> on Twitter. Review-Journal White House correspondent Debra J. Saunders and the Associated Press contributed to this report.</p>
<p />
<p>Monument scorecard</p>
<p>Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke has completed his review of 22 national monuments, but his full slate of recommendations has not yet been released. Here are the recommendations he has made public so far:</p>
<p>No changes</p>
<p>■ Canyons of the Ancients, Colorado</p>
<p>■ Craters of the Moon, Idaho</p>
<p>■ Hanford Reach, Washington</p>
<p>■ Grand Canyon-Parashant, Arizona</p>
<p>■ Sand to Snow, California</p>
<p>■ Upper Missouri River Breaks, Montana</p>
<p>Reduce in size</p>
<p>■ Bears Ears, Utah</p>
<p>Still unknown</p>
<p>■ Basin and Range, Nevada, 703,585 acres</p>
<p>■ Berryessa Snow Mountain, California, 330,780 acres</p>
<p>■ Carrizo Plain, California, 204,107 acres</p>
<p>■ Cascade Siskiyou, Oregon, 100,000 acres</p>
<p>■ Giant Sequoia, California, 327,760 acres</p>
<p>■ Gold Butte, Nevada, 296,937 acres</p>
<p>■ Grand Staircase-Escalante, Utah, 1,700,000 acres</p>
<p>■ Ironwood Forest, Arizona, 128,917 acres</p>
<p>■ Katahdin Woods and Waters, Maine, 87,563 acres</p>
<p>■ Mojave Trails, California, 1,600,000 acres</p>
<p>■ Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks, New Mexico, 496,330 acres</p>
<p>■ Rio Grande del Norte, New Mexico, 242,555 acres</p>
<p>■ San Gabriel Mountains, California, 346,177 acres</p>
<p>■ Sonoran Desert, Arizona, 486,149 acres</p>
<p>■ Vermilion Cliffs, Arizona, 279,568 acres</p>
<p /> | false | 1 | interior secretary ryan zinke said none 22 national monuments review trump administration eliminated outright recommending boundary reductions handful sites declined name zinke told associated press unspecified boundary adjustments monuments designated past two decades included report submitted president donald trump thursday none federally controlled sites would revert new ownership said public access uses hunting fishing grazing would maintained restored two obamaera national monuments nevada gold butte northeastern clark county basin range remote lincoln nye counties among reviewed zinke past four months white house official confirmed background trump received zinkes recommendations said president reviewing determine best path forward american people washington post reported thursday grand staircaseescalante national monument utah cascadesiskiyou national monument oregon list sites zinke wants downsized june zinke called unspecified boundary reduction 14 millionacre bears ears national monument utah interior department announced completion review press release thursday linked summary report mention monuments name include specifics zinkes recommendations frustrated monument advocates seized lack information released far entire exercise allegedly bring transparency public process protecting cultural natural resources rep dina titus dnev said secretary zinke president trump instead created questions answers ignoring years hard work thousands advocating creation gold butte basin range monuments across united states patrick donnelly nevada state director center biological diversity said exercise sham start secretary zinke ending review like began proceeded throughout veiled secrecy ignoring public donnelly said nevadans clearly stated support gold butte basin range national monuments administration choice respect people tucson arizonabased environmental group filed freedom information act request thursday zinkes report president earlier month group sued administration failing respond public record requests zinkes emails schedule documents associated review zinke montana thursday briefing wildfires burning across northern rockies pacific northwest declined say whether portions monuments wants changed would opened oil gas drilling mining logging industries trump advocated instead spoke protecting tribal interests historical land grants pointing monuments new mexico hispanic ranchers opposed two monuments proclaimed president barack obama trump adopts recommendations would quiet worst fears opponents warned vast public lands marine areas could lost states private interests significant reductions size monuments especially created obama would mark latest string actions trump sought erode democratic predecessors legacy recommendations cap unprecedented review launched executive order april 26 based belief centuryold antiquities act misused past presidents create oversized monuments hinder energy development grazing uses review raised alarm among conservationists said protections could lost areas home ancient cliff dwellings towering sequoia trees deep canyons ocean habitats theyve vowed file lawsuits trump attempts changes would reduce size monuments rescind designations zinke previously announced would recommend changes made six national monuments grand canyonparashant northwestern arizona across border nevada canyons ancients colorado craters moon idaho hanford reach washington sand snow southern california upper missouri river breaks montana contact henry brean hbreanreviewjournalcom 7023830350 follow refriedbrean twitter reviewjournal white house correspondent debra j saunders associated press contributed report monument scorecard interior secretary ryan zinke completed review 22 national monuments full slate recommendations yet released recommendations made public far changes canyons ancients colorado craters moon idaho hanford reach washington grand canyonparashant arizona sand snow california upper missouri river breaks montana reduce size bears ears utah still unknown basin range nevada 703585 acres berryessa snow mountain california 330780 acres carrizo plain california 204107 acres cascade siskiyou oregon 100000 acres giant sequoia california 327760 acres gold butte nevada 296937 acres grand staircaseescalante utah 1700000 acres ironwood forest arizona 128917 acres katahdin woods waters maine 87563 acres mojave trails california 1600000 acres organ mountainsdesert peaks new mexico 496330 acres rio grande del norte new mexico 242555 acres san gabriel mountains california 346177 acres sonoran desert arizona 486149 acres vermilion cliffs arizona 279568 acres | 593 |
<p>My reaction to last night’s <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/13/us/politics/obamas-2013-state-of-the-union-address.html?_r=0&amp;pagewanted=all" type="external">State of the Union address</a>&#160;begins from compassion for my fellow wonks, and ends with a sense that the Democrats’ political fortunes in the coming years may not be so rosy as many on the Left would like to think.</p>
<p>By the end of the speech, I was feeling sorry for the White House policy staff. It’s perfectly clear looking over the text that they have just been through a months-long budget policy process that must have ended in total failure.</p>
<p>Anyone who has been through this annual exercise at the White House would recognize the tell-tale signs. The phrase “I will direct my cabinet to come up with executive actions we can take,” which came quite early in the speech in relation to energy and environmental policy, is the policy staffer’s worst nightmare in a State of the Union address. It’s your boss saying you failed. It means that after months of meetings and dozens of memos, the White House, OMB, and the relevant cabinet agencies couldn’t even agree on executive actions to take, let alone on a proposal to include in the budget or to press for in Congress. I thought it was strange that Obama would put that declaration of failure so early in the speech. Why not raise your key 2014 budget proposals first–that’s generally what the State of the Union is for–and then do cleanup on the issues that some constituencies want to hear about but that you weren’t able to pull off? If you look at State of the Union addresses from the past few decades, that’s usually how they work.</p>
<p>As the speech went on, though, the reason became clear: There were no 2014 budget proposals. The president didn’t even mention his forthcoming budget–again, that’s usually a big part of what this speech is for. And he didn’t make any significant proposal for reforming any government program, for launching any new one, ending any old one, or doing much of anything in particular that he hasn’t been pushing unsuccessfully for years. It was like an eighth-year State of the Union address, not a fifth-year one.</p>
<p>You have to try to cover up such things, of course, especially if you’re a Democrat, and so the president did speak of all manner of obnoxious federal micromanagement initiatives with fancy names–manufacturing hubs, “fix it first,” a “partnership to rebuild America,” a challenge to “redesign America’s schools,” an “Energy Security Trust,” and so on. But you know what these things are? They’re nothing. They’re the headings that the wonks in a Democratic White House put at the top of otherwise blank memos at the beginning of a process that, months later, is supposed to end up with a budget and a State of the Union address. And here they were at the end of that process with barely more meat on their bones than when they started. Some of these proposals might “happen” and some of them will not, but there won’t be any difference between the two.</p>
<p>From my point of view, this is basically a good thing. Of course, it would have been nice if the president had offered some proposals to address our looming fiscal crisis–and what he had to say about entitlement reform and tax reform amounted to essentially nothing new–or to actually spur economic growth. I agree entirely with the <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/340557/broke-retreating-state-our-union-editors?pg=1" type="external">editors’ critique</a>&#160;this morning. But there was no reason to expect that from this president. What we might have expected, especially in light of his second inaugural, was a much more assertive progressive agenda. If the president had an ambitious left-wing agenda, his party might have the numbers to push some portion of it through Congress, or at least to force the coming year to be focused on the subjects they want to talk about. So it’s a good thing he doesn’t. He ran for re-election without a governing agenda, and it now seems he will preside without one too. He offered a tonally progressive speech (as John Podhoretz aptly <a href="http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/welcome_to_fantasy_world_of_gov_NkGQD7lqaMTczb7kqzjF1H" type="external">put it</a>&#160;this morning, “a liberal fantasy of a State of the Union straight out of The West Wing,”) but like those West Wing speeches, it just didn’t add up to anything substantive.</p>
<p>Why is that? I think there are probably three inter-related reasons. First is the exhaustion of liberalism in our time. It might be odd to speak of exhaustion when liberals feel so ascendant now, but that’s when exhaustion happens, and the fact is that the progressive ideal laid out so clearly in Obama’s second inaugural is an exhausted ideology. It is so both because of its successes–after health care, there are no large pieces left in the social-democratic puzzle the left has been building in fits and starts for a century in America–and because of its failures: It is increasingly clear that the liberal welfare state is not sustainable in its current form, and its costs and inefficiencies are increasingly present and real and are putting huge burdens on our economy at every level. This can’t really go on. From here on, the left has mostly to play a defensive game of retrenchment and reaction, and this is an exhausting game, especially for liberals. If you put the narrative laid out in the president’s second inaugural together with the speech he gave last night, you have a story of past glory and present exhaustion.</p>
<p>Second is the smallness of this particular president at this particular time. It is not a coincidence that the only policy initiative the president spoke about last night that actually seems to be going somewhere was immigration reform, which is moving in Congress not because the president wanted it to but because some leading Democrats and Republicans seem to have decided that they had to take it into their own hands. It’s an effort that will only succeed if Obama mostly stays out of it, and he knows that. I think we are entering a period, at least for the next two years, of congressional supremacy in which something closer to regular order resumes in Congress and the interaction of the Republican House and the Democratic Senate will be what determines the policy agenda. The President will sign anything that passes both houses, and meaningful legislation will only be likely to pass if he is mostly kept at arm’s length from it. This is in part because of the dynamics of a divided Congress (especially now that the House Republicans no longer see confronting Obama as their key priority) and in part because of the president’s almost unbelievable incompetence in dealing with both parties in Congress in the past four years. Under these circumstances, it might have been a little ridiculous for Obama to propose a detailed legislative agenda last night. He’s in the strange position of having to stay somewhat out of policy debates in which he wants to see progress in his second term. It looks like he’s in the process of becoming a very weak president.</p>
<p>But the third reason may be the most significant in the next few years. It becomes evident in contrasting Obama’s speech with Rubio’s response. Simply put, the foremost problem to which the country now wants a solution from Washington is the problem of slow economic growth, and the Democrats are in a very bad position to advance solutions to that problem.</p>
<p>As the president suggested, and Rubio said outright, slow growth is the key barrier to upward mobility and a key source of pressure on middle-class families, and only robust growth offers a plausible way out of our economic and fiscal problems. The core of Rubio’s speech was basically an outline of how he thinks growth could be achieved now. It suggested an implicit assumption that the reason the economy is not growing is the inefficiency or unproductivity of our economy today–and especially of the p ublic sector and those portions of the public sector most dominated by the government–and it proposed entitlement reform (to induce greater efficiency in health care and to reduce federal spending), education reform (to improve the quality of our labor force and provide greater opportunities for mobility), tax reform (to reduce needless drag on the economy by raising revenue more efficiently), immigration reform (to improve the quality of our labor force), and energy exploration (to make the fossil fuels that power today’s economy much cheaper). I think that’s a pretty plausible list (though I would add real health-care reform beyond the entitlements to vastly improve productivity and reduce costs, and regulatory reform to ensure open competition rather than further advantage large established players throughout the economy). And when you look over that list, you realize the Democrats’ dilemma. They are prevented by the politics of their electoral coalition from seriously advancing most of these ideas.</p>
<p>The real progressives are staunchly opposed to entitlement reform and unhappy with tax reform that doesn’t raise rates (as an efficiency-oriented reform would not), the environmentalists are allergic to fossil fuel exploration, the teachers’ unions won’t hear of real K-12 reform while the professoriate (which is remarkably important to the party) will resist a genuine transformation of the university business model. That leaves only immigration reform, which is certainly the least economically significant of the elements of Rubio’s growth agenda, and is also the only element of that agenda that wouldn’t directly reduce the cost of living of the middle class. The Democrats can talk in general about ways of reducing the cost of living of the middle class (as the president talked about college costs last night) but in practice the only means they can really offer to significantly do that at this point is by giving middle-class Americans more benefits, which is certainly not a means of encouraging economic growth.</p>
<p>This suggests a huge opening for Republicans–an opportunity to advance a prosperity agenda with direct benefits for middle-class families and which the Democrats could not really match. It also suggests that we should expect more empty speeches from the president in the coming years, and that for all that liberals today feel ascendant and empowered, they are both exhausted and vulnerable. If Obama is as true a modern progressive as his second inaugural suggested, then he will not be well positioned to get the left out of this difficulty. And if Republicans move to capitalize on the opportunity (which is still a big “if”), Democrats could find themselves in serious political trouble relatively quickly. There will surely be steps they can take to alleviate that trouble, but voting on gun control and cap-and-trade are not among them.</p>
<p>Yuval Levin is Hertog fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and editor of National Affairs.</p> | false | 1 | reaction last nights state union address160begins compassion fellow wonks ends sense democrats political fortunes coming years may rosy many left would like think end speech feeling sorry white house policy staff perfectly clear looking text monthslong budget policy process must ended total failure anyone annual exercise white house would recognize telltale signs phrase direct cabinet come executive actions take came quite early speech relation energy environmental policy policy staffers worst nightmare state union address boss saying failed means months meetings dozens memos white house omb relevant cabinet agencies couldnt even agree executive actions take let alone proposal include budget press congress thought strange obama would put declaration failure early speech raise key 2014 budget proposals firstthats generally state union forand cleanup issues constituencies want hear werent able pull look state union addresses past decades thats usually work speech went though reason became clear 2014 budget proposals president didnt even mention forthcoming budgetagain thats usually big part speech didnt make significant proposal reforming government program launching new one ending old one much anything particular hasnt pushing unsuccessfully years like eighthyear state union address fifthyear one try cover things course especially youre democrat president speak manner obnoxious federal micromanagement initiatives fancy namesmanufacturing hubs fix first partnership rebuild america challenge redesign americas schools energy security trust know things theyre nothing theyre headings wonks democratic white house put top otherwise blank memos beginning process months later supposed end budget state union address end process barely meat bones started proposals might happen wont difference two point view basically good thing course would nice president offered proposals address looming fiscal crisisand say entitlement reform tax reform amounted essentially nothing newor actually spur economic growth agree entirely editors critique160this morning reason expect president might expected especially light second inaugural much assertive progressive agenda president ambitious leftwing agenda party might numbers push portion congress least force coming year focused subjects want talk good thing doesnt ran reelection without governing agenda seems preside without one offered tonally progressive speech john podhoretz aptly put it160this morning liberal fantasy state union straight west wing like west wing speeches didnt add anything substantive think probably three interrelated reasons first exhaustion liberalism time might odd speak exhaustion liberals feel ascendant thats exhaustion happens fact progressive ideal laid clearly obamas second inaugural exhausted ideology successesafter health care large pieces left socialdemocratic puzzle left building fits starts century americaand failures increasingly clear liberal welfare state sustainable current form costs inefficiencies increasingly present real putting huge burdens economy every level cant really go left mostly play defensive game retrenchment reaction exhausting game especially liberals put narrative laid presidents second inaugural together speech gave last night story past glory present exhaustion second smallness particular president particular time coincidence policy initiative president spoke last night actually seems going somewhere immigration reform moving congress president wanted leading democrats republicans seem decided take hands effort succeed obama mostly stays knows think entering period least next two years congressional supremacy something closer regular order resumes congress interaction republican house democratic senate determines policy agenda president sign anything passes houses meaningful legislation likely pass mostly kept arms length part dynamics divided congress especially house republicans longer see confronting obama key priority part presidents almost unbelievable incompetence dealing parties congress past four years circumstances might little ridiculous obama propose detailed legislative agenda last night hes strange position stay somewhat policy debates wants see progress second term looks like hes process becoming weak president third reason may significant next years becomes evident contrasting obamas speech rubios response simply put foremost problem country wants solution washington problem slow economic growth democrats bad position advance solutions problem president suggested rubio said outright slow growth key barrier upward mobility key source pressure middleclass families robust growth offers plausible way economic fiscal problems core rubios speech basically outline thinks growth could achieved suggested implicit assumption reason economy growing inefficiency unproductivity economy todayand especially p ublic sector portions public sector dominated governmentand proposed entitlement reform induce greater efficiency health care reduce federal spending education reform improve quality labor force provide greater opportunities mobility tax reform reduce needless drag economy raising revenue efficiently immigration reform improve quality labor force energy exploration make fossil fuels power todays economy much cheaper think thats pretty plausible list though would add real healthcare reform beyond entitlements vastly improve productivity reduce costs regulatory reform ensure open competition rather advantage large established players throughout economy look list realize democrats dilemma prevented politics electoral coalition seriously advancing ideas real progressives staunchly opposed entitlement reform unhappy tax reform doesnt raise rates efficiencyoriented reform would environmentalists allergic fossil fuel exploration teachers unions wont hear real k12 reform professoriate remarkably important party resist genuine transformation university business model leaves immigration reform certainly least economically significant elements rubios growth agenda also element agenda wouldnt directly reduce cost living middle class democrats talk general ways reducing cost living middle class president talked college costs last night practice means really offer significantly point giving middleclass americans benefits certainly means encouraging economic growth suggests huge opening republicansan opportunity advance prosperity agenda direct benefits middleclass families democrats could really match also suggests expect empty speeches president coming years liberals today feel ascendant empowered exhausted vulnerable obama true modern progressive second inaugural suggested well positioned get left difficulty republicans move capitalize opportunity still big democrats could find serious political trouble relatively quickly surely steps take alleviate trouble voting gun control capandtrade among yuval levin hertog fellow ethics public policy center editor national affairs | 907 |
<p>It’s always fascinating to encounter a documentary about a historical event after you’ve seen the meticulously staged Hollywood version. Your hunger to take in the subject is probably ramped up a notch or two — but beyond that, there’s now an added point of interest, since a good documentary will shed powerful light on a question that lurks behind any piece of dramatized history. Namely: How accurate is it? “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/12th-and-clairmount/" type="external">12th and Clairmount</a>,” an illuminating and innovatively crafted account of the 1967 Detroit riot, is a documentary that viewers will be eager to compare and contrast with Kathryn Bigelow’s “Detroit” (timed, like this film, to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the uprising). That’s likely to give it that much more of a specialty niche.</p>
<p>Not that the movie wouldn’t be absorbing on its own. Brian Kaufman, who directed and edited it, takes a disarmingly personalized approach, mixing newsreels and photographs with grainy silent 8mm home movies, a number of which are accompanied on the soundtrack by first-person testimonials from the people who shot them. It’s not just riot footage, either. Kaufman, in 81 minutes, creates a revelatory portrait of the city, reaching back to the late ’50s and early ’60s, when Detroit was one of the most racially diverse places in the United States but the word Detroit didn’t carry the connotation of violent entropy and broken-down ruin that it would acquire — and hold onto — after the riots.</p>
<p>Kaufman constructs an arresting profile of the city’s mayor, Jerome P. Cavanagh, an ebullient and crusading integrationist who many at the time compared to JFK (he seemed on a fast track to rise into presidential politics). Under Cavanagh’s leadership, many believed that Detroit was a city leading the way. The film also offers testimonials to the forceful influence of the speech that Martin Luther King, Jr. gave in Detroit in 1963, when the gathering of thousands of African-Americans in the streets, united in righteous exaltation, became a message not so much to the outside world as to the individuals who comprised the crowd: Yes, we have the power.</p>
<p>But they did and they didn’t. The gains in Civil Rights were real, but Detroit remained segregated (even during the height of Cavanagh’s influence, the city council defeated an anti-housing-bias bill by a vote of 7-2), and Kaufman lets us hear from people of every class and neighborhood: the melting pot of downtown, the whites in their secluded enclaves, the African-Americans who were kept out even when they could afford to buy a home, the way the practice of “blockbusting” worked, with landlords indulging in greedy scare tactics like paying black children to throw a bottle through a window, thereby establishing a neighborhood as vulnerable to crime, at which point the landlord would snap up one house at a fire-sale price, then another, fomenting a wave of panicked sell-offs. This was the economic engine of white flight.</p>
<p>“12th and Clairmount” also features a terrifying portrait of the Detroit police force, who regarded the city’s black population as a class that needed to be squashed. A group of cops known as the Big Four rode around in a squad car as a terrorist gang, looking for blacks to beat up — one of them, nicknamed Rotation Slim, carried half a pool cue as his weapon of choice. By the time “12th and Clairmount” reaches the incident that touched off the riot (the police raid on an after-hours bar on 12th Street in the wee hours of July 23, 1967), we feel in our gut that it’s nothing more than a match that lit the tinder box.</p>
<p>The riot is captured with a you-are-there ferocity, but that doesn’t that the movie views it with any sort of imperial clarity. “12th and Clairmount” wipes away preconceptions by asking: What, exactly, is a riot? What was happening, spiritually and psychologically, in Watts, Cleveland, Newark, and — finally — Detroit when black Americans went on a chaotic rampage of looting and burning? As a black female witness on the soundtrack puts it, “Then the riots started. Or the revolution, or the insurrection. What is it called?” The explosion of rage and despair was a knotty tangle of empowerment and self-destruction. “12th and Clairmount” features a great deal of footage of people skulking through trashed stores, walking out with things like shoes: a fantasy apocalypse of shopping gone amok. Even when the National Guard is called in, its soldiers have no real idea of what to do. You can target law-breakers, but how do you arrest a war zone?</p>
<p>As someone who got swept up by the power of “Detroit,” I watched “12th and Clairmount” wishing that Bigelow’s film had spent more time with these ordinary looters. That said, the Algiers Motel incident that formed the dramatic core of “Detroit” is treated in several scenes that confirm the truth Bigelow’s film was built around: that the execution-style murder of three young black men by police officers was the Detroit riot’s heart of darkness — the fullest expression of the sickness that triggered the upheaval in the first place. Phrases like “police brutality” or “black lives matter” can take you only so far: What words are there to evoke what it means when an advanced society’s normalizes homicide? The documentary’s amateur footage of burning buildings is expressive in a startling way. Watching “12th and Clairmount,” you feel the anger of the riot alive in the inferno. It’s the burning down of dreams.</p>
<p>Film Review: ’12th and Clairmount’</p>
<p>Reviewed on-line, Nov. 15, 2017. Running time: 81 MIN.</p>
<p>Production: A Film by Detroit Free Press, produced in collaboration with Brigade, WXYZ Detroit, Detroit Institute of Arts, with support from the Knight Foundation. Producers: Kathy Kieliszewski, Bill McGraw, Brian Kaufman. Executive producers: Robert Huschka, Brian Priester. Director: Brian Kaufman. Screenplay: Kathy Kieliszewski, Bill McGraw, Brian Kaufman. Editor: Brian Kaufman.</p>
<p>With: Jerome P. Cavanagh, Shirley Davis, Ernie Harwell, Walter P. Reuther, George W. Romney, Rev. Dr. Wendell Anthony, James Atkin, Sheila Cockrel, Harry Cook, John Eddings, Anthony Fiermonte, Jay Butler, LeeRoy Johnson, Kathleen Kurta, John Eddings, Zola Masembuko, Renee Giles, Marsha Music, Bill Goodman.</p> | false | 1 | always fascinating encounter documentary historical event youve seen meticulously staged hollywood version hunger take subject probably ramped notch two beyond theres added point interest since good documentary shed powerful light question lurks behind piece dramatized history namely accurate 12th clairmount illuminating innovatively crafted account 1967 detroit riot documentary viewers eager compare contrast kathryn bigelows detroit timed like film coincide 50th anniversary uprising thats likely give much specialty niche movie wouldnt absorbing brian kaufman directed edited takes disarmingly personalized approach mixing newsreels photographs grainy silent 8mm home movies number accompanied soundtrack firstperson testimonials people shot riot footage either kaufman 81 minutes creates revelatory portrait city reaching back late 50s early 60s detroit one racially diverse places united states word detroit didnt carry connotation violent entropy brokendown ruin would acquire hold onto riots kaufman constructs arresting profile citys mayor jerome p cavanagh ebullient crusading integrationist many time compared jfk seemed fast track rise presidential politics cavanaghs leadership many believed detroit city leading way film also offers testimonials forceful influence speech martin luther king jr gave detroit 1963 gathering thousands africanamericans streets united righteous exaltation became message much outside world individuals comprised crowd yes power didnt gains civil rights real detroit remained segregated even height cavanaghs influence city council defeated antihousingbias bill vote 72 kaufman lets us hear people every class neighborhood melting pot downtown whites secluded enclaves africanamericans kept even could afford buy home way practice blockbusting worked landlords indulging greedy scare tactics like paying black children throw bottle window thereby establishing neighborhood vulnerable crime point landlord would snap one house firesale price another fomenting wave panicked selloffs economic engine white flight 12th clairmount also features terrifying portrait detroit police force regarded citys black population class needed squashed group cops known big four rode around squad car terrorist gang looking blacks beat one nicknamed rotation slim carried half pool cue weapon choice time 12th clairmount reaches incident touched riot police raid afterhours bar 12th street wee hours july 23 1967 feel gut nothing match lit tinder box riot captured youarethere ferocity doesnt movie views sort imperial clarity 12th clairmount wipes away preconceptions asking exactly riot happening spiritually psychologically watts cleveland newark finally detroit black americans went chaotic rampage looting burning black female witness soundtrack puts riots started revolution insurrection called explosion rage despair knotty tangle empowerment selfdestruction 12th clairmount features great deal footage people skulking trashed stores walking things like shoes fantasy apocalypse shopping gone amok even national guard called soldiers real idea target lawbreakers arrest war zone someone got swept power detroit watched 12th clairmount wishing bigelows film spent time ordinary looters said algiers motel incident formed dramatic core detroit treated several scenes confirm truth bigelows film built around executionstyle murder three young black men police officers detroit riots heart darkness fullest expression sickness triggered upheaval first place phrases like police brutality black lives matter take far words evoke means advanced societys normalizes homicide documentarys amateur footage burning buildings expressive startling way watching 12th clairmount feel anger riot alive inferno burning dreams film review 12th clairmount reviewed online nov 15 2017 running time 81 min production film detroit free press produced collaboration brigade wxyz detroit detroit institute arts support knight foundation producers kathy kieliszewski bill mcgraw brian kaufman executive producers robert huschka brian priester director brian kaufman screenplay kathy kieliszewski bill mcgraw brian kaufman editor brian kaufman jerome p cavanagh shirley davis ernie harwell walter p reuther george w romney rev dr wendell anthony james atkin sheila cockrel harry cook john eddings anthony fiermonte jay butler leeroy johnson kathleen kurta john eddings zola masembuko renee giles marsha music bill goodman | 599 |
<p>President Donald Trump pressed Republicans in the Senate Friday morning to get healthcare reform done soon.</p>
<p>On Twitter, he first praised them for “working hard” before issuing a warning that they “must come through as they have promised!,</p>
<p>Republicans Senators are working hard to get their failed ObamaCare replacement approved. I will be at my desk, pen in hand!</p>
<p>— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/885770227514052608" type="external">July 14, 2017</a></p>
<p>So impt Rep Senators, under leadership of <a href="https://twitter.com/SenateMajLdr" type="external">@SenateMajLdr</a> McConnell get healthcare plan approved. After 7yrs of O’Care disaster, must happen!</p>
<p>— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/885772254017187840" type="external">July 14, 2017</a></p>
<p>After all of these years of suffering thru ObamaCare, Republican Senators must come through as they have promised!</p>
<p>— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/885772727315030020" type="external">July 14, 2017</a></p>
<p>. <a href="https://twitter.com/VP" type="external">@VP</a> Mike Pence is working hard on HealthCare and getting our wonderful Republican Senators to do what is right for the people.</p>
<p>— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/885773130723205120" type="external">July 14, 2017</a></p>
<p>Republican leaders have revised their bill in an increasingly desperate effort to deliver on seven years of promises to repeal and replace Obamacare, but f immediately lost two pivotal votes, leaving none to spare as the party’s own divisions put its central campaign pledge in serious jeopardy.</p>
<p>Trump said this week that failure would make him “very angry” and that he would blame Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. “</p>
<p>Earlier in the week, while flying to France, Trump had acknowledged the challenges lawmakers face.</p>
<p>“I’d say the only thing more difficult than peace between Israel and the Palestinians is healthcare,” Trump told reporters traveling with him. “But I think we’re going to have something that’s really good and that people are going to like.”</p>
<p>Trump is waiting and eager to sign health legislation: “I will be at my desk, pen in hand!” he tweeted on Friday.</p>
<p>The reworked bill McConnell presented to fellow Republicans on Thursday aims to win conservatives’ support by letting insurers sell low-cost, skimpy policies. At the same time, he seeks to placate hesitant moderates by adding billions to combat opioid abuse and help consumers with skyrocketing insurance costs.</p>
<p>But it was not clear whether the Republican leader has achieved the delicate balance he needs after an embarrassing setback last month when he abruptly canceled a vote in the face of widespread opposition to a bill he crafted largely in secret.</p>
<p>Moderate Sen. Susan Collins of Maine told reporters she had informed McConnell she would be voting against beginning debate on the bill, citing in part cuts in the Medicaid health program for the poor and disabled. Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, who has repeatedly complained that McConnell’s efforts don’t amount to a full-blown repeal of Obama’s law, also announced he was a “no.”</p>
<p>That means McConnell cannot lose any other Republican senators. With Democrats unanimously opposed in a Senate split 52-48 in favor of the GOP, he needs 50 votes, with Vice President Mike Pence breaking the tie, to get past a procedural hurdle and begin debate on the bill.</p>
<p>The showdown vote is set for next week, though McConnell could cancel again if he’s short of support. He and other GOP leaders are urging senators to at least vote in favor of opening debate, which would open the measure up to amendments. And GOP leaders express optimism that they are getting closer to a version that could pass the Senate.</p>
<p>“It’s in the best shape it’s been in so far,” said Sen. Roy Blunt of Missouri. “Now that members actually have paper in their hand they can look at what is likely to be very close to the final bill we’ll be voting on and move forward.”</p>
<p>McConnell said the 172-page legislation is the senators’ opportunity to make good on years of promises.</p>
<p>“This is our chance to bring about changes we’ve been talking about since Obamacare was forced on the American people,” he said.</p>
<p>Many Republicans believe the party could face electoral catastrophe if it alienates GOP voters by failing get rid of Obama’s law after taking control of both chambers of Congress and the White House.</p>
<p>“It could be the biggest political broken promise in many years,” said conservative former Sen. Jim DeMint, former president of the Heritage Foundation.</p>
<p>Throughout the day McConnell huddled in his office with holdouts, including Dean Heller of Nevada, the most endangered Senate Republican in next year’s midterms, Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, Rob Portman of Ohio and John Hoeven of North Dakota.</p>
<p>The lawmakers wanted details and numbers on how the bill would affect rural and Medicaid-dependent people in their states. All had opposed McConnell’s earlier bill. This time, several exited their meetings saying they were undecided and needed more time to evaluate the legislation.</p>
<p>Like legislation earlier passed by the House after struggles of its own, the Senate bill would get rid of the law’s mandates for individuals to buy insurance and for companies to offer it, repeal taxes and unwind the Medicaid expansion created by the Affordable Care Act. Analyses by the Congressional Budget Office have found the House bill and the earlier Senate version both would eliminate insurance coverage for more than 20 million people over the next decade.</p>
<p>The new bill contains language demanded by conservative Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas letting insurers sell plans with minimal coverage, as long as they also sell policies that meet strict coverage requirements set by Obama’s 2010 statute.</p>
<p>The retooled measure retains McConnell’s plan to phase out the extra money 31 states have used to expand Medicaid under Obama’s statute, and to tightly limit the overall program’s future growth.</p>
<p>The rewritten package would add $70 billion to the $112 billion McConnell originally sought that states could use to help insurers curb the growth of premiums and consumers’ other out-of-pocket costs. And it has an added $45 billion for states to combat the misuse of drugs like opioids.</p>
<p>Still, the nation’s largest doctors’ group said the plan falls short on coverage and access, particularly for low-income people on Medicaid. In a statement Friday, the American Medical Association said Medicaid cuts and “inadequate subsidies” will lead to “millions of Americans losing health insurance coverage.”</p>
<p>The AMA said GOP leaders took a “positive step” by adding $45 billion for treatment to help victims of the opioid epidemic. But it pointed out that people dealing with addiction also need regular health insurance, and many would lose it if Republicans succeed in rolling back Medicaid financing.</p>
<p>The group is calling for bipartisan cooperation, starting with action to shore up shaky insurance markets.</p> | false | 1 | president donald trump pressed republicans senate friday morning get healthcare reform done soon twitter first praised working hard issuing warning must come promised republicans senators working hard get failed obamacare replacement approved desk pen hand donald j trump realdonaldtrump july 14 2017 impt rep senators leadership senatemajldr mcconnell get healthcare plan approved 7yrs ocare disaster must happen donald j trump realdonaldtrump july 14 2017 years suffering thru obamacare republican senators must come promised donald j trump realdonaldtrump july 14 2017 vp mike pence working hard healthcare getting wonderful republican senators right people donald j trump realdonaldtrump july 14 2017 republican leaders revised bill increasingly desperate effort deliver seven years promises repeal replace obamacare f immediately lost two pivotal votes leaving none spare partys divisions put central campaign pledge serious jeopardy trump said week failure would make angry would blame senate majority leader mitch mcconnell rky earlier week flying france trump acknowledged challenges lawmakers face id say thing difficult peace israel palestinians healthcare trump told reporters traveling think going something thats really good people going like trump waiting eager sign health legislation desk pen hand tweeted friday reworked bill mcconnell presented fellow republicans thursday aims win conservatives support letting insurers sell lowcost skimpy policies time seeks placate hesitant moderates adding billions combat opioid abuse help consumers skyrocketing insurance costs clear whether republican leader achieved delicate balance needs embarrassing setback last month abruptly canceled vote face widespread opposition bill crafted largely secret moderate sen susan collins maine told reporters informed mcconnell would voting beginning debate bill citing part cuts medicaid health program poor disabled sen rand paul kentucky repeatedly complained mcconnells efforts dont amount fullblown repeal obamas law also announced means mcconnell lose republican senators democrats unanimously opposed senate split 5248 favor gop needs 50 votes vice president mike pence breaking tie get past procedural hurdle begin debate bill showdown vote set next week though mcconnell could cancel hes short support gop leaders urging senators least vote favor opening debate would open measure amendments gop leaders express optimism getting closer version could pass senate best shape far said sen roy blunt missouri members actually paper hand look likely close final bill well voting move forward mcconnell said 172page legislation senators opportunity make good years promises chance bring changes weve talking since obamacare forced american people said many republicans believe party could face electoral catastrophe alienates gop voters failing get rid obamas law taking control chambers congress white house could biggest political broken promise many years said conservative former sen jim demint former president heritage foundation throughout day mcconnell huddled office holdouts including dean heller nevada endangered senate republican next years midterms shelley moore capito west virginia rob portman ohio john hoeven north dakota lawmakers wanted details numbers bill would affect rural medicaiddependent people states opposed mcconnells earlier bill time several exited meetings saying undecided needed time evaluate legislation like legislation earlier passed house struggles senate bill would get rid laws mandates individuals buy insurance companies offer repeal taxes unwind medicaid expansion created affordable care act analyses congressional budget office found house bill earlier senate version would eliminate insurance coverage 20 million people next decade new bill contains language demanded conservative sen ted cruz texas letting insurers sell plans minimal coverage long also sell policies meet strict coverage requirements set obamas 2010 statute retooled measure retains mcconnells plan phase extra money 31 states used expand medicaid obamas statute tightly limit overall programs future growth rewritten package would add 70 billion 112 billion mcconnell originally sought states could use help insurers curb growth premiums consumers outofpocket costs added 45 billion states combat misuse drugs like opioids still nations largest doctors group said plan falls short coverage access particularly lowincome people medicaid statement friday american medical association said medicaid cuts inadequate subsidies lead millions americans losing health insurance coverage ama said gop leaders took positive step adding 45 billion treatment help victims opioid epidemic pointed people dealing addiction also need regular health insurance many would lose republicans succeed rolling back medicaid financing group calling bipartisan cooperation starting action shore shaky insurance markets | 677 |
<p>By Julie Steenhuysen</p>
<p>ANN ARBOR, Mich. (Reuters) – Dr. Brian Halloran, a vascular surgeon at St. Joseph Mercy Ann Arbor, starts planning his garden long before spring arrives in southeast Michigan.</p>
<p>His tiny plot, located in the shadow of the 537-bed teaching hospital, helps Halloran cope with burnout from long hours and the stress of surgery on gravely ill patients.</p>
<p>“You really have to find the balance to put it a little more in perspective,” he said.</p>
<p>Hospitals such as St. Joseph Mercy Ann Arbor have been investing in programs ranging from yoga classes to personal coaches designed to help doctors become more resilient. But national burnout rates keep rising, with up to 54 percent of doctors affected.</p>
<p>Some leading healthcare executives now say the way medicine is practiced in the United States is to blame, fueled in part by growing clerical demands that have doctors spending two hours on the computer for every one hour they spend seeing patients.</p>
<p>What’s more, burnout is not just bad for doctors; it’s bad for patients and bad for business, according to interviews with more than 20 healthcare executives, doctors and burnout experts.</p>
<p>“This really isn’t just about exercise and getting enough sleep and having a life outside the hospital,” said Dr. Tait Shanafelt, a former Mayo Clinic researcher who became Stanford Medicine’s first chief physician wellness officer in September.</p>
<p>“It has at least as much or more to do with the environment in which these folks are practicing,” he said.</p>
<p>Shanafelt and other researchers have shown that burnout erodes job performance, increases medical errors and leads doctors to leave a profession they once loved.</p>
<p>For a graphic, click http://tmsnrt.rs/2zMlmuy</p>
<p>Hospitals can ill afford these added expenses in an era of tight margins, costly nursing shortages and uncertainty over the fate of the Affordable Care Act, which has put capital projects and payment reform efforts on hold.</p>
<p>“Burnout decreases productivity and increases errors. It’s a big deal,” said Cleveland Clinic Chief Executive Dr. Toby Cosgrove, one of 10 U.S. healthcare CEOs who earlier this year declared physician burnout a public health crisis.</p>
<p>WHAT TO DO?</p>
<p>Hospitals are just beginning to recognize the toll of burnout on their operations.</p>
<p>Experts estimate, for example, that it can cost more than a $1 million to recruit and train a replacement for a doctor who leaves because of burnout.</p>
<p>But no broad calculation of burnout costs exists, Shanafelt said. Stanford, Harvard Business School, Mayo and the American Medical Association are working on that. They have put together a comprehensive estimate of the costs of burnout at the organizational and societal level, which has been submitted to a journal for review.</p>
<p>In July, the National Academy of Medicine (NAM) called on researchers to identify interventions that ease burnout. Meanwhile, some hospitals and health insurers are already trying to lighten the load.</p>
<p>Cleveland Clinic last year increased the number of nurse practitioners and other highly trained providers by 25 percent to 1,600 to handle more routine tasks for its 3,600 physicians. It hired eight pharmacists to help with prescription refills.</p>
<p>Atrius Health, Massachusetts’ largest independent physicians group, is diverting unnecessary email traffic away from doctors to other staffers and simplifying medical records, aiming to cut 1.5 million mouse “clicks” per year.</p>
<p>Insurer UnitedHealth Group (NYSE:), which operates physician practices for more than 20,000 doctors through its Optum subsidiary, launched a program to help doctors quickly determine whether drugs are covered by a patient’s insurance plan during the patient visit. It is also running a pilot program for Medicare plans in eight states to shrink the number of procedures that require prior authorization.</p>
<p>Similarly, Aetna Inc (NYSE:) this year began a behavioral health program that eliminates prior authorization requirements for admission to some high-performing hospitals.</p>
<p>DOCTOR OVERLOAD</p>
<p>Experts define burnout as a syndrome marked by emotional exhaustion, cynicism and decreased effectiveness. Many burned out doctors cut back their hours to cope, and a disturbing number commit suicide.</p>
<p>A landmark 2015 Mayo Clinic study found that more than 7 percent of nearly 7,000 doctors had considered suicide within the prior 12 months, compared with 4 percent of other workers. About 400 a year go through with it.</p>
<p>Driving the burnout symptoms is the burden of data entry on clumsy electronic medical records systems that doctors must use to prove the quality of their care, said Dr. Christine Sinsky, vice president of professional satisfaction at the American Medical Association.</p>
<p>Sinsky recently conducted an experiment in her own internal medicine practice in Dubuque, Iowa. She asked a staff member how many mouse clicks it takes to order and record a single patient’s flu shot in their electronic medical record. The answer: 32.</p>
<p>She has visited some practices where a doctor had to record flu shots for more than 1,000 patients because only the doctor was allowed to enter the order.</p>
<p>Such mandates reflect an overly strict interpretation of federal health reforms designed to encourage doctors to use electronic medical records, such as&#160;the 2009&#160;Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act that required doctors to demonstrate “meaningful use” of the systems.</p>
<p>“We have to recognize the exacting toll that the first generation of electronic health records have had on physicians,” Sinsky said. “I would identify it as one of the most important drivers of physician burnout.”</p>
<p>Pre-approval requirements from health insurers for many services and quality metrics built into Obamacare have added to doctors’ administrative duties.</p>
<p>“We’ve got this measurement mania. We’ve got to back off of that,” said Dr. Paul Harkaway, chief accountable care officer for Michigan’s St. Joseph Mercy Health System, a part of Trinity Health, a national not-for-profit Catholic healthcare system.</p>
<p>As a result of these requirements, primary care physicians spend more than half of their 11.4 hour workday performing data entry and other tasks, according to a September AMA/University of Wisconsin study published in the Annals of Family Medicine.</p>
<p>To manage, doctors often finish work at home in the evening, a part of the day known as “pajama time.”&#160;&#160;&#160;</p>
<p>COSTS TO THE HEALTHCARE SYSTEM</p>
<p>Doctors’ suffering can take a direct toll on patients. In a 2010 study, Shanafelt and colleagues found that the more burned out a surgeon was, the more likely he or she was to report a major medical error. Other studies have shown that burnout drives up rates of unnecessary testing, referrals to specialists and hospital admissions.</p>
<p>When doctors quit, it costs an estimated $800,000 to $1.3 million in recruitment, training and productivity costs, depending on the specialty.</p>
<p>Even when physicians don’t leave, they can contribute thousands of dollars in costs each year “just as a matter of inefficient functioning,” said Dr. Colin West of the Mayo Clinic.</p>
<p>The trend has medical malpractice experts concerned. CRICO, the malpractice carrier for Harvard University’s two dozen affiliated hospitals, recently had to settle a handful of cases because doctors were too burned out to fight, even though CRICO believed it could win.</p>
<p>“The clinician just wanted it to go away,” said Dr. Luke Sato, CRICO’s chief medical officer. Sato estimates that an average breast or colorectal cancer malpractice case might cost $750,000 to $1 million to settle.</p>
<p>The crisis has Harkaway worried for his colleagues in Michigan, and for his profession.</p>
<p>“Working with doctors every day, you see it,” he said. “They are just beat down.”</p> | false | 1 | julie steenhuysen ann arbor mich reuters dr brian halloran vascular surgeon st joseph mercy ann arbor starts planning garden long spring arrives southeast michigan tiny plot located shadow 537bed teaching hospital helps halloran cope burnout long hours stress surgery gravely ill patients really find balance put little perspective said hospitals st joseph mercy ann arbor investing programs ranging yoga classes personal coaches designed help doctors become resilient national burnout rates keep rising 54 percent doctors affected leading healthcare executives say way medicine practiced united states blame fueled part growing clerical demands doctors spending two hours computer every one hour spend seeing patients whats burnout bad doctors bad patients bad business according interviews 20 healthcare executives doctors burnout experts really isnt exercise getting enough sleep life outside hospital said dr tait shanafelt former mayo clinic researcher became stanford medicines first chief physician wellness officer september least much environment folks practicing said shanafelt researchers shown burnout erodes job performance increases medical errors leads doctors leave profession loved graphic click httptmsnrtrs2zmlmuy hospitals ill afford added expenses era tight margins costly nursing shortages uncertainty fate affordable care act put capital projects payment reform efforts hold burnout decreases productivity increases errors big deal said cleveland clinic chief executive dr toby cosgrove one 10 us healthcare ceos earlier year declared physician burnout public health crisis hospitals beginning recognize toll burnout operations experts estimate example cost 1 million recruit train replacement doctor leaves burnout broad calculation burnout costs exists shanafelt said stanford harvard business school mayo american medical association working put together comprehensive estimate costs burnout organizational societal level submitted journal review july national academy medicine nam called researchers identify interventions ease burnout meanwhile hospitals health insurers already trying lighten load cleveland clinic last year increased number nurse practitioners highly trained providers 25 percent 1600 handle routine tasks 3600 physicians hired eight pharmacists help prescription refills atrius health massachusetts largest independent physicians group diverting unnecessary email traffic away doctors staffers simplifying medical records aiming cut 15 million mouse clicks per year insurer unitedhealth group nyse operates physician practices 20000 doctors optum subsidiary launched program help doctors quickly determine whether drugs covered patients insurance plan patient visit also running pilot program medicare plans eight states shrink number procedures require prior authorization similarly aetna inc nyse year began behavioral health program eliminates prior authorization requirements admission highperforming hospitals doctor overload experts define burnout syndrome marked emotional exhaustion cynicism decreased effectiveness many burned doctors cut back hours cope disturbing number commit suicide landmark 2015 mayo clinic study found 7 percent nearly 7000 doctors considered suicide within prior 12 months compared 4 percent workers 400 year go driving burnout symptoms burden data entry clumsy electronic medical records systems doctors must use prove quality care said dr christine sinsky vice president professional satisfaction american medical association sinsky recently conducted experiment internal medicine practice dubuque iowa asked staff member many mouse clicks takes order record single patients flu shot electronic medical record answer 32 visited practices doctor record flu shots 1000 patients doctor allowed enter order mandates reflect overly strict interpretation federal health reforms designed encourage doctors use electronic medical records as160the 2009160health information technology economic clinical health act required doctors demonstrate meaningful use systems recognize exacting toll first generation electronic health records physicians sinsky said would identify one important drivers physician burnout preapproval requirements health insurers many services quality metrics built obamacare added doctors administrative duties weve got measurement mania weve got back said dr paul harkaway chief accountable care officer michigans st joseph mercy health system part trinity health national notforprofit catholic healthcare system result requirements primary care physicians spend half 114 hour workday performing data entry tasks according september amauniversity wisconsin study published annals family medicine manage doctors often finish work home evening part day known pajama time160160160 costs healthcare system doctors suffering take direct toll patients 2010 study shanafelt colleagues found burned surgeon likely report major medical error studies shown burnout drives rates unnecessary testing referrals specialists hospital admissions doctors quit costs estimated 800000 13 million recruitment training productivity costs depending specialty even physicians dont leave contribute thousands dollars costs year matter inefficient functioning said dr colin west mayo clinic trend medical malpractice experts concerned crico malpractice carrier harvard universitys two dozen affiliated hospitals recently settle handful cases doctors burned fight even though crico believed could win clinician wanted go away said dr luke sato cricos chief medical officer sato estimates average breast colorectal cancer malpractice case might cost 750000 1 million settle crisis harkaway worried colleagues michigan profession working doctors every day see said beat | 757 |
<p>As in last year’s Run, Lola, Run, which was actually made later, the German director Tom Tykwer shows in Winter Sleepers his fascination with time and chance, with the momentous consequences of quite trivial causes — and his sense of style. But this film is less laden with cinematic trickery and self-conscious cleverness than Lola and is all the better for it. It also bears a certain similarity to the great and unforgettable Dreamlife of Angels by Erick Zonca in its use of the device of a young girl in a coma who is made to stand for those ultimate things, the matters of life and death, that we keep as much as possible thrust to the periphery of our lives. Both films put in their foregrounds the relatively trivial concerns of the main characters, yet never let us forget the tremendous thing going on in the background. In this way they attempt to show us how the everyday can be touched by the infinite, both for good and ill.</p>
<p>Of course, Zonca does it a lot better. Tykwer’s story mainly concerns two couples living in a small Alpine ski-resort. Rebecca (Floriane Daniel) a translator of romance novels, and Marco (Heino Ferch), a ski instructor, take up residence together in the house of Laura (Marie-Lou Sellem), a nurse and would-be actress who has inherited the place from an aunt. Before long, Laura meets René (Ulrich Matthes), the projectionist at the local movie house. René has been wounded in an accident with a grenade during service with the army and has lost most of his short term memory. He goes around with a Polaroid snapping pictures of the things he sees and spends his spare time pasting the photos into an album, which serves him in lieu of memory. This is itself a memorable image for the audience, though perhaps not made enough of by Tykwer — an image of life as a succession of snapshots with no way of defining the relationships between them or telling which are more and less important.</p>
<p>As the film opens, we see René admiring Marco’s new sports car, in which the latter has left the keys at the importunity of Rebecca, who can’t wait to get him into bed. On an impulse, René decides to jump in and take the car for a spin. At the same time we see a farmer called Theo (Josef Bierbichler) setting out in his truck, pulling a horse-trailer, for the vet’s, and assuring his little daughter that Lizzy, the horse, will be all right. When he turns his back the daughter sneaks into the trailer to ride with Lizzy to the vet. Along the icy road he meets René in Marco’s sports car, which skids out of control and buries itself in a snowdrift. Theo runs off the road and the trailer overturns. The horse has to be destroyed and his daughter, whom he did not know was in the trailer is unconscious and has to be rushed to the hospital.</p>
<p>René, in the snowdrift, crawls out of the car, briefly notices the overturned truck and trailer (and is seen by Theo, just regaining consciousness) and walks back to the village. Because of his short term memory loss, all record of the incident is erased from his mind. Because of the snowdrift, no one notices the other vehicle involved in the accident and Theo’s insistence that the other car ran him off the road is regarded as a figment of his imagination, an attempt on his part to evade some of the guilt for the accident which has left his daughter in a comatose state. His harping upon the other car that nobody believes in becomes his grieving, inarticulate way of insisting that the accident and, by extension, the world of mere contingency, must make sense. Marco reports his car stolen</p>
<p>Now the film settles down to explore the relatively trivial lives of the two couples while Theo, in the background, stews with guilt, grief and frustration over the accident. Soon, we learn, he must face the additional anxiety of trying to preserve his little farm from failure and bankruptcy. In the life of this stricken character and his family you have the material of a serious drama, but the drama is kept mostly off-stage by Tykwer. Instead, we see Laura meet René at a performance of A Streetcar Named Desire, in which she plays the role of Blanche, and the first passages of romance between them; we see Marco and Rebecca squabbling about whether or not Marco can move in with her (he will), whether or not Rebecca will give up translating romance novels in order to become a ski-instructor like him (she won’t). Marco begins to suspect that Rebecca is interested in René. When Rebecca goes away for a few days and, simultaneously, Marco is asked to house-sit for his boss, he picks up another girl to join him in the new chalet, which has an indoor swimming pool.</p>
<p>Almost incidentally we learn of the death of Theo’s comatose daughter, who never regains consciousness, and his own failure as a farmer. Soon we see him and his wife and remaining daughters selling up and moving out — to an even more Spartan existence in an even more rural setting. Theo, apparently crazed by grief and disappointment goes around the village putting up handbills with a picture of the scar — in the shape of a snake — that he remembers on the head of the man who ran him off the road. His wife follows him around, taking down the papers as quickly as he can put them up. “Nobody in the whole town believes you,” she tells him. “I was ashamed. They think you won’t admit it’s your fault.”</p>
<p>I won’t reveal the ending in which all these seemingly unrelated events in several different lives come together in a way that would not have been possible without each chance encounter along the way. So life goes, Tykwer, shows us: we are in the hands of the most capricious fates and yet — and yet Theo is right about the other car. It is typical that the meaning of it all, insofar as there is any meaning, is left for the big, dumb, unsympathetic Marco to sum up when, dropping in on Laura at the hospital, he finds Theo’s daughter, who to him is just an anonymous child, just dead. “She looks unreal somehow,” says Marco. “I wonder if life has to be so long. Perhaps she had three good years out of ten. Have you had three good years?”</p>
<p>“I don’t know,” says Laura.</p>
<p>“I don’t know either,” Marco muses. “It depends on how you look at it.”</p>
<p>This is a movie about things depending on how you look at them. And your reaction to the movie itself depends, more even than is usually the case, on how you look at it. On the one hand it lacks the emotional force and the compassion of The Dreamlife of Angels; on the other hand, it makes a similar point about the way in which the important things in life can (and ultimately will) break through our determination to keep them as occupied with petty things as possible.</p> | false | 1 | last years run lola run actually made later german director tom tykwer shows winter sleepers fascination time chance momentous consequences quite trivial causes sense style film less laden cinematic trickery selfconscious cleverness lola better also bears certain similarity great unforgettable dreamlife angels erick zonca use device young girl coma made stand ultimate things matters life death keep much possible thrust periphery lives films put foregrounds relatively trivial concerns main characters yet never let us forget tremendous thing going background way attempt show us everyday touched infinite good ill course zonca lot better tykwers story mainly concerns two couples living small alpine skiresort rebecca floriane daniel translator romance novels marco heino ferch ski instructor take residence together house laura marielou sellem nurse wouldbe actress inherited place aunt long laura meets rené ulrich matthes projectionist local movie house rené wounded accident grenade service army lost short term memory goes around polaroid snapping pictures things sees spends spare time pasting photos album serves lieu memory memorable image audience though perhaps made enough tykwer image life succession snapshots way defining relationships telling less important film opens see rené admiring marcos new sports car latter left keys importunity rebecca cant wait get bed impulse rené decides jump take car spin time see farmer called theo josef bierbichler setting truck pulling horsetrailer vets assuring little daughter lizzy horse right turns back daughter sneaks trailer ride lizzy vet along icy road meets rené marcos sports car skids control buries snowdrift theo runs road trailer overturns horse destroyed daughter know trailer unconscious rushed hospital rené snowdrift crawls car briefly notices overturned truck trailer seen theo regaining consciousness walks back village short term memory loss record incident erased mind snowdrift one notices vehicle involved accident theos insistence car ran road regarded figment imagination attempt part evade guilt accident left daughter comatose state harping upon car nobody believes becomes grieving inarticulate way insisting accident extension world mere contingency must make sense marco reports car stolen film settles explore relatively trivial lives two couples theo background stews guilt grief frustration accident soon learn must face additional anxiety trying preserve little farm failure bankruptcy life stricken character family material serious drama drama kept mostly offstage tykwer instead see laura meet rené performance streetcar named desire plays role blanche first passages romance see marco rebecca squabbling whether marco move whether rebecca give translating romance novels order become skiinstructor like wont marco begins suspect rebecca interested rené rebecca goes away days simultaneously marco asked housesit boss picks another girl join new chalet indoor swimming pool almost incidentally learn death theos comatose daughter never regains consciousness failure farmer soon see wife remaining daughters selling moving even spartan existence even rural setting theo apparently crazed grief disappointment goes around village putting handbills picture scar shape snake remembers head man ran road wife follows around taking papers quickly put nobody whole town believes tells ashamed think wont admit fault wont reveal ending seemingly unrelated events several different lives come together way would possible without chance encounter along way life goes tykwer shows us hands capricious fates yet yet theo right car typical meaning insofar meaning left big dumb unsympathetic marco sum dropping laura hospital finds theos daughter anonymous child dead looks unreal somehow says marco wonder life long perhaps three good years ten three good years dont know says laura dont know either marco muses depends look movie things depending look reaction movie depends even usually case look one hand lacks emotional force compassion dreamlife angels hand makes similar point way important things life ultimately break determination keep occupied petty things possible | 595 |
<p>A Democrat running for governorship of Ohio is in hot water after revealing identifying details of his sexual conquests in a Facebook post. The politician said he was sexually intimate with “50 very attractive females” in his lifetime.</p>
<p>Bill O’Neill, a justice on the Ohio Supreme Court and one of the Democrats running for governor, published a <a href="https://www.facebook.com/WilliamMONeill/posts/10105715840671394" type="external">Facebook post</a> Friday morning claiming to have sex with “approximately 50 very attractive females.”</p>
<p>Among the women mentioned were “a gorgeous secretary” to a senator and “a drop dead gorgeous redhead” working at Progressive Insurance in Cleveland. The hints at the women’s identities were quickly edited out of the post, however.</p>
<p>“Now that the dogs of war are calling for the head of Senator Al Franken I believe it is time to speak up on behalf of all heterosexual males,” O’Neill wrote. “As a candidate for Governor let me save my opponents some research time. In the last fifty years I was sexually intimate with approximately 50 very attractive females. It ranged from a gorgeous blonde who was my first true love and we made passionate love in the hayloft of her parents barn and ended with a drop dead gorgeous redhead from Cleveland.</p>
<p>“Now can we get back to discussing legalizing marijuana and opening the state hospital network to combat the opioid crisis. I am sooooo disappointed by this national feeding frenzy about sexual indiscretions decades ago. Peace.”</p>
<p />
<p>Bill O’Neill, an Ohio Supreme Court associate justice and a current candidate for Ohio Governor posted this on his Facebook page..he then amended the post to remove identifying details about the women he allegedly slept with. <a href="https://t.co/rQ825ankUF" type="external">pic.twitter.com/rQ825ankUF</a></p>
<p>— Yashar Ali (@yashar) <a href="https://twitter.com/yashar/status/931578398954180609?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">November 17, 2017</a></p>
<p />
<p>On Thursday, broadcaster Leeann Tweeden said that Senator Al Franken (D-Minnesota) <a href="https://www.rt.com/usa/410097-senator-franken-tweeden-groping/" type="external">kissed and groped</a> her during a 2006 USO tour in the Middle East, while he was still a comedian.</p>
<p>O’Neill wrote that he was trying to “save my opponents some research time.” The candidate’s comments sparked a swift and severe backlash, however, and may have ended his political career.</p>
<p>Spokesperson for O’Neill’s campaign, Chris Clevenger, resigned after the post was brought to his attention. He called the judge’s comments “disturbing and misguided” and wrote that “sexual harassment and assault is no laughing matter.”</p>
<p />
<p>The comments made today by <a href="https://twitter.com/BillForOhio?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">@BillForOhio</a> were both disturbing and misguided. As a victim of sexual assault, I cannot in good faith remain a part of <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/TeamONeill?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">#TeamONeill</a>.</p>
<p>— Chris Clevenger (@ChrisEClevenger) <a href="https://twitter.com/ChrisEClevenger/status/931594569682010113?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">November 17, 2017</a></p>
<p />
<p />
<p>Moments ago I was able to contact Justice O’Neill to announce my resignation from the campaign. I have been out of pocket all day, and had no prior knowledge of his statement.</p>
<p>— Chris Clevenger (@ChrisEClevenger) <a href="https://twitter.com/ChrisEClevenger/status/931595012307148800?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">November 17, 2017</a></p>
<p />
<p>Ohio Democratic Party chairman David Pepper called O’Neill’s comments “terrible” and said they “trivialize this important conversation, which is actually about harassment and abuse, not encounters between consenting adults.”</p>
<p />
<p>Just a terrible post by Justice O’Neill. We’re having a serious national conversation about rape culture and sexual harassment, and it’s crucial for men to take time to listen to women and consider their experiences and insights.</p>
<p>(1/2)</p>
<p>— David Pepper (@DavidPepper) <a href="https://twitter.com/DavidPepper/status/931586387421343744?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">November 17, 2017</a></p>
<p />
<p />
<p>(2/2) Justice O’Neill’s Facebook comments both dehumanize women and do nothing but trivialize this important conversation, which is actually about harassment and abuse, not encounters between consenting adults.</p>
<p>— David Pepper (@DavidPepper) <a href="https://twitter.com/DavidPepper/status/931586587154141184?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">November 17, 2017</a></p>
<p />
<p>Ohio Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor condemned the post “in no uncertain terms” in a statement, adding: “No words can convey my shock. This gross disrespect for women shakes the public’s confidence in the integrity of the judiciary.”</p>
<p>Fellow Democratic gubernatorial candidate and former Congresswoman Betty Sutton called on O’Neill to resign from the race.</p>
<p />
<p>As an attorney I’m appalled at these remarks of <a href="https://twitter.com/BillForOhio?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">@billforohio</a>, a Justice, as a democrat I’m horrified he would belittle victims of sexual harassment/assault this way and as a woman I’m outraged he would equate sexual assault with indiscretion. He should resign immediately. <a href="https://t.co/uPyFsH8Tma" type="external">pic.twitter.com/uPyFsH8Tma</a></p>
<p>— Betty Sutton (@BettySutton) <a href="https://twitter.com/BettySutton/status/931578155642642432?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">November 17, 2017</a></p>
<p />
<p>She was joined by mayor of Dayton, Ohio and gubernatorial candidate Nan Whaley.</p>
<p>Lieutenant Governor Mary Taylor, a Republican, called O’Neill’s post “crass” and “dismissive at best,” though stopped short of calling for his resignation.</p>
<p />
<p>There’s a very serious conversation going on right now in this country about sexual harassment and <a href="https://twitter.com/BillForOhio?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">@BillForOhio</a>‘s crass post is ill-timed and dismissive at best. We have to be better than this. <a href="https://t.co/Ee1p9q9pc0" type="external">https://t.co/Ee1p9q9pc0</a></p>
<p>— Mary Taylor (@MaryTaylorOH) <a href="https://twitter.com/MaryTaylorOH/status/931582031791783936?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">November 17, 2017</a></p>
<p />
<p>Senator Joe Schiavoni (D-Ohio) called O’Neill’s remarks “ridiculous” and said they were not “reflective of the way I feel as a heterosexual man.”</p>
<p />
<p>This is a ridiculous comment by someone who is supposed to be a professional representing Ohioans on our highest court. It is definitely not reflective of the way I feel as a heterosexual man.Bill O’Neill is not speaking ‘on behalf of all heterosexual males.’ <a href="https://t.co/bNYcL5Bxch" type="external">https://t.co/bNYcL5Bxch</a></p>
<p>— Sen Joe Schiavoni (@JoeSchiavoni) <a href="https://twitter.com/JoeSchiavoni/status/931616578487115776?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw" type="external">November 17, 2017</a></p>
<p />
<p>O’Neill’s comments come as numerous politicians, celebrities and public figures have been accused of sexual assault in the wake of actress Rose McGowan’s complaint against Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein. Judge Roy Moore, the Republican candidate for the open Senate seat in Alabama, has also been <a href="https://www.rt.com/usa/409789-moore-mcconnell-sexual-allegations/" type="external">accused</a> of sexual misconduct. He has denied all allegations.</p> | false | 1 | democrat running governorship ohio hot water revealing identifying details sexual conquests facebook post politician said sexually intimate 50 attractive females lifetime bill oneill justice ohio supreme court one democrats running governor published facebook post friday morning claiming sex approximately 50 attractive females among women mentioned gorgeous secretary senator drop dead gorgeous redhead working progressive insurance cleveland hints womens identities quickly edited post however dogs war calling head senator al franken believe time speak behalf heterosexual males oneill wrote candidate governor let save opponents research time last fifty years sexually intimate approximately 50 attractive females ranged gorgeous blonde first true love made passionate love hayloft parents barn ended drop dead gorgeous redhead cleveland get back discussing legalizing marijuana opening state hospital network combat opioid crisis sooooo disappointed national feeding frenzy sexual indiscretions decades ago peace bill oneill ohio supreme court associate justice current candidate ohio governor posted facebook pagehe amended post remove identifying details women allegedly slept pictwittercomrq825ankuf yashar ali yashar november 17 2017 thursday broadcaster leeann tweeden said senator al franken dminnesota kissed groped 2006 uso tour middle east still comedian oneill wrote trying save opponents research time candidates comments sparked swift severe backlash however may ended political career spokesperson oneills campaign chris clevenger resigned post brought attention called judges comments disturbing misguided wrote sexual harassment assault laughing matter comments made today billforohio disturbing misguided victim sexual assault good faith remain part teamoneill chris clevenger chriseclevenger november 17 2017 moments ago able contact justice oneill announce resignation campaign pocket day prior knowledge statement chris clevenger chriseclevenger november 17 2017 ohio democratic party chairman david pepper called oneills comments terrible said trivialize important conversation actually harassment abuse encounters consenting adults terrible post justice oneill serious national conversation rape culture sexual harassment crucial men take time listen women consider experiences insights 12 david pepper davidpepper november 17 2017 22 justice oneills facebook comments dehumanize women nothing trivialize important conversation actually harassment abuse encounters consenting adults david pepper davidpepper november 17 2017 ohio chief justice maureen oconnor condemned post uncertain terms statement adding words convey shock gross disrespect women shakes publics confidence integrity judiciary fellow democratic gubernatorial candidate former congresswoman betty sutton called oneill resign race attorney im appalled remarks billforohio justice democrat im horrified would belittle victims sexual harassmentassault way woman im outraged would equate sexual assault indiscretion resign immediately pictwittercomupyfsh8tma betty sutton bettysutton november 17 2017 joined mayor dayton ohio gubernatorial candidate nan whaley lieutenant governor mary taylor republican called oneills post crass dismissive best though stopped short calling resignation theres serious conversation going right country sexual harassment billforohios crass post illtimed dismissive best better httpstcoee1p9q9pc0 mary taylor marytayloroh november 17 2017 senator joe schiavoni dohio called oneills remarks ridiculous said reflective way feel heterosexual man ridiculous comment someone supposed professional representing ohioans highest court definitely reflective way feel heterosexual manbill oneill speaking behalf heterosexual males httpstcobnycl5bxch sen joe schiavoni joeschiavoni november 17 2017 oneills comments come numerous politicians celebrities public figures accused sexual assault wake actress rose mcgowans complaint hollywood mogul harvey weinstein judge roy moore republican candidate open senate seat alabama also accused sexual misconduct denied allegations | 518 |
<p>WASHINGTON — Laying bare deep and dangerous divisions on Syria and other issues, President Donald Trump declared that U.S. relations with Russia “may be at an all-time low.” His top diplomat offered a similarly grim assessment from the other side of the globe after meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow.</p>
<p>“Right now we’re not getting along with Russia at all,” Trump said flatly during a White House news conference Wednesday. It was stark evidence that the president is moving ever further from his campaign promises to establish better ties with Moscow.</p>
<p>Only weeks ago, it appeared that Trump, who praised Putin throughout the U.S. election campaign, was poised for a potentially historic rapprochement with Russia. But any such expectations have crashed into reality amid the nasty back-and-forth over Syria and ongoing U.S. investigations into Russia’s alleged interference in America’s U.S. presidential election.</p>
<p>“It’d be a fantastic thing if we got along with Putin and if we got along with Russia,” Trump said. But he clearly wasn’t counting on it.</p>
<p>“That could happen, and it may not happen,” he said. “It may be just the opposite.”</p>
<p>Not long before Trump spoke in Washington, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson struck a similar tone after an almost two-hour meeting with Putin, saying the two countries had reached a “low point” in relations.</p>
<p>Trump, who last week ordered airstrikes on a Syrian air base in retaliation for a chemical weapons attack, was asked Wednesday if Syria could have launched the attack without Russia’s knowledge. Trump said it was “certainly possible” though “probably unlikely.”</p>
<p>The newly hardened view of Moscow comes as the president has tried to shake suspicions about the motives behind his campaign calls for warmer relations. As the FBI and multiple congressional committees investigate possible <a href="" type="internal">collusion between Russia and Trump’s campaign</a>, the president and his aides can now point to his hard-line stance on Syrian President Bashar Assad as evidence he’s willing to stand up to Putin.</p>
<p>More than 80 people were killed in what the U.S. has described as a <a href="" type="internal">nerve gas attack</a> that Assad’s forces undoubtedly carried out. Russia says rebels were responsible for whatever chemical agent was used, which the Trump administration calls a disinformation campaign.</p>
<p />
<p>Not long before Trump spoke, Russia vetoed a Western-backed U.N. resolution that would have condemned the chemical weapons attack and demanded a speedy investigation.</p>
<p>The dim view of U.S.-Russian ties from both Trump and Tillerson reflected the former Cold War foes’ inability to forge better relations, as Trump until recently has advocated.</p>
<p>Allegations of collusion between Russian officials and Trump campaign associates also have weakened Trump’s ability to make concessions to Russia on any issue, lest he be accused of rewarding bad behavior. Russia wants the U.S. to eliminate sanctions on Moscow related to its 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea region and support for pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine.</p>
<p>Until the chemical attack, the Trump administration had sought to step back from the U.S. position that Assad should leave power. But Tillerson repeated the administration’s new belief that “the reign of the Assad family is coming to an end.”</p>
<p>Beyond Syria, Russia’s alleged meddling in the U.S. presidential election also hovered over what was the first face-to-face encounter between Putin and any Trump administration Cabinet member.</p>
<p>Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov blasted U.S. claims that it has “irrefutable evidence” of election interference.</p>
<p>“We have not seen a single fact, or even a hint of facts,” he said. “I do not know who saw them. No one showed us anything, no one said anything, although we repeatedly asked to produce the details on which these unfounded accusations lie.”</p>
<p>He also rejected American claims of certain evidence that Assad ordered the chemical attack.</p>
<p>Still, Tillerson sought to stress the positives from his meetings. He said working groups would be established to improve U.S.-Russian ties and identify problems. He said the two sides would also discuss disagreements on Syria and how to end the country’s six-year civil war.</p>
<p>But such hopes appeared optimistic as the diplomats outlined their sharply diverging views on Syria. Tillerson said Syria’s government had committed more than 50 attacks using chlorine or other chemical weapons over the duration of the conflict. And he suggested that possible war crimes charges could be levied against the Syrian leader. Russia has never publicly acknowledged any such attacks by Assad’s forces and has tried for the past 18 months to help him expand his authority in Syria.</p>
<p>The civil war is separate from the U.S.-led effort against the Islamic State group in the north of the country.</p>
<p>While the most immediate U.S.-Russian dispute concerns culpability for the chemical weapons, broader disagreements over everything from Ukraine to Russia’s support for once-fringe candidates in European elections are among other sore points.</p>
<p>Tillerson was greeted frostily in the Russian capital as Lavrov began their meeting Wednesday by demanding to know America’s “real intentions.”</p>
<p>“We have seen very alarming actions recently with an unlawful attack against Syria,” Lavrov said, referring to the 59 Tomahawk missiles Trump launched at an air base to punish Assad for using chemical weapons. “We consider it of utmost importance to prevent the risks of replay of similar action in the future.”</p>
<p>Trump and others have indeed threatened similar action. But in a Fox Business Network interview, the U.S. president said he wouldn’t intervene militarily against Assad unless the Syrian leader resorts to using weapons of mass destruction again. “Are we going to get involved with Syria? No,” Trump said. But, he added, “I see them using gas … we have to do something.”</p> | false | 1 | washington laying bare deep dangerous divisions syria issues president donald trump declared us relations russia may alltime low top diplomat offered similarly grim assessment side globe meeting russian president vladimir putin moscow right getting along russia trump said flatly white house news conference wednesday stark evidence president moving ever campaign promises establish better ties moscow weeks ago appeared trump praised putin throughout us election campaign poised potentially historic rapprochement russia expectations crashed reality amid nasty backandforth syria ongoing us investigations russias alleged interference americas us presidential election itd fantastic thing got along putin got along russia trump said clearly wasnt counting could happen may happen said may opposite long trump spoke washington secretary state rex tillerson struck similar tone almost twohour meeting putin saying two countries reached low point relations trump last week ordered airstrikes syrian air base retaliation chemical weapons attack asked wednesday syria could launched attack without russias knowledge trump said certainly possible though probably unlikely newly hardened view moscow comes president tried shake suspicions motives behind campaign calls warmer relations fbi multiple congressional committees investigate possible collusion russia trumps campaign president aides point hardline stance syrian president bashar assad evidence hes willing stand putin 80 people killed us described nerve gas attack assads forces undoubtedly carried russia says rebels responsible whatever chemical agent used trump administration calls disinformation campaign long trump spoke russia vetoed westernbacked un resolution would condemned chemical weapons attack demanded speedy investigation dim view usrussian ties trump tillerson reflected former cold war foes inability forge better relations trump recently advocated allegations collusion russian officials trump campaign associates also weakened trumps ability make concessions russia issue lest accused rewarding bad behavior russia wants us eliminate sanctions moscow related 2014 annexation ukraines crimea region support prorussian separatists eastern ukraine chemical attack trump administration sought step back us position assad leave power tillerson repeated administrations new belief reign assad family coming end beyond syria russias alleged meddling us presidential election also hovered first facetoface encounter putin trump administration cabinet member russian foreign minister sergey lavrov blasted us claims irrefutable evidence election interference seen single fact even hint facts said know saw one showed us anything one said anything although repeatedly asked produce details unfounded accusations lie also rejected american claims certain evidence assad ordered chemical attack still tillerson sought stress positives meetings said working groups would established improve usrussian ties identify problems said two sides would also discuss disagreements syria end countrys sixyear civil war hopes appeared optimistic diplomats outlined sharply diverging views syria tillerson said syrias government committed 50 attacks using chlorine chemical weapons duration conflict suggested possible war crimes charges could levied syrian leader russia never publicly acknowledged attacks assads forces tried past 18 months help expand authority syria civil war separate usled effort islamic state group north country immediate usrussian dispute concerns culpability chemical weapons broader disagreements everything ukraine russias support oncefringe candidates european elections among sore points tillerson greeted frostily russian capital lavrov began meeting wednesday demanding know americas real intentions seen alarming actions recently unlawful attack syria lavrov said referring 59 tomahawk missiles trump launched air base punish assad using chemical weapons consider utmost importance prevent risks replay similar action future trump others indeed threatened similar action fox business network interview us president said wouldnt intervene militarily assad unless syrian leader resorts using weapons mass destruction going get involved syria trump said added see using gas something | 565 |
<p>For the past several decades, I’ve been wishing friends and familiars a “happy new year” — on the First Sunday of Advent, which marks the beginning of the liturgical year and thus the start of the really real “new year:” a new year of grace. That greeting is not just a bit of countercultural contrariness, however. It’s a way to remind myself that Christians ought to live by a different temporal rhythm, a different pace, than the culture we’re trying to convert. That reminder may be particularly necessary during the frenetic “holidays,” but it’s useful throughout the civil year as well. And as the impending 2016 seems likely to be full of — how to put it gently? — challenges, it’s worth pondering and praying over, this Christmastide, the truth through which Christians “read” history: the truth that salvation history, God’s work within his creation, unfolds inside, not alongside, what the world thinks of as “history.”</p>
<p>That salvific work began in earnest with the call of Abraham. It was experienced by the People of Israel during their Egyptian captivity, their miraculous exodus into freedom, their struggles to live in covenant relationship with God in the land they had been given as a patrimony, their exile in Babylon, their return to the land, and their contest with the pagan powers of the day. Through all of that “history,” a deeper history was unfolding, to which Moses, Elijah, David, and the prophets bore witness. And in that deeper history, the promises made to Abraham were being fulfilled, no matter how hard it was to discern that fulfillment or its trajectory.</p>
<p>The liturgical season of Advent — a month, more or less, in which the Church prepares annually for Christmas — is dominated by two figures whom Christians understand as a kind of pivot between God’s revelation to Israel and God’s revelation in his Incarnate Son.</p>
<p>The first of those figures is St. John the Baptist, whose ability to discern the history unfolding within what the world imagines to be “history” is first displayed before his own birth. Then, according to the Gospel story of the Visitation (Luke 1:39–56), the unborn child who will call Israel to a baptism of water and repentance recognizes his cousin Jesus, who will baptize the repentant with the Holy Spirit and with fire: As John’s mother Elizabeth puts it to her cousin Mary, “&#160;.&#160;.&#160;.&#160;when the voice of your greeting came to my ears, the babe in my womb leaped for joy.” Later in the gospels, John reappears as a kind of prophetic wild man, living alone in the Judean wilderness, clad “in a garment of camel’s hair [with] a leather girdle around his waist,” sustaining himself on a diet of “locusts and wild honey” [Matthew 3:4]. He has no truck with the religious establishment of his day, whom he dismisses as a “brood of vipers” [Matthew 3:7], and his proclamation of the coming Reign of God is a proclamation of judgment: “Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire” [Matthew 3:10]. As for the unrepentant, the “chaff,” they will “burn with unquenchable fire” [Matthew 3:12].</p>
<p>Yet for all that he appears in Scripture as someone utterly, uniquely intense — the biblical equivalent of what physicists would call a “singularity” — John, this bridge figure between the ancient prophets of Israel and the coming of the Messiah whom he heralds, is not about himself. On the contrary, after he baptizes Jesus in the Jordan River, John tells his own disciples that Jesus “must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30). The Baptist’s prophetic witness is one of self-emptying through relentless truth-telling and sets the New Testament standard for political incorrectness; his passionate commitment to the moral truths given to the chosen people by God eventually costs him, literally, his head.</p>
<p>The Church’s meditation on the strangely compelling figure of John the Baptist during Advent is thus a challenge to the regnant self-absorption of this cultural moment: For if anything is a frontal assault on the 21st-century ideology of Self, it is John’s insistence that “He must increase, but I must decrease.” No expressive individualism there; no “I did it my way;” no public-life-as-reality-TV, Trump-style. “He must increase, but I must decrease”: that countercultural message from the one whom Christians revere as the culmination of the prophets of Israel is then embodied in the second great Advent figure who helps prepare the Church for Christmas, Mary of Nazareth.</p>
<p>Mary, too, is both pivot and link between God’s revelation to Israel and God’s revelation in his Son. Like Israel of old, she is both attentive to a possible word from God and puzzled, even startled, when it arrives: a combination well captured in <a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ac/Henry_Ossawa_Tanner_-_The_Annunciation.jpg" type="external">Henry Ossawa Tanner’s splendid painting, The Annunciation</a>. Like John, last of the prophets, Mary places herself, not at the disposal of her Self, but at the disposal of the divine will: “Be it done unto me according to your word” [Luke 1:38]. And, like John, Mary knows that she must decrease so that her son might increase: thus her last recorded words in the New Testament, to the waiters at the wedding fast in Cana, “Do whatever he tells you” (John 2:4).</p>
<p>In all of this, Mary both sets the pattern of Christian discipleship and appears to the eyes of Christian faith as the greatest of bridges between the Old and New Testaments. For as Luke presents the story of the Incarnation, Mary becomes, through her self-emptying and obedient acceptance of the divine will, the new Ark of the Covenant, in whom, by the power of the Holy Spirit, the glory of God once again dwells among his chosen people — this time,&#160;in the flesh: “The Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God.” (Luke 1:35). Thus, through Mary’s “yes,” her fiat, the eyes of faith first glimpse the Thrice Holy God who is Trinity, and who, through her, blesses the world in a new and definitive way. And because God is a triune communion in which the three divine Persons live in complete self-gift and reciprocity, those disciples who live in the light and love of the Trinity can, even now, live beyond the paganism of Self, making their lives into a gift to others and thereby becoming a light to the nations.</p>
<p>Christmas is a richly&#160;symbolic, evocative antidote to the ideology of the imperial, autonomous Self: John the Baptist and Mary bear witness to the Law of the Gift inscribed in creation by the Triune God — the moral truth that fulfillment and human flourishing come through the gift of self, not the assertion of self.&#160;Christmas is where God’s revelation to the People of Israel meets God’s revelation in his Son. Christmas is where the drama of salvation history erupts into what the world knows as “history” through a shining star, an angelic choir, a faithful young couple, some startled herders, and wise men from a distant land.&#160;Two millennia of Christian disciples have known this about Advent and Christmas; few hymns express it better than that traditionally ascribed to St. Ambrose, bishop of Milan in the fourth century:</p>
<p>Veni, Redemptor gentium; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; O Come, Redeemer of the earth, ostende partum Virginis; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; and manifest Thy virgin birth. miretur omne saeculum:&#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; Let every age in wonder fall: talis decet partus Deum&#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;Such birth befits the God of all.</p>
<p>Non ex virili semine, &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;Begotten of no human will sed mystico spiramine&#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;but of the Spirit, Thou art still Verbum Dei factum est caro &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;the Word of God in flesh arrayed fructusque ventris floruit. &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;the promised fruit to man displayed.</p>
<p>Alvus tumescit Virginis, &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;The Virgin’s womb that burden gained, claustrum pudoris permanet, &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;its virgin honor still unstained. vexilla virtutum micant, &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;The banners there of virtue glow; versatur in templo Deus. &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;God in his temple dwells below.</p>
<p>Procedat e thalamo suo, &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;Proceeding from His chamber free pudoris aula regia, &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; that royal home of purity geminae gigans substantiae&#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; a giant in twofold substance one, alacris ut currat viam. &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; rejoicing now his course to run.</p>
<p>Aequalis aeterno Patri,&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;O equal to the father, Thou! carnis tropaeo&#160;cingere, &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;gird on Thy fleshly mantle now; infirma nostri corporis&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160; &#160;&#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;the weakness of our mortal state virtute firmans perpeti. &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;with deathless might invigorate.</p>
<p>Praesepe iam fulget tuum&#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; Thy cradle here shall glitter bright, lumenque nox spirat novum, &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;and darkness breathe a newer light quod nulla nox interpolet&#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;where endless faith shall shine serene fideque iugi luceat. &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;and twilight never intervene.</p>
<p>Sit, Christi,&#160;rex piissime, &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;All praise, eternal Son, to Thee, tibi Patrique gloria&#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;whose advent sets Thy people free, cum Spiritu Paraclito, &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;whom, with the Father, we adore, in sempitern saecula. &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160; &#160;and Holy Ghost, for evermore.</p>
<p>Amen.&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;Amen. [trans. J. M. Neale]</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 | past several decades ive wishing friends familiars happy new year first sunday advent marks beginning liturgical year thus start really real new year new year grace greeting bit countercultural contrariness however way remind christians ought live different temporal rhythm different pace culture trying convert reminder may particularly necessary frenetic holidays useful throughout civil year well impending 2016 seems likely full put gently challenges worth pondering praying christmastide truth christians read history truth salvation history gods work within creation unfolds inside alongside world thinks history salvific work began earnest call abraham experienced people israel egyptian captivity miraculous exodus freedom struggles live covenant relationship god land given patrimony exile babylon return land contest pagan powers day history deeper history unfolding moses elijah david prophets bore witness deeper history promises made abraham fulfilled matter hard discern fulfillment trajectory liturgical season advent month less church prepares annually christmas dominated two figures christians understand kind pivot gods revelation israel gods revelation incarnate son first figures st john baptist whose ability discern history unfolding within world imagines history first displayed birth according gospel story visitation luke 13956 unborn child call israel baptism water repentance recognizes cousin jesus baptize repentant holy spirit fire johns mother elizabeth puts cousin mary 160160160160when voice greeting came ears babe womb leaped joy later gospels john reappears kind prophetic wild man living alone judean wilderness clad garment camels hair leather girdle around waist sustaining diet locusts wild honey matthew 34 truck religious establishment day dismisses brood vipers matthew 37 proclamation coming reign god proclamation judgment even axe laid root trees every tree therefore bear good fruit cut thrown fire matthew 310 unrepentant chaff burn unquenchable fire matthew 312 yet appears scripture someone utterly uniquely intense biblical equivalent physicists would call singularity john bridge figure ancient prophets israel coming messiah heralds contrary baptizes jesus jordan river john tells disciples jesus must increase must decrease john 330 baptists prophetic witness one selfemptying relentless truthtelling sets new testament standard political incorrectness passionate commitment moral truths given chosen people god eventually costs literally head churchs meditation strangely compelling figure john baptist advent thus challenge regnant selfabsorption cultural moment anything frontal assault 21stcentury ideology self johns insistence must increase must decrease expressive individualism way publiclifeasrealitytv trumpstyle must increase must decrease countercultural message one christians revere culmination prophets israel embodied second great advent figure helps prepare church christmas mary nazareth mary pivot link gods revelation israel gods revelation son like israel old attentive possible word god puzzled even startled arrives combination well captured henry ossawa tanners splendid painting annunciation like john last prophets mary places disposal self disposal divine done unto according word luke 138 like john mary knows must decrease son might increase thus last recorded words new testament waiters wedding fast cana whatever tells john 24 mary sets pattern christian discipleship appears eyes christian faith greatest bridges old new testaments luke presents story incarnation mary becomes selfemptying obedient acceptance divine new ark covenant power holy spirit glory god dwells among chosen people time160in flesh holy spirit come upon power high overshadow therefore child born called holy son god luke 135 thus marys yes fiat eyes faith first glimpse thrice holy god trinity blesses world new definitive way god triune communion three divine persons live complete selfgift reciprocity disciples live light love trinity even live beyond paganism self making lives gift others thereby becoming light nations christmas richly160symbolic evocative antidote ideology imperial autonomous self john baptist mary bear witness law gift inscribed creation triune god moral truth fulfillment human flourishing come gift self assertion self160christmas gods revelation people israel meets gods revelation son christmas drama salvation history erupts world knows history shining star angelic choir faithful young couple startled herders wise men distant land160two millennia christian disciples known advent christmas hymns express better traditionally ascribed st ambrose bishop milan fourth century veni redemptor gentium 160 160 160 160 160 160 come redeemer earth ostende partum virginis 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 manifest thy virgin birth miretur omne saeculum160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 let every age wonder fall talis decet partus deum160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160such birth befits god non ex virili semine 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160begotten human sed mystico spiramine160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160but spirit thou art still verbum dei factum est caro 160 160 160 160 160 160the word god flesh arrayed fructusque ventris floruit 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160the promised fruit man displayed alvus tumescit virginis 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160the virgins womb burden gained claustrum pudoris permanet 160 160 160 160 160its virgin honor still unstained vexilla virtutum micant 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160the banners virtue glow versatur templo deus 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160god temple dwells procedat e thalamo suo 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160proceeding chamber free pudoris aula regia 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 royal home purity geminae gigans substantiae160 160 160 160 160 160 giant twofold substance one alacris ut currat viam 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 rejoicing course run aequalis aeterno patri160160160160160160160160160160160 160 160 160 160o equal father thou carnis tropaeo160cingere 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160gird thy fleshly mantle infirma nostri corporis160160160160160 160160 160 160 160 160 160 160the weakness mortal state virtute firmans perpeti 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160with deathless might invigorate praesepe iam fulget tuum160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 thy cradle shall glitter bright lumenque nox spirat novum 160 160 160 160 160 160and darkness breathe newer light quod nulla nox interpolet160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160where endless faith shall shine serene fideque iugi luceat 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160and twilight never intervene sit christi160rex piissime 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160all praise eternal son thee tibi patrique gloria160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160whose advent sets thy people free cum spiritu paraclito 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160whom father adore sempitern saecula 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160 160and holy ghost evermore amen160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160160amen trans j neale george weigel distinguished senior fellow washingtons ethics public policy center holds william e simon chair catholic studies | 1,086 |
<p>The United States government has abandoned everyone except the rich.</p>
<p>Your purchases at <a href="https://www.amazon.com/?_encoding=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;linkCode=ur2&amp;tag=forepolijour-20&amp;linkId=QBLURRIJM7RG4UUE" type="external">Amazon.com</a> via affiliate links below will help support FPJ at no extra cost to you.</p>
<p>The US economy died when middle class jobs were offshored and when the financial system was deregulated.</p>
<p>Jobs offshoring benefitted Wall Street, corporate executives, and shareholders, because lower labor and compliance costs resulted in higher profits. These profits flowed through to shareholders in the form of capital gains and to executives in the form of “performance bonuses.” Wall Street benefitted from the bull market generated by higher profits.</p>
<p>However, jobs offshoring also offshored US GDP and consumer purchasing power. Despite promises of a “New Economy” and better jobs, the replacement jobs have been increasingly part-time, lowly-paid jobs in domestic services, such as retail clerks, waitresses and bartenders.</p>
<p>The offshoring of US manufacturing and professional service jobs to Asia stopped the growth of consumer demand in the US, decimated the middle class, and left insufficient employment for college graduates to be able to service their student loans. The ladders of upward mobility that had made the United States an “opportunity society” were taken down in the interest of higher short-term profits.</p>
<p>Without growth in consumer incomes to drive the economy, the Federal Reserve under Alan Greenspan substituted the growth in consumer debt to take the place of the missing growth in consumer income.&#160; Under the Greenspan regime, Americans’ stagnant and declining incomes were augmented with the ability to spend on credit. One source of this credit was the rise in housing prices that the Federal Reserve’s low interest rate policy made possible.&#160; Consumers could refinance their now higher-valued home at lower interest rates and take out the “equity” and spend it.</p>
<p>The debt expansion, tied heavily to housing mortgages, came to a halt when the fraud perpetrated by a deregulated financial system crashed the real estate and stock markets. The bailout of the guilty imposed further costs on the very people that the guilty had victimized.</p>
<p>Under Fed chairman Bernanke the economy was kept going with Quantitative Easing, a massive increase in the money supply in order to bail out the “banks too big to fail.”&#160; Liquidity supplied by the Federal Reserve found its way into stock and bond prices and made those invested in these financial instruments richer. Corporate executives helped to boost the stock market by using the companies’ profits and by taking out loans in order to buy back the companies’ stocks, thus further expanding debt.</p>
<p>Those few benefitting from inflated financial asset prices produced by Quantitative Easing and buy-backs are a much smaller percentage of the population than was affected by the Greenspan consumer credit expansion. A relatively few rich people are an insufficient number to drive the economy.</p>
<p>The Federal Reserve’s zero interest rate policy was designed to support the balance sheets of the mega-banks and denied Americans interest income on their savings.&#160; This policy decreased the incomes of retirees and forced the elderly to reduce their consumption and/or draw down their savings more rapidly, leaving no safety net for heirs.</p>
<p>Using the smoke and mirrors of under-reported inflation and unemployment, the US government kept alive the appearance of economic recovery.&#160; Foreigners fooled by the deception continue to support the US dollar by holding US financial instruments.</p>
<p>The official inflation measures were “reformed” during the Clinton era in order to dramatically understate inflation.&#160; The measures do this in two ways.&#160; One way is to discard from the weighted basket of goods that comprises the inflation index those goods whose price rises.&#160; In their place, inferior lower-priced goods are substituted.</p>
<p>For example, if the price of New York strip steak rises, round steak is substituted in its place.&#160; The former official inflation index measured the cost of a constant standard of living.&#160; The “reformed” index measures the cost of a falling standard of living.</p>
<p>The other way the “reformed” measure of inflation understates the cost of living is to discard price rises as “quality improvements.”&#160; It is true that quality improvements can result in higher prices.&#160; However, it is still a price rise for the consumer as the former product is no longer available.&#160; Moreover, not all price rises are quality improvements; yet many prices rises that are not can be misinterpreted as “quality improvements.”</p>
<p>These two “reforms” resulted in no reported inflation and a halt to cost-of-living adjustments for Social Security recipients.&#160; The fall in Social Security real incomes also negatively impacted aggregate consumer demand.</p>
<p>The rigged understatement of inflation deceived people into believing that the US economy was in recovery. The lower the measure of inflation, the higher is real GDP when nominal GDP is deflated by the inflation measure.&#160; By understating inflation, the US government has overstated GDP growth.</p>
<p>What I have written is easily ascertained and proven; yet the financial press does not question the propaganda that sustains the psychology that the US economy is sound.&#160; This carefully cultivated psychology keeps the rest of the world invested in dollars, thus sustaining the House of Cards.</p>
<p>John Maynard Keynes understood that the Great Depression was the product of an insufficiency of consumer demand to take off the shelves the goods produced by industry.&#160; The post-WWII macroeconomic policy focused on maintaining the adequacy of aggregate demand in order to avoid high unemployment.&#160; The supply-side policy of President Reagan successfully corrected a defect in Keynesian macroeconomic policy and kept the US economy functioning without the “stagflation” from worsening “Philips Curve” trade-offs between inflation and employment.&#160; In the 21st century, jobs offshoring has depleted consumer demand’s ability to maintain US full employment.</p>
<p>The unemployment measure that the presstitute press reports is meaningless as it counts no discouraged workers, and discouraged workers are a huge part of American unemployment.&#160; The reported unemployment rate is about 5%, which is the U-3 measure that does not count as unemployed workers who are too discouraged to continue searching for jobs.</p>
<p>The US government has a second official unemployment measure, U-6, that counts workers discouraged for less than one-year.&#160; This official rate of unemployment is 10%.</p>
<p>When long term (more than one year) discouraged workers are included in the measure of unemployment, as once was done, the US unemployment rate is 23%. (See John Williams, <a href="http://shadowstats.com" type="external">shadowstats.com</a>)</p>
<p>Fiscal and monetary stimulus can pull the unemployed back to work if jobs for them still exist domestically.&#160; But if the jobs have been sent offshore, monetary and fiscal policy cannot work.</p>
<p>What jobs offshoring does is to give away US GDP to the countries to which US corporations move the jobs.&#160; In other words, with the jobs go American careers, consumer purchasing power and the tax base of state, local, and federal governments.&#160; There are only a few American winners, and they are the shareholders of the companies that offshored the jobs and the executives of the companies who receive multi-million dollar “performance bonuses” for raising profits by lowering labor costs. And, of course, the economists, who get grants, speaking engagements, and corporate board memberships for shilling for the offshoring policy that worsens the distribution of income and wealth. An economy run for a few only benefits the few, and the few, no matter how large their incomes, cannot consume enough to keep the economy growing.</p>
<p>In the 21st century US economic policy has destroyed the ability of real aggregate demand in the US to increase.&#160; Economists will deny this, because they are shills for globalism and jobs offshoring. They misrepresent jobs offshoring as free trade and, as in their ideology free trade benefits everyone, claim that America is benefitting from jobs offshoring.&#160; Yet, they cannot show any evidence whatsoever of these alleged benefits. (See my book, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0986036250/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=0986036250&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=forepolijour-20&amp;linkId=RSA5OX6ETNAZDDSG" type="external">The Failure of Laissez Faire Capitalism and Economic Dissolution of the West</a>.)&#160;</p>
<p>As an economist, it is a mystery to me how any economist can think that a population that does not produce the larger part of the goods that it consumes can afford to purchase the goods that it consumes. Where does the income come from to pay for imports when imports are swollen by the products of offshored production?</p>
<p>We were told that the income would come from better-paid replacement jobs provided by the “New Economy,” but neither the payroll jobs reports nor the US Labor Department’s projections of future jobs show any sign of this mythical “New Economy.”</p>
<p>There is no “New Economy.”&#160; The “New Economy” is like the neoconservatives promise that the Iraq war would be a six-week “cake walk” paid for by Iraqi oil revenues, not a $3 trillion dollar expense to American taxpayers (according to Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes) and a war that has lasted the entirely of the 21st century to date, and is getting more dangerous.</p>
<p>The American “New Economy” is the American Third World economy in which the only jobs created are low productivity, low paid non-tradable domestic service jobs incapable of producing export earnings with which to pay for the goods and services produced offshore for US consumption.</p>
<p>The massive debt arising from Washington’s endless wars for neoconservative hegemony now threaten Social Security and the entirety of the social safety net. The presstitute media are blaming not the policy that has devastated Americans, but, instead, the Americans who have been devastated by the policy.</p>
<p>Earlier this month I posted readers’ reports on the dismal job situation in Ohio, Southern Illinois, and Texas. In the March issue of Chronicles, Wayne Allensworth describes America’s declining rural towns and once great industrial cities as consequences of “globalizing capitalism.”&#160; A thin layer of very rich people rule over those “who have been left behind”—a shrinking middle class and a growing underclass.&#160; According to a poll last autumn, 53 percent of Americans say that they feel like a stranger in their own country.</p>
<p>Most certainly these Americans have no political representation. As Republicans and Democrats work to raise the retirement age in order to reduce Social Security outlays, Princeton University experts report that the mortality rates for the white working class are rising.&#160; The US government will not be happy until no one lives long enough to collect Social Security.</p>
<p>The United States government has abandoned everyone except the rich.</p>
<p>In the opening sentence of this article, I said that the two murderers of the American economy were jobs offshoring and financial deregulation.&#160; Deregulation greatly enhanced the ability of the large banks to financialize the economy. Financialization is the diversion of income streams into debt service. When debt service absorbs a large amount of the available income, the economy experiences debt deflation.&#160; The service of debt leaves too little income for purchases of goods and services and prices fall.</p>
<p>Michael Hudson, who I recently wrote about, is the expert on financialization.&#160; His book, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B014IAV9MK/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=B014IAV9MK&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=forepolijour-20&amp;linkId=FZZJCCPDTD3LZ5TP" type="external">Killing the Host</a>, which I recommended to you, tells the complete story.&#160; Briefly, financialization is the process by which creditors capitalize an economy’s economic surplus into interest payments to themselves. Perhaps an example would be a corporation that goes into debt in order to buy back its shares. The corporation achieves a temporary boost in its share prices at the cost of years of interest payments that drain the corporation of profits and deflate its share price.</p>
<p>Michael Hudson stresses the conversion of the rental value of real estate into mortgage payments.&#160; He emphasizes that classical economists wanted to base taxation not on production, but on economic rent.&#160; Economic rent is value due to location or to a monopoly position. For example, beachfront property has a higher price because of location.&#160; The difference in value between beachfront and non-beachfront property is economic rent, not a produced value.&#160; An unregulated monopoly can charge a price for a service that is higher than the price that would bring that service unto the market.</p>
<p>The proposal to tax economic rent does not mean taxing you on the rent that you pay your landlord or taxing your landlord on the rent that you pay him such that he ceases to provide the housing.&#160; By economic rent, Hudson means, for example, the rise in land values due to public infrastructure projects such as roads and subway systems.&#160; The rise in the value of land opened by a new road and housing and in commercial space along a new subway line is not due to any action of the property owners.&#160; This rise in value could be taxed in order to pay for the project instead of taxing the income of the population in general.&#160; Instead, the rise in land values raises appraisals and the amount that creditors are willing to lend on the property.&#160; New purchasers and existing owners can borrow more on the property, and the larger mortgages divert the increased land valuation into interest payments to creditors. Lenders end up as the major beneficiaries of public projects that raise real estate prices.</p>
<p>Similarly, unless the economy is financialized to such an extent that mortgage debt can no longer be serviced, when central banks lower interest rates property values rise, and this rise can be capitalized into a larger mortgage.</p>
<p>Another example would be property tax reductions and legislation such as California’s Proposition 13 that freeze in whole or part the property tax base.&#160; The rise in real estate values that escape taxation are capitalized into larger mortgages.&#160; New buyers do not benefit. The beneficiaries are the lenders who capture the rise in real estate prices in interest payments.</p>
<p>Taxing economic rent would prevent the financial system from capitalizing the rent into debt instruments that pay interest to the financial sector.&#160; Considering the amount of rents available to be taxed, taxing rents would free production from income and sales taxation, thus lowering consumer prices and freeing labor and productive capital from taxation.</p>
<p>With so much of land rent already capitalized into debt instruments shifting the tax burden to economic rent would be challenging.&#160; Nevertheless, Hudson’s analysis shows that financialization, not wage suppression, is the main instrument of exploitation and takes place via the financial system’s conversion of income streams into interest payments on debt.</p>
<p>I remember when mortgage service was restricted to one-quarter of household income. Today mortgage service can eat up half of household income.&#160; This extraordinary growth crowds out the production of goods and services as less of household income is available for other purchases.</p>
<p>Michael Hudson and I bring a total indictment of the neoliberal economics profession, “junk economists” as Hudson calls them.</p>
<p>This article was originally published at&#160; <a href="http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2016/02/18/expanded-version-the-us-economy-has-not-recovered-and-will-not-recover/" type="external">PaulCraigRoberts.org</a>.</p> | false | 1 | united states government abandoned everyone except rich purchases amazoncom via affiliate links help support fpj extra cost us economy died middle class jobs offshored financial system deregulated jobs offshoring benefitted wall street corporate executives shareholders lower labor compliance costs resulted higher profits profits flowed shareholders form capital gains executives form performance bonuses wall street benefitted bull market generated higher profits however jobs offshoring also offshored us gdp consumer purchasing power despite promises new economy better jobs replacement jobs increasingly parttime lowlypaid jobs domestic services retail clerks waitresses bartenders offshoring us manufacturing professional service jobs asia stopped growth consumer demand us decimated middle class left insufficient employment college graduates able service student loans ladders upward mobility made united states opportunity society taken interest higher shortterm profits without growth consumer incomes drive economy federal reserve alan greenspan substituted growth consumer debt take place missing growth consumer income160 greenspan regime americans stagnant declining incomes augmented ability spend credit one source credit rise housing prices federal reserves low interest rate policy made possible160 consumers could refinance highervalued home lower interest rates take equity spend debt expansion tied heavily housing mortgages came halt fraud perpetrated deregulated financial system crashed real estate stock markets bailout guilty imposed costs people guilty victimized fed chairman bernanke economy kept going quantitative easing massive increase money supply order bail banks big fail160 liquidity supplied federal reserve found way stock bond prices made invested financial instruments richer corporate executives helped boost stock market using companies profits taking loans order buy back companies stocks thus expanding debt benefitting inflated financial asset prices produced quantitative easing buybacks much smaller percentage population affected greenspan consumer credit expansion relatively rich people insufficient number drive economy federal reserves zero interest rate policy designed support balance sheets megabanks denied americans interest income savings160 policy decreased incomes retirees forced elderly reduce consumption andor draw savings rapidly leaving safety net heirs using smoke mirrors underreported inflation unemployment us government kept alive appearance economic recovery160 foreigners fooled deception continue support us dollar holding us financial instruments official inflation measures reformed clinton era order dramatically understate inflation160 measures two ways160 one way discard weighted basket goods comprises inflation index goods whose price rises160 place inferior lowerpriced goods substituted example price new york strip steak rises round steak substituted place160 former official inflation index measured cost constant standard living160 reformed index measures cost falling standard living way reformed measure inflation understates cost living discard price rises quality improvements160 true quality improvements result higher prices160 however still price rise consumer former product longer available160 moreover price rises quality improvements yet many prices rises misinterpreted quality improvements two reforms resulted reported inflation halt costofliving adjustments social security recipients160 fall social security real incomes also negatively impacted aggregate consumer demand rigged understatement inflation deceived people believing us economy recovery lower measure inflation higher real gdp nominal gdp deflated inflation measure160 understating inflation us government overstated gdp growth written easily ascertained proven yet financial press question propaganda sustains psychology us economy sound160 carefully cultivated psychology keeps rest world invested dollars thus sustaining house cards john maynard keynes understood great depression product insufficiency consumer demand take shelves goods produced industry160 postwwii macroeconomic policy focused maintaining adequacy aggregate demand order avoid high unemployment160 supplyside policy president reagan successfully corrected defect keynesian macroeconomic policy kept us economy functioning without stagflation worsening philips curve tradeoffs inflation employment160 21st century jobs offshoring depleted consumer demands ability maintain us full employment unemployment measure presstitute press reports meaningless counts discouraged workers discouraged workers huge part american unemployment160 reported unemployment rate 5 u3 measure count unemployed workers discouraged continue searching jobs us government second official unemployment measure u6 counts workers discouraged less oneyear160 official rate unemployment 10 long term one year discouraged workers included measure unemployment done us unemployment rate 23 see john williams shadowstatscom fiscal monetary stimulus pull unemployed back work jobs still exist domestically160 jobs sent offshore monetary fiscal policy work jobs offshoring give away us gdp countries us corporations move jobs160 words jobs go american careers consumer purchasing power tax base state local federal governments160 american winners shareholders companies offshored jobs executives companies receive multimillion dollar performance bonuses raising profits lowering labor costs course economists get grants speaking engagements corporate board memberships shilling offshoring policy worsens distribution income wealth economy run benefits matter large incomes consume enough keep economy growing 21st century us economic policy destroyed ability real aggregate demand us increase160 economists deny shills globalism jobs offshoring misrepresent jobs offshoring free trade ideology free trade benefits everyone claim america benefitting jobs offshoring160 yet show evidence whatsoever alleged benefits see book failure laissez faire capitalism economic dissolution west160 economist mystery economist think population produce larger part goods consumes afford purchase goods consumes income come pay imports imports swollen products offshored production told income would come betterpaid replacement jobs provided new economy neither payroll jobs reports us labor departments projections future jobs show sign mythical new economy new economy160 new economy like neoconservatives promise iraq war would sixweek cake walk paid iraqi oil revenues 3 trillion dollar expense american taxpayers according joseph stiglitz linda bilmes war lasted entirely 21st century date getting dangerous american new economy american third world economy jobs created low productivity low paid nontradable domestic service jobs incapable producing export earnings pay goods services produced offshore us consumption massive debt arising washingtons endless wars neoconservative hegemony threaten social security entirety social safety net presstitute media blaming policy devastated americans instead americans devastated policy earlier month posted readers reports dismal job situation ohio southern illinois texas march issue chronicles wayne allensworth describes americas declining rural towns great industrial cities consequences globalizing capitalism160 thin layer rich people rule left behinda shrinking middle class growing underclass160 according poll last autumn 53 percent americans say feel like stranger country certainly americans political representation republicans democrats work raise retirement age order reduce social security outlays princeton university experts report mortality rates white working class rising160 us government happy one lives long enough collect social security united states government abandoned everyone except rich opening sentence article said two murderers american economy jobs offshoring financial deregulation160 deregulation greatly enhanced ability large banks financialize economy financialization diversion income streams debt service debt service absorbs large amount available income economy experiences debt deflation160 service debt leaves little income purchases goods services prices fall michael hudson recently wrote expert financialization160 book killing host recommended tells complete story160 briefly financialization process creditors capitalize economys economic surplus interest payments perhaps example would corporation goes debt order buy back shares corporation achieves temporary boost share prices cost years interest payments drain corporation profits deflate share price michael hudson stresses conversion rental value real estate mortgage payments160 emphasizes classical economists wanted base taxation production economic rent160 economic rent value due location monopoly position example beachfront property higher price location160 difference value beachfront nonbeachfront property economic rent produced value160 unregulated monopoly charge price service higher price would bring service unto market proposal tax economic rent mean taxing rent pay landlord taxing landlord rent pay ceases provide housing160 economic rent hudson means example rise land values due public infrastructure projects roads subway systems160 rise value land opened new road housing commercial space along new subway line due action property owners160 rise value could taxed order pay project instead taxing income population general160 instead rise land values raises appraisals amount creditors willing lend property160 new purchasers existing owners borrow property larger mortgages divert increased land valuation interest payments creditors lenders end major beneficiaries public projects raise real estate prices similarly unless economy financialized extent mortgage debt longer serviced central banks lower interest rates property values rise rise capitalized larger mortgage another example would property tax reductions legislation californias proposition 13 freeze whole part property tax base160 rise real estate values escape taxation capitalized larger mortgages160 new buyers benefit beneficiaries lenders capture rise real estate prices interest payments taxing economic rent would prevent financial system capitalizing rent debt instruments pay interest financial sector160 considering amount rents available taxed taxing rents would free production income sales taxation thus lowering consumer prices freeing labor productive capital taxation much land rent already capitalized debt instruments shifting tax burden economic rent would challenging160 nevertheless hudsons analysis shows financialization wage suppression main instrument exploitation takes place via financial systems conversion income streams interest payments debt remember mortgage service restricted onequarter household income today mortgage service eat half household income160 extraordinary growth crowds production goods services less household income available purchases michael hudson bring total indictment neoliberal economics profession junk economists hudson calls article originally published at160 paulcraigrobertsorg | 1,415 |
<p>The Mayflower Hotel, Washington, D.C.</p>
<p>June 18, 2014</p>
<p>Speaker: Yuval Levin, Ethics and Public Policy Center and National Affairs</p>
<p>Yuval Levin</p>
<p>Yuval Levin: Good morning. Welcome to the 2014 Bradley Symposium. Thank you all for being here.&#160; I’m Yuval Levin. I’m a Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and the editor of National Affairs&#160;magazine. EPPC and National Affairs are very pleased to be co-hosting the symposium, together with the Bradley Foundation this year.</p>
<p>For more than a decade now the symposium has accompanied each year’s Bradley Prizes ceremony, and it’s given us a chance to reflect on an important set of questions facing the country, to step back and consider some element of our public life with greater perspective and distance than the rush of events usually allows for. And that, of course, is exactly what we hope to do this year.</p>
<p>A few words of thanks– first of all, naturally to the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, which supports so many important projects aimed at advancing American ideals and strengthening our country, and its institutions and traditions.</p>
<p>We’re very honored to have with us this morning some of the Foundation’s board members, as well as the Foundation’s staff members. Many thanks to all of you for everything that you do, and for helping this event come together. We’re particularly grateful to Dan Schmidt and to Terry Famer-Bradley for their guidance and wisdom in setting up this event.</p>
<p>I also want to recognize Bill Schambra and his colleagues at the Hudson Institute who have hosted the symposium over the past decade since it started. Bill is retiring, or more or less retiring this year, which we hope just means he’ll be writing more. But that’s why we at EPPC are taking over running the symposium. And as we do that, we do want to thank him and all the people who’ve worked with him over the years, to make these events so successful.</p>
<p>And finally, I want to thank Laura Mitchell of the Ethics and Public Policy Center and Sylvia Travaglione of EPPC who really did all the work to put this event together and did so brilliantly, as usually. Many thanks to all of you.</p>
<p>Our subject today flows naturally from the Bradley Foundation’s long-standing interest in strengthening and reinforcing the institutions of America’s free society, free economy, and liberal democracy. Bradley has always taken it upon itself to help America deal with its present problems and better prepare itself for its future challenges and opportunities. And in thinking about the right questions to take up in this year’s symposium, we all were struck by the degree to which the nature of those challenges and opportunities is so unclear just now the degree to which the present is a blur, even more than &#160;usual, which makes the future even more of a mystery of an unknown country than it usually is to us.</p>
<p>There are a few reasons for this, I&#160; think. First, for one thing the Obama years have been very disorienting for both the left and the&#160; right. They followed the heels of a terrible financial crisis, they began with a terrible recession. The last five years have been spent more or less waiting for the roaring recovery that refuses to come. They continued with a series of dramatic political moments, all of which have tended to exacerbate the sense that our politics&#160;are&#160;intensely polarized and divided, that our government is increasingly overwhelmed– if not incompetent, that our economy is not what it used to be, that our country somehow is under stress and having trouble dealing with it.</p>
<p>The right and the left have both been stuck in defensive crouches in these years, each believing that it’s under assault and every moment has felt like a prelude to another crisis somehow.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, our country really is going through a series of transitions that leave the American public uncertain. We all live a sense that we’re somehow at the end of an era in American life, and it’s not clear what the next era will look like. The order of American life since the Second World War was dominated by large institutions, big government, big labor, big business, big media, big academic and cultural institutions and the path to success involved charting a path through these large institutions. That is how we lived in a time of unprecedented prosperity and success in American life, and we’re reluctant to see it go, but it does appear to be going.</p>
<p>Increasingly, American life is defined not by big consolidated institutions but by smaller, decentralized networks, less stable but more dynamic, and therefore by a vast array of options confronting all of us in every part of life, with the possible exception of government. &#160;This massive decentralization of American life comes at the same time as the global economy has also been less and less dominated by the American economy, so that everywhere you look there’s more competition and less stability and security for us.</p>
<p>This new era in American life will offer us a lot of opportunities, if not also a lot of risks. But we haven’t yet learned how to recognize or handle either one, how to make sense of the present and prepare for the future. Instead, we’re still to a large extent mourning the passing order which cannot be kept.</p>
<p>And our politics, again, on both the left and the right, if in different ways, is overwhelmed today, maybe even suffocated by a kind of nostalgia. Liberals always think it’s 1965, conservatives always think it’s 1981, but it isn’t. And what Americans need is a better sense of how things look in 2014 and where they might be headed, for good and for bad.</p>
<p>That’s why we’ve gathered this panel this morning. To help us break through the fog and see some of the key trends and dynamics that increasingly define American life. To help us better grasp the present and think more clearly about the future, so that we can consider how the timeless principles of American life need to be applied to new circumstances.</p>
<p>And we couldn’t have asked for a better foursome to do that for us. So, I’ll tell you just a little bit about each of them, we’ll hear from each of them and then open things up for discussion, including your questions.</p>
<p>First we’ll be hearing about demographic and opinion trends from Karlyn Bowman. Karlyn is a Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise &#160;Institute, where she wears a lot of hats, but is above all an analyst of demographics and public opinion. She’s served in the past as managing editor of Public Opinion&#160;magazine, editor of the American Enterprise and a contributing editor to AEI’s magazine, The American. And she’s written essays,papers, and books on an extraordinary variety of subjects in public opinion and in demography, from how we view Congress to how we think about healthcare, abortion, the economy, war and peace, death and taxes. She’s focused particularly in recent years on the evolution of American political and social life in response to key demographic and geographic changes in our society. She’s also the editor of AEI’s monthly political report, has been a columnist for Roll Call, and now has a regular column at Forbes.com.</p>
<p>After Karlyn we’ll hear about economic trends and dynamics from Glenn Hubbard. Glenn is the dean of the Columbia Business School and the Russell L. Carson Professor of Finance and Economics there. From 2001 through 2003 he was the chairman of the U.S. Council of Economic Advisors at the White House. He has served as an economic advisor to a variety of policymakers and government bodies and was the chief economic advisor to Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign in 2012. He’s the author of many dozens of scholarly articles in economics and finance, of three popular economics textbooks, co-author of books on foreign aid and healthcare reform and the federal budget and other subjects. And he’s written countless essays and articles on economic issues for general audiences, including writing for National Affairs. He’s one of the country’s foremost academic economists.</p>
<p>After economics we’ll hear about political dynamics from Henry Olsen, my colleague at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. Henry’s a Senior Fellow at EPPC where his work focuses on how to address the electoral challenges facing modern American servatism, work that will culminate in a forthcoming book entitled New Century, New Deal: How Conservatives Can Win Hearts, Minds and Elections. He has previously served as a Vice President at AEI and at the Manhattan Institute, President of the Commonwealth Foundation. His work has been very widely published and recognized. In recent years he’s been essentially celebrated as a scholar of the overlooked voter, working class voters who haven’t found a stable home in either party, and in a sense are the remaining winnable swing constituency in our politics and so are extremely important to the future of both parties.</p>
<p>Finally,we will hear about&#160;how the future might take shape, we’ll hear a little bit about who might live there,&#160;and about the characteristics and views of the rising millennial generation, from Kristen Soltis Anderson. Kristen is a pollster and a columnist for The Daily Beast. She’s done extensive research on public opinion, particularly in the youth vote. In 2013, she was the author of a report for the College Republicans called, “Grand Old Party for a Brand New Generation,” about how Republicans could win young voters. She’s been published widely, from academic journals to opinion journals to the op-ed pages. She’s writing a book on new ideas and social trends that matter to emerging voter groups, which is due out in 2015.</p>
<p>We’re enormously privileged and grateful to have these four as our guides this morning. So, we’ll hear from each of them in that order and then open things up for a conversation, both among them and between them and all of us. &#160;So, why don’t we begin with Karlyn.</p> | false | 1 | mayflower hotel washington dc june 18 2014 speaker yuval levin ethics public policy center national affairs yuval levin yuval levin good morning welcome 2014 bradley symposium thank here160 im yuval levin im fellow ethics public policy center editor national affairs160magazine eppc national affairs pleased cohosting symposium together bradley foundation year decade symposium accompanied years bradley prizes ceremony given us chance reflect important set questions facing country step back consider element public life greater perspective distance rush events usually allows course exactly hope year words thanks first naturally lynde harry bradley foundation supports many important projects aimed advancing american ideals strengthening country institutions traditions honored us morning foundations board members well foundations staff members many thanks everything helping event come together particularly grateful dan schmidt terry famerbradley guidance wisdom setting event also want recognize bill schambra colleagues hudson institute hosted symposium past decade since started bill retiring less retiring year hope means hell writing thats eppc taking running symposium want thank people whove worked years make events successful finally want thank laura mitchell ethics public policy center sylvia travaglione eppc really work put event together brilliantly usually many thanks subject today flows naturally bradley foundations longstanding interest strengthening reinforcing institutions americas free society free economy liberal democracy bradley always taken upon help america deal present problems better prepare future challenges opportunities thinking right questions take years symposium struck degree nature challenges opportunities unclear degree present blur even 160usual makes future even mystery unknown country usually us reasons i160 think first one thing obama years disorienting left the160 right followed heels terrible financial crisis began terrible recession last five years spent less waiting roaring recovery refuses come continued series dramatic political moments tended exacerbate sense politics160are160intensely polarized divided government increasingly overwhelmed incompetent economy used country somehow stress trouble dealing right left stuck defensive crouches years believing assault every moment felt like prelude another crisis somehow meanwhile country really going series transitions leave american public uncertain live sense somehow end era american life clear next era look like order american life since second world war dominated large institutions big government big labor big business big media big academic cultural institutions path success involved charting path large institutions lived time unprecedented prosperity success american life reluctant see go appear going increasingly american life defined big consolidated institutions smaller decentralized networks less stable dynamic therefore vast array options confronting us every part life possible exception government 160this massive decentralization american life comes time global economy also less less dominated american economy everywhere look theres competition less stability security us new era american life offer us lot opportunities also lot risks havent yet learned recognize handle either one make sense present prepare future instead still large extent mourning passing order kept politics left right different ways overwhelmed today maybe even suffocated kind nostalgia liberals always think 1965 conservatives always think 1981 isnt americans need better sense things look 2014 might headed good bad thats weve gathered panel morning help us break fog see key trends dynamics increasingly define american life help us better grasp present think clearly future consider timeless principles american life need applied new circumstances couldnt asked better foursome us ill tell little bit well hear open things discussion including questions first well hearing demographic opinion trends karlyn bowman karlyn senior fellow american enterprise 160institute wears lot hats analyst demographics public opinion shes served past managing editor public opinion160magazine editor american enterprise contributing editor aeis magazine american shes written essayspapers books extraordinary variety subjects public opinion demography view congress think healthcare abortion economy war peace death taxes shes focused particularly recent years evolution american political social life response key demographic geographic changes society shes also editor aeis monthly political report columnist roll call regular column forbescom karlyn well hear economic trends dynamics glenn hubbard glenn dean columbia business school russell l carson professor finance economics 2001 2003 chairman us council economic advisors white house served economic advisor variety policymakers government bodies chief economic advisor mitt romneys presidential campaign 2012 hes author many dozens scholarly articles economics finance three popular economics textbooks coauthor books foreign aid healthcare reform federal budget subjects hes written countless essays articles economic issues general audiences including writing national affairs hes one countrys foremost academic economists economics well hear political dynamics henry olsen colleague ethics public policy center henrys senior fellow eppc work focuses address electoral challenges facing modern american servatism work culminate forthcoming book entitled new century new deal conservatives win hearts minds elections previously served vice president aei manhattan institute president commonwealth foundation work widely published recognized recent years hes essentially celebrated scholar overlooked voter working class voters havent found stable home either party sense remaining winnable swing constituency politics extremely important future parties finallywe hear about160how future might take shape well hear little bit might live there160and characteristics views rising millennial generation kristen soltis anderson kristen pollster columnist daily beast shes done extensive research public opinion particularly youth vote 2013 author report college republicans called grand old party brand new generation republicans could win young voters shes published widely academic journals opinion journals oped pages shes writing book new ideas social trends matter emerging voter groups due 2015 enormously privileged grateful four guides morning well hear order open things conversation among us 160so dont begin karlyn | 878 |
<p>HOUSTON — <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Deshaun-Watson/" type="external">Deshaun Watson</a> has always been an unusually precocious quarterback.</p>
<p>As a true freshman at Clemson, he delivered a touchdown pass during a road game at Georgia on just the sixth snap of his college career as he overtook starter Cole Stoudt.</p>
<p>As a high school freshman at Gainesville High School in Georgia, Watson was named the starter and threw three touchdown passes in his first varsity game.</p>
<p>The path to the Texans’ starting job may not come as quickly, though, for the first-round draft pick and national championship winner from Clemson.</p>
<p>Texans head coach <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Bill-OBrien/" type="external">Bill O’Brien</a> has installed veteran <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Tom-Savage/" type="external">Tom Savage</a> as the starter over Watson and backup <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Brandon-Weeden/" type="external">Brandon Weeden</a> as the defending AFC South champions head into training camp at The Greenbrier Resort in West Virginia.</p>
<p>For now, the plan is for Watson to learn behind Savage and gain some seasoning before the Texans consider changing his status.</p>
<p>As much as he’s eager to play and contribute, it’s a blueprint that Watson is on board with while being coached by O’Brien, a former <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/New_England_Patriots/" type="external">New England Patriots</a> offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach for star quarterback <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Tom_Brady/" type="external">Tom Brady</a>.</p>
<p>“It’s best for the team,” Watson said. “Coach OB knows a lot of football. He’s been with the best, if not one of the best in NFL history, Tom Brady. 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>“So, I’m following their footsteps. I’m the rookie and I really don’t know no better, so I’m just kind of going with the flow, learning from the vets, learning from the coaching staff. Whenever he calls my name, I’ll make sure I’m prepared and go out and perform.”</p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Heisman_Trophy/" type="external">Heisman Trophy</a> finalist, Davey O’Brien and Manning Award winner — as well as claiming an ESPY this month for Best Male College Athlete — Watson has a proven track record of exceeding initial expectations.</p>
<p>In high school and college, Watson emerged as the starter almost immediately.</p>
<p>“That just kind of came natural,” Watson said. “I’ve been playing football my whole life. Coaches felt like I was prepared and ready and they wanted me in there, so I just took advantage of the opportunity and didn’t look back.</p>
<p>“This is a whole new level. I’m starting from ground zero. If it happens, it happens. If it doesn’t, I’ll play my role well and support the team.”</p>
<p>Throwing that first touchdown pass against an aggressive blitz package against Georgia made a lasting impression on Clemson coach <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Dabo-Swinney/" type="external">Dabo Swinney</a>. It was the springboard to a career that included 83 career touchdown passes in three seasons before declaring early for the draft.</p>
<p>“That was the first time we experienced how special Deshaun was,” Swinney said.</p>
<p>“It was a really exotic blitz, very dangerous. If we didn’t get into the right protection and call, it could be a big-time sack and free hit on the quarterback. We couldn’t believe he could do that as a true freshman. That was a sign that this young man was different and one of the special ones.”</p>
<p>Watson finished his college career with 9,201 passing yards, also rushing for 1,744 yards and 21 scores. Prior to enrolling early at Clemson, Watson set Georgia high school state records with 17,134 yards of total offense and 218 touchdowns.</p>
<p>Watson has made a good first impression on the Texans’ coaching staff, especially O’Brien, who’s operating as the offensive coordinator after the team parted ways with George Godsey after last season.</p>
<p>Watson puts in overtime, haunting the Texans’ film room and weight room on days off to make sure he’s prepared.</p>
<p>“He’s doing good,” O’Brien said. “For a rookie coming in here, he’s spent a lot of time. He’s studying hard. He has great questions. He has good answers to the questions when we kind of quiz them every morning. I’ve been impressed with all three guys. It’s a good room and he’s working hard.”</p>
<p>In consecutive national championship games against Alabama, Watson passed for a combined 825 yards with seven touchdowns and one interception. He delivered the game-winning touchdown pass in the final seconds to cap his prolific college career in the BCS national title game last season.</p>
<p>“He was special, a once-in-a-lifetime player and person,” Gainesville coach Bruce Miller said. “He was self-motivated with a terrific work ethic. You could tell football was one of his main priorities in his life. He was so coachable, just wanted it so bad.</p>
<p>“It was amazing what he did behind the scenes to be good. He’s what coaches call a ‘film hound.’ He goes hunting for film. He can’t watch enough. He is an extremely fast learner. The Texans got themselves a good one. He’s the type of kid that can take the Texans franchise a step higher.”</p>
<p>Competing against the Texans’ top-ranked defense during minicamps and organized team activities, Watson got a glimpse of the increased speed of the game and the quick adjustments he’ll need to make to diagnose defensive schemes designed to confuse him.</p>
<p>“Everyone can run at this level,” Watson said. “Everyone is smart. Everyone watches film. Everyone is athletic. You have to approach the game differently. You can’t take a play off at this level. If you do, you will get smoked.”</p>
<p>TOP THREE TRAINING CAMP GOALS</p>
<p>— <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/JJ-Watt/" type="external">J.J. Watt</a> must remain healthy. The three-time NFL Defensive Player of the Year missed most of last season after undergoing a pair of back surgeries to repair a herniated disk. Watt hasn’t been exposed to any 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>–Build timing in the passing game. The Texans sorely need new starting QB Tom Savage to get off to a good start at building chemistry with Pro Bowl alternate wide receiver <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/DeAndre-Hopkins/" type="external">DeAndre Hopkins</a>. Hopkins’ production dipped last season during the failed <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Brock_Osweiler/" type="external">Brock Osweiler</a> experiment. He seems to click better with Savage, but Savage has yet to throw a touchdown pass in an NFL regular-season game.</p>
<p>–Improve red-zone offense. The Texans ranked 31st in the NFL in red-zone offense last season. They couldn’t effectively throw the ball or run the ball into the end zone, relying on kicker <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Nick_Novak/" type="external">Nick Novak</a> to provide points. They need to spend a lot of extra time on this shortcoming.</p>
<p>PROJECTED CAMP DEPTH CHART</p>
<p>QUARTERBACKS: Starter — Tom Savage. Backups — Brandon Weeden, Deshaun Watson.</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>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>WIDE RECEIVERS: Starters — DeAndre Hopkins, 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>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>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>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>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>SPECIAL TEAMS: K Nick Novak, P Shane Lechler, LS Jon Weeks, KOR Tyler Ervin, PR Will Fuller, K Ka’imi Fairbairn, P Cory Carter.</p> | false | 1 | houston deshaun watson always unusually precocious quarterback true freshman clemson delivered touchdown pass road game georgia sixth snap college career overtook starter cole stoudt high school freshman gainesville high school georgia watson named starter threw three touchdown passes first varsity game path texans starting job may come quickly though firstround draft pick national championship winner clemson texans head coach bill obrien installed veteran tom savage starter watson backup brandon weeden defending afc south champions head training camp greenbrier resort west virginia plan watson learn behind savage gain seasoning texans consider changing status much hes eager play contribute blueprint watson board coached obrien former new england patriots offensive coordinator quarterbacks coach star quarterback tom brady best team watson said coach ob knows lot football hes best one best nfl history tom brady knows everything operated knows perfect timing knows right wrong im following footsteps im rookie really dont know better im kind going flow learning vets learning coaching staff whenever calls name ill make sure im prepared go perform heisman trophy finalist davey obrien manning award winner well claiming espy month best male college athlete watson proven track record exceeding initial expectations high school college watson emerged starter almost immediately kind came natural watson said ive playing football whole life coaches felt like prepared ready wanted took advantage opportunity didnt look back whole new level im starting ground zero happens happens doesnt ill play role well support team throwing first touchdown pass aggressive blitz package georgia made lasting impression clemson coach dabo swinney springboard career included 83 career touchdown passes three seasons declaring early draft first time experienced special deshaun swinney said really exotic blitz dangerous didnt get right protection call could bigtime sack free hit quarterback couldnt believe could true freshman sign young man different one special ones watson finished college career 9201 passing yards also rushing 1744 yards 21 scores prior enrolling early clemson watson set georgia high school state records 17134 yards total offense 218 touchdowns watson made good first impression texans coaching staff especially obrien whos operating offensive coordinator team parted ways george godsey last season watson puts overtime haunting texans film room weight room days make sure hes prepared hes good obrien said rookie coming hes spent lot time hes studying hard great questions good answers questions kind quiz every morning ive impressed three guys good room hes working hard consecutive national championship games alabama watson passed combined 825 yards seven touchdowns one interception delivered gamewinning touchdown pass final seconds cap prolific college career bcs national title game last season special onceinalifetime player person gainesville coach bruce miller said selfmotivated terrific work ethic could tell football one main priorities life coachable wanted bad amazing behind scenes good hes coaches call film hound goes hunting film cant watch enough extremely fast learner texans got good one hes type kid take texans franchise step higher competing texans topranked defense minicamps organized team activities watson got glimpse increased speed game quick adjustments hell need make diagnose defensive schemes designed confuse everyone run level watson said everyone smart everyone watches film everyone athletic approach game differently cant take play level get smoked top three training camp goals jj watt must remain healthy threetime nfl defensive player year missed last season undergoing pair back surgeries repair herniated disk watt hasnt exposed contact drills yet fully cleared participated offseason practices health paramount nfls topranked defense build timing passing game texans sorely need new starting qb tom savage get good start building chemistry pro bowl alternate wide receiver deandre hopkins hopkins production dipped last season failed brock osweiler experiment seems click better savage savage yet throw touchdown pass nfl regularseason game improve redzone offense texans ranked 31st nfl redzone offense last season couldnt effectively throw ball run ball end zone relying kicker nick novak provide points need spend lot extra time shortcoming projected camp depth chart quarterbacks starter tom savage backups brandon weeden deshaun watson running backs starters lamar miller fb jay prosch backups donta foreman akeem hunt alfred blue tyler ervin dare ogunbowale tight ends starter cj fiedorowicz backups ryan griffin stephen anderson zach conque rashaun allen evan baylis wide receivers starters deandre hopkins fuller backups jaelen strong braxton miller wendall williams chris thompson riley mccarron justin hardee deante gray shaq hill 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 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 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 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 special teams k nick novak p shane lechler ls jon weeks kor tyler ervin pr fuller k kaimi fairbairn p cory carter | 907 |
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>Trying to understand the economics of Medicare is a difficult business, but nearly everyone agrees that things do not look good. In March 2004, the Medicare Board of Trustees issued its annual report on the financial health of Medicare Part A, which funds primarily hospital expenses, and Medicare Part B, which funds outpatient care. The prognosis was grim: The Hospital Insurance (HI) “trust fund is projected to be exhausted in 2019 – 7 years earlier than estimated in last year’s report…. The long-range projections for HI continue to show a very substantial imbalance…. The Part B premium and corresponding general revenue transfers will need to be increased sharply for 2005 to match projected costs.” To fix this “imbalance,” the report concluded, “would require very substantial increases in revenues and/or reductions in benefits.”</p>
<p>The Medicare Modernization Act (MMA), signed into law in December 2003, has no doubt made this financial crisis even worse. The new law provides partial prescription drug coverage for all desiring seniors – with an estimated cost between $395 billion and $534 billion over the next decade, before most of the drug-hungry baby boomers even retire. Many analysts believe these estimates are already far too low, and that policy makers have conveniently avoided discussing the benefit’s costs in the second decade and beyond. The bill also includes a combination of other reforms: higher premiums for wealthy seniors who participate in Part B; rule changes that allow more private health plans to offer Medicare coverage; subsidies for employers that continue drug coverage for retirees; medical savings accounts for people of all ages; and a six-city “demonstration project” of voucher-style competition starting in 2010, which many analysts believe will be killed before it begins.</p>
<p>None of these additional reforms changes the fundamental character of Medicare as a government-funded and government-run entitlement program, though the ideas behind them may be significant in shaping efforts at large-scale reform in the future. And all of these additional measures are overshadowed by the new drug benefit that begins in 2006—the largest expansion of Medicare since the program was created in 1965. Specifically, the new benefit will cover 75 percent of drug costs between $250 and $2,250, provide no coverage between $2,250 and $5,100 (the so-called “hole in the doughnut”), and cover 95 percent of drug costs of $5,100 and over. Participation in the program is voluntary; the benefit will be administered by publicly approved private companies; and the premiums are estimated to cost $35 per month, with different private-sector plans competing to offer the best drug prices, and each plan required to offer drugs in every therapeutic category.</p>
<p>Not surprisingly, the debate over MMA was politically bitter and complex in legislative terms. It was pushed hard by the Bush administration, the Republican establishment, and some moderate Democrats – who saw it as the best way to give seniors the drug benefit they desire (a political plus), without breaking the bank or engineering a government take-over of the drug industry. The law was bitterly opposed by the majority of Democrats, who believe the drug benefits are too small and the “pay-off” to pharmaceutical companies too big; and it was attacked by many conservatives, who believe it will expand the grip of the welfare state and eventually lead to price controls, tax hikes, and a slowed economy.</p>
<p>MMA is a significant achievement, and in many ways an improvement. It corrects a genuine gap in Medicare, a program that was created before prescription drugs were a central part of modern medicine. And it significantly helps those seniors who are currently ineligible for Medicaid but still too poor to buy prescription drugs without economic hardship.</p>
<p>But one can also understand why so many people — Left, Right, and center — see the bill as irresponsible or inadequate, and why no one really believes it is what Medicare needs over the long-term. “We are building a new expansion onto a house that’s teetering on a cliff,” says Republican Senator Don Nickles. “It cynically uses the elderly’s need for prescription drugs as a Trojan horse to reshape Medicare,” says Democratic Senator Ted Kennedy. “Medicare has become pork barrel. It plays to retirees’ desires and raises their discretionary income. The question of generational justice is nearly absent,” says centrist columnist Robert J. Samuelson. The new law expands an entitlement that is already the fastest growing part of the federal budget. It leaves middle-class citizens with significant drug bills to pay, and thus invites future demands to “sweeten the benefits.” And it punts the hardest social questions down the road — not only about the economics of Medicare, but about the intersection of modern medicine, an aging society, and the character of American society as a whole. These deeper questions are what lie at the core of the Medicare “crisis.”</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>How Medicare works</p>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>To understand the implications of the new Medicare bill and the political disagreements surrounding it, one needs to understand how Medicare works as a whole. This is no easy task, but a few salient points are worth noting.</p>
<p>First, Medicare is primarily a federally funded, third-party payer, fee-for-service program. In other words, when seniors get sick, they go to the doctor and the government pays most of the bill. Beneficiaries pay some premiums: an $876 deductible for major hospital visits under Part A; $66.60 per month, a $100 annual deductible, and 20 percent co-payments for most outpatient treatment under Part B. But the value of the government subsidies rises the more care one uses. Seniors who participate in traditional Medicare (roughly 88 percent) have the freedom to see any doctor who will see them. This is generally wonderful for beneficiaries: They have access to all the care they desire. But it is problematic for society as a whole, since there are limited incentives for seniors to cut their own health-care costs, and there is limited room within the heavily regulated system for private insurers to improve efficiency by creating health-care networks or tailoring services to individual needs. This economic problem will only get worse, many believe, as expensive new medical technologies become available, as the percentage of the national population on Medicare increases, and as the average age of Medicare beneficiaries rises and their health deteriorates.</p>
<p>Second, Medicare is a major part of the “hidden subsidy” and “price control” system that now shapes American health care. The government sets the prices by fiat for all the medical services covered under Medicare — with different physician groups lobbying constantly for increases to the reimbursement rate for their own specialties, and the government trying constantly to keep up with ongoing changes in the nature of medical care. This system allows government to exert some control over Medicare costs — though reimbursement cuts in the past have often resulted in reduced access to care, reduced quality of care, or increased billing for a larger volume of services. And of course, government doesn’t get the prices right. This means the system only works because those services that are over-reimbursed subsidize those services that are under-reimbursed — for example, over-payment for cancer drugs subsidizes under-payment for cancer treatment. This system of cross-subsidizing exists both within Medicare and between Medicare and private-sector health insurance.</p>
<p>Third, Medicare’s system of government-controlled pricing also shapes how patients are treated, and not always for the better. In some cases, people seek not the best or cheapest treatments for a given condition but those treatments that are covered by Medicare. In other cases, avoiding inexpensive but uncovered therapies leads to expensive but covered emergencies in the future. As Joseph Antos, an analyst for the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), explains about cancer therapy: “There is widespread agreement that Medicare overpaid for Part B drugs, although oncologists argued that those overpayments helped compensate for the extra costs of administering the drugs and caring for patients that were not reflected in fees paid by Medicare for office visits.” The problem is that when the federal government reduced payments for cancer drugs, as it did in MMA, there was “a shift of patients out of the doctor’s office and back to the inpatient hospital care, which reduces patient satisfaction and could increase federal outlays.”</p>
<p>Finally, the current Medicare system does not pay for long-term care. If someone suffers a stroke, for example, Medicare covers the expenses incurred in its immediate aftermath — hospital care, 21 days of skilled nursing care with no deductible, and 79 additional days of skilled nursing care for a subsidized rate of $109.50 per day. However, once the patient no longer requires skilled medical treatment but still requires constant personal care, Medicare pays nothing. This leaves individuals and families with a range of hard choices: family caretaking by a spouse or child; professional caretaking paid for out-of-pocket; or self-impoverishment until one qualifies for Medicaid, which does pay for long-term care, either by spending down one’s assets or moving them in advance to one’s children or siblings. The result is that a significant number of seniors who live to 65 end up on Medicaid — a welfare program — at some point before dying, including many who were self-sufficient throughout most of their lives. And looking forward, it suggests that the next Medicare entitlement debate will be about whether to add a long-term care benefit — which could prove far more expensive than paying for drugs.</p>
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<p>The rich and the poor</p>
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<p>In trying to make sense of the significance of MMA, it is perhaps useful to begin with the two dimensions of the bill that have won nearly universal support: extra subsidies for low-income seniors to purchase prescription drugs and additional premiums for high-income seniors who participate in Medicare Part B. During the 2002 debate about prescription drug coverage, liberal commentator Michael Kinsley told policy makers the following: “When Congress takes up a drug benefit again, it should keep things simple and concentrate on the risk, approaching a certainty, that it wishes to prevent: people doing without drugs — or without food — because of the cost. That means concentrating on poor people.”</p>
<p>In the MMA, Congress took his advice — about helping the poor, if not keeping things simple. Beginning in June 2004, the bill created a temporary “drug discount card” that aims to give all participating seniors a 10 to 25 percent discount and low-income seniors a $600 direct subsidy. The permanent drug benefit, which includes substantial out-of-pocket “cost-sharing” for middle-income and high-income seniors, requires only minimal cost-sharing for those below 150 percent of the poverty level. This includes roughly a third of all Medicare beneficiaries.</p>
<p>Conservative critics of MMA have largely embraced this particular element of the bill. “Instead of displacing existing drug coverage with a universal entitlement, Congress could target federal subsidies to low-income seniors or those without drug coverage,” wrote Robert E. Moffit, a health-care analyst for the Heritage Foundation, in a recent policy memo urging Congress to fix MMA before it is enacted. AEI’s Joseph Antos has urged that the temporary “discount-plus-subsidy” program be made permanent and expanded.</p>
<p>No doubt the liberal and conservative reasons behind such support are not identical. Conservatives see subsidies for the poor as a way to limit the expansion of Medicare in general — by eventually making it a welfare program, not a universal entitlement. They believe that government action should be limited to helping those who cannot help themselves, while leaving individuals with middling means to plan, invest, and make choices in the marketplace. Liberals believe that society has a special obligation to help those who have been “left behind,” and that the rich have a special obligation to support them. But both liberals and conservatives typically accept the notion that subsidizing the elderly poor (who are also chronically poor, with incomes likely to fall rather than rise) is a proper responsibility of the state. They disagree about whether MMA does this in the best possible way. Democrats believe that state-controlled drug prices are crucial to control costs, while Republicans believe America needs a subsidized voucher system that allows the poor to purchase drugs in the marketplace. But they both agree that drug benefits should be means-tested, with the poor paying less and everyone else paying more.</p>
<p>MMA also singles out wealthy seniors in a novel way by means-testing Medicare Part B benefits. Part B (also called “Supplementary Medical Insurance,” or SMI) is a voluntary program, covering physician and outpatient care, in which nearly all seniors participate. At present, the premium is 25 percent (or $66.60 per month) of the total cost of the benefit — the same for all seniors, regardless of health, income, or the amount of medical care they need (though patients pay roughly 20 percent co-insurance per doctor visit). In this way, Medicare has always been (in both Parts A and B) a universal entitlement, not a welfare benefit.</p>
<p>Beginning in 2007, however, Part B beneficiaries with incomes over $80,000 for individuals (or $160,000 for a married couple) will pay gradually escalating premiums, with individuals earning over $200,000 (or couples earning over $400,000) paying premiums of 80 percent. The cost savings of such a change are likely minor compared to the cost of Medicare as a whole, since the higher premiums will affect only an estimated 1.2 million seniors out of the 35 million now on Medicare. But the principle it establishes for future reform may be significant: namely, the idea that means-testing is a potential route for further cost-cutting. As liberal Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein and the aforementioned conservative Senator Don Nickles wrote together in the Washington Post, “Why should low-income families pay 75 percent of the bill for Ross Perot to have a checkup?”</p>
<p>Of course, this idea still makes both sides a bit nervous — liberals because they fear the unraveling of Medicare as a universal entitlement, conservatives because they fear out-of-control taxes on successful wage-earners. But in such a bitter debate, this is a crucial point of consensus. It suggests that the real fights are not about the rich (who can take care of themselves) and the poor (who everyone agrees need public assistance) but the middle-class, whose prospects and obligations are more complex and ambiguous. And it suggests that the real disagreements are not about state subsidies for health care, which everyone agrees should exist, but how these subsidies should be spent and how health care should be delivered.</p>
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<p>Liberals and conservatives</p>
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<p>The MMA debate also made clear that liberals and conservatives have fundamentally different ideas about the relationship between medicine, the state, and the elderly. They disagree both in their assumptions about how the world works and their priorities regarding what is most important. Neither side is finally happy with the Medicare bill as passed, but more conservatives than liberals perceived MMA as better than nothing and less disastrous than it could have been. It was, overwhelmingly, a Republican bill. That said, there were many exceptions — including conservative lawmakers who bitterly opposed the legislation as excessive, unnecessary, and misguided, and liberal lawmakers who supported it as a way to put a drug entitlement in place that could be expanded in the future.</p>
<p>The conservative idea of Medicare reform is rooted in three basic principles: First, government control over medical pricing and inadequate incentives for individuals to control their own health-care costs lead to waste and inefficiencies. Conservatives seek to replace traditional Medicare with a “premium support” system — which basically means giving all seniors vouchers, then allowing them to purchase the private-sector health-care plan that most suits their needs. They believe this will improve the “efficiency of health care delivery,” as Antos has put it, and thus maintain or improve the quality of care while both cutting costs and freeing resources for investment in new medical technologies.</p>
<p>Second, conservatives believe that government control over drug prices — whether by purchasing Medicare drugs directly or setting prices for drugs the way Medicare sets prices for physician services — would cripple the pharmaceutical industry. They argue that the price of many drugs is artificially high because such profits are necessary to recoup the money spent on past research failures and to make the investments necessary for finding more and better drugs in the future. If government sets drug prices too low, investors will pull out of the drug business for fear of making abnormally low returns. The result would be a great slow-down of medical progress.</p>
<p>Finally, conservatives believe that medicine must be balanced against other human goods — both by individuals and by society as a whole. They worry that the benign tyranny of medicine will crowd out other public necessities or limit other human aspirations. And they believe that a more privatized system would ensure adequate public resources for defense, education, and other priorities, and allow individuals to decide whether to put their own discretionary income toward marginally better health care or toward other goods (education for grandchildren, vacations, home improvements, for example) that give them a higher “subjective value.” A voucher or premium support system, they argue, would better balance the obligation of society to provide “basic health care” for the elderly with the need for individuals to make personal decisions about always limited resources.</p>
<p>Liberals tend to share the same central goal as conservatives — better medicine for the elderly — but differ both in their priorities and their assumptions. First, they believe that only a government-run program can ensure that all seniors have access to quality care. A voucher system, they believe, would leave the poorest and sickest seniors worse off. Private plans would cherry-pick the healthiest seniors; premiums for the very sick would increase; and the poor would be left with great disruptions and great inadequacies in care — including high out-of-pocket costs, restrictions on doctors, and caps on certain therapies.</p>
<p>Second, liberals believe that government should use its buying power to demand lower drug prices and lessen the economic burden for poor seniors. They believe drug companies are both too profitable and too manipulative —charging too much for drugs, and producing drugs that promise advantages over generic alternatives that are often more fanciful than real. They point to lower drug prices in Canada and Western Europe — where state-run health-care systems negotiate the prices directly—and believe America should do the same. While they believe drug access in the present is more important than drug development in the future, most liberals do not accept that there is a trade-off between the two.</p>
<p>Finally, liberals see health care as a “right,” and they are less likely to weigh it against other economic, civic, or human goods. They believe the real luxuries of life are enjoyed by a small percentage of wealthy Americans, and that raising their taxes would fund a more egalitarian and constantly improving health-care system for the elderly. They also believe valuable resources are squandered on unnecessary wars and corporate pork—money that could be used to pay for health care at home. When it comes to controlling rising health-care costs, they believe government can exert its buying power to reduce prices, and they do not believe this will lower the quality of care.</p>
<p>In the real world, of course, those who wish to govern must moderate their theories, and those who are in power have a much greater incentive to do so, since they can claim credit for “delivering the goods.” In the MMA, neither conservatives nor liberals got their ideal reforms. Conservatives wanted open-ended competition between private plans and traditional Medicare, but they lost. Liberals wanted government-negotiated drug prices and drug benefits with virtually no deductibles, but they too lost. The new law does tinker around the edges — for example, creating a new “Medicare Advantage” program to replace the existing “Medicare+Choice,” with the new program allowing seniors to choose from a slightly greater variety of tightly regulated health maintenance organizations (HMOs) or preferred provider organizations (PPOs) as alternatives to traditional Medicare. And the new law creates health savings accounts on a small scale. Over the long run, these limited measures may prove to be the seeds of more fundamental reforms. But for now, the major feature of the Medicare bill — the new drug benefit — overshadows them all. The new benefit combines liberal and conservative elements, but satisfies the theoretical orthodoxies of neither. It includes a real, but limited, drug entitlement — with drugs prices set in the marketplace, not by government fiat. It is a moderate, if expensive, reform. But whether it is prudent or addresses the deeper issues remains an open question.</p>
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<p>Success or failure?</p>
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<p>The fact is that, if Medicare were being created from scratch, it would almost certainly include a prescription drug benefit. But there are also good reasons to believe that adding a universal drug benefit was unnecessary or unwise, and that the sense of urgency in doing so was more artificial than real — a battle for senior-friendly voters (young, not old) who presumed a crisis that never really existed. As Samuelson reported in the Washington Post, a government survey of Medicare recipients in 2002 asked the following question: “In the last six months, how much of a problem, if any, was it to get the prescription medicine you needed?” The answers: 86.4 percent, not a problem; 9.4 percent, a small problem; 4.2 percent, a big problem. And so one could have imagined a targeted subsidy for low-income seniors in need, and national acceptance that drugs are just one of those things on which seniors will have to spend their own money.</p>
<p>But for the politically ambitious, drug coverage had already become a “must deliver” issue, and for the country, it had become a political expectation. Moreover, it is unclear how the above survey from 2002 meshes with other realities, such as the high number of low-income Medicare beneficiaries who will now be eligible for drug subsidies, or the deepening erosion of employee-based drug coverage for retirees. Clearly, there existed some real hardship, though hardly a national crisis. And clearly, both parties believed they needed to pass a prescription drug benefit in order to remain attractive to senior and senior-friendly voters.</p>
<p>Given these realities, there is a certain wisdom in the way MMA’s drug benefit is designed. It establishes a baseline of coverage for all seniors, and thus assures universal access to at least the most urgently needed medications. It provides genuine insurance against catastrophic drug costs — that is, against suddenly losing all of one’s financial resources in a desperate effort to stay alive. But MMA also establishes the principle that not everything can be paid for by government; that medicine must be balanced against other national priorities and other human goods; and that middle-class individuals will have to support their own middling drug bills. The “hole in the doughnut,” for all the mockery it has received, is sensible in its guiding principles.</p>
<p>But in practice, of course, many unanswered questions remain, and it is far too early to make any clear predictions about the long-term consequences of the new law. Will it drive companies that offer drug benefits to retirees to stop doing so? Will it create an artificial demand for expensive drugs with limited medical benefits? Will the private-sector organizations that the drug benefit relies upon come into existence? Will the “doughnut hole” eventually be filled? Will government impose price controls if the cost of the new drug benefits far outstrips current expectations? Will the modest changes, like means-testing benefits and medical savings accounts, pave the way toward more fundamental reforms? How will increased access to prescription drugs affect the overall health of seniors and thus the trajectory of aging and death? Will the drug benefit reduce the costs of Medicare Part A and Part B by keeping seniors healthy? Or will it increase Medicare costs by preventing acute causes of death in favor of long, expensive, chronic diseases?</p>
<p>This last question is an important one. One of the strongest arguments for adding a prescription drug benefit to Medicare was that doing so would prevent beneficiaries from needing or using more expensive therapies for ailments that could be ameliorated or prevented using less expensive drugs. This is certainly true in some cases, but it is also difficult to quantify for Medicare as a whole. Drugs that keep people alive or prevent certain diseases also mean new costs for new diseases down the road that never would have existed. (Early death, after all, would be the best way to solve Medicare’s economic woes.) Some drug therapies may indeed cut costs or allow individuals to remain self-sufficient. But the notion that we will cure our way out of the economic problems involved in caring for the elderly is a fallacy. People will simply be sicker later in life; they will die from chronic conditions instead of acute episodes.</p>
<p>Such questions — unanswerable for now, but important to ask — point to the grave shortcomings of the new law. MMA puts off any serious confrontation with the pending financial problems of Medicare as a whole, and it fails to reckon with the deeper human, generational, and medical realities that underlie our sense of impending “crisis.” More deeply, it fails to grasp or even consider the novelty of the world to come: a world of aging baby-boomers, with fewer children, geographically scattered, with high rates of divorce, and a greater likelihood of living long enough to suffer diseases (like Alzheimer’s) that create long-term states of dependence.</p>
<p>The hardest decisions about Medicare in the future may ultimately be faced by the middle-class members of the middle-aged generation — and specifically, by members of Generation X in their 40s and 50s. They will have to decide what they are willing to pay and what they are willing to give up, and they will have to balance the demands of aging parents and dependent children. When the financial balance finally hits, they may have to choose between higher taxes or lower benefits; between sending their child to Harvard or their parent to Sunrise Assisted Living; between raising their own retirement age or cutting funding for national defense; between forcing their proud father to become eligible for Medicaid or giving up their inheritance to pay for the nursing home.</p>
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<p>The dilemmas of progress</p>
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<p>Despite the bitter disagreements over Medicare, liberals and conservatives share two basic assumptions: the ideal of self-determination and the ideal of medical progress. They both want more choice for the aging, and they both believe that more drugs for more people is an unequivocal good, even if they disagree about how best to achieve these goals. And so they are both, in different ways, prone to utopianism, believing that the right policies will create a world where the Medicare crisis is largely solved. This is a fantasy shared by liberal and conservative thinkers alike, whether packaged in the rhetoric of new vouchers or new entitlements.</p>
<p>In reality, the Medicare crisis is permanent. So long as we continue to see aging and death as crises, we will feel the need to spend increasing amounts on the aging ill. Medicare confronts us with the impossibility of winning the war against time, and the limited capacity of rapidly improving medical technologies to fulfill our rapidly rising expectations. Our problems are largely those of success, and success seems to bring its own novel miseries — whether dying alone in a nursing home, or living through a heart attack to suffer years of dementia, or betraying our aging, declining parents to meet the demands of our growing children. This is the real human cost of our prescription-drug world — a cost we would be fools not to pay, but also fools to ignore.</p>
<p>Copyright of The Public Interest, Issue #156 (Summer 2004), National Affairs, Inc.</p>
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<p>Eric Cohen is editor of the New Atlantis and director of the Project on Biotechnology and American Democracy at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | false | 1 | 160 trying understand economics medicare difficult business nearly everyone agrees things look good march 2004 medicare board trustees issued annual report financial health medicare part funds primarily hospital expenses medicare part b funds outpatient care prognosis grim hospital insurance hi trust fund projected exhausted 2019 7 years earlier estimated last years report longrange projections hi continue show substantial imbalance part b premium corresponding general revenue transfers need increased sharply 2005 match projected costs fix imbalance report concluded would require substantial increases revenues andor reductions benefits medicare modernization act mma signed law december 2003 doubt made financial crisis even worse new law provides partial prescription drug coverage desiring seniors estimated cost 395 billion 534 billion next decade drughungry baby boomers even retire many analysts believe estimates already far low policy makers conveniently avoided discussing benefits costs second decade beyond bill also includes combination reforms higher premiums wealthy seniors participate part b rule changes allow private health plans offer medicare coverage subsidies employers continue drug coverage retirees medical savings accounts people ages sixcity demonstration project voucherstyle competition starting 2010 many analysts believe killed begins none additional reforms changes fundamental character medicare governmentfunded governmentrun entitlement program though ideas behind may significant shaping efforts largescale reform future additional measures overshadowed new drug benefit begins 2006the largest expansion medicare since program created 1965 specifically new benefit cover 75 percent drug costs 250 2250 provide coverage 2250 5100 socalled hole doughnut cover 95 percent drug costs 5100 participation program voluntary benefit administered publicly approved private companies premiums estimated cost 35 per month different privatesector plans competing offer best drug prices plan required offer drugs every therapeutic category surprisingly debate mma politically bitter complex legislative terms pushed hard bush administration republican establishment moderate democrats saw best way give seniors drug benefit desire political plus without breaking bank engineering government takeover drug industry law bitterly opposed majority democrats believe drug benefits small payoff pharmaceutical companies big attacked many conservatives believe expand grip welfare state eventually lead price controls tax hikes slowed economy mma significant achievement many ways improvement corrects genuine gap medicare program created prescription drugs central part modern medicine significantly helps seniors currently ineligible medicaid still poor buy prescription drugs without economic hardship one also understand many people left right center see bill irresponsible inadequate one really believes medicare needs longterm building new expansion onto house thats teetering cliff says republican senator nickles cynically uses elderlys need prescription drugs trojan horse reshape medicare says democratic senator ted kennedy medicare become pork barrel plays retirees desires raises discretionary income question generational justice nearly absent says centrist columnist robert j samuelson new law expands entitlement already fastest growing part federal budget leaves middleclass citizens significant drug bills pay thus invites future demands sweeten benefits punts hardest social questions road economics medicare intersection modern medicine aging society character american society whole deeper questions lie core medicare crisis 160 medicare works 160 understand implications new medicare bill political disagreements surrounding one needs understand medicare works whole easy task salient points worth noting first medicare primarily federally funded thirdparty payer feeforservice program words seniors get sick go doctor government pays bill beneficiaries pay premiums 876 deductible major hospital visits part 6660 per month 100 annual deductible 20 percent copayments outpatient treatment part b value government subsidies rises care one uses seniors participate traditional medicare roughly 88 percent freedom see doctor see generally wonderful beneficiaries access care desire problematic society whole since limited incentives seniors cut healthcare costs limited room within heavily regulated system private insurers improve efficiency creating healthcare networks tailoring services individual needs economic problem get worse many believe expensive new medical technologies become available percentage national population medicare increases average age medicare beneficiaries rises health deteriorates second medicare major part hidden subsidy price control system shapes american health care government sets prices fiat medical services covered medicare different physician groups lobbying constantly increases reimbursement rate specialties government trying constantly keep ongoing changes nature medical care system allows government exert control medicare costs though reimbursement cuts past often resulted reduced access care reduced quality care increased billing larger volume services course government doesnt get prices right means system works services overreimbursed subsidize services underreimbursed example overpayment cancer drugs subsidizes underpayment cancer treatment system crosssubsidizing exists within medicare medicare privatesector health insurance third medicares system governmentcontrolled pricing also shapes patients treated always better cases people seek best cheapest treatments given condition treatments covered medicare cases avoiding inexpensive uncovered therapies leads expensive covered emergencies future joseph antos analyst american enterprise institute aei explains cancer therapy widespread agreement medicare overpaid part b drugs although oncologists argued overpayments helped compensate extra costs administering drugs caring patients reflected fees paid medicare office visits problem federal government reduced payments cancer drugs mma shift patients doctors office back inpatient hospital care reduces patient satisfaction could increase federal outlays finally current medicare system pay longterm care someone suffers stroke example medicare covers expenses incurred immediate aftermath hospital care 21 days skilled nursing care deductible 79 additional days skilled nursing care subsidized rate 10950 per day however patient longer requires skilled medical treatment still requires constant personal care medicare pays nothing leaves individuals families range hard choices family caretaking spouse child professional caretaking paid outofpocket selfimpoverishment one qualifies medicaid pay longterm care either spending ones assets moving advance ones children siblings result significant number seniors live 65 end medicaid welfare program point dying including many selfsufficient throughout lives looking forward suggests next medicare entitlement debate whether add longterm care benefit could prove far expensive paying drugs 160 rich poor 160 trying make sense significance mma perhaps useful begin two dimensions bill nearly universal support extra subsidies lowincome seniors purchase prescription drugs additional premiums highincome seniors participate medicare part b 2002 debate prescription drug coverage liberal commentator michael kinsley told policy makers following congress takes drug benefit keep things simple concentrate risk approaching certainty wishes prevent people without drugs without food cost means concentrating poor people mma congress took advice helping poor keeping things simple beginning june 2004 bill created temporary drug discount card aims give participating seniors 10 25 percent discount lowincome seniors 600 direct subsidy permanent drug benefit includes substantial outofpocket costsharing middleincome highincome seniors requires minimal costsharing 150 percent poverty level includes roughly third medicare beneficiaries conservative critics mma largely embraced particular element bill instead displacing existing drug coverage universal entitlement congress could target federal subsidies lowincome seniors without drug coverage wrote robert e moffit healthcare analyst heritage foundation recent policy memo urging congress fix mma enacted aeis joseph antos urged temporary discountplussubsidy program made permanent expanded doubt liberal conservative reasons behind support identical conservatives see subsidies poor way limit expansion medicare general eventually making welfare program universal entitlement believe government action limited helping help leaving individuals middling means plan invest make choices marketplace liberals believe society special obligation help left behind rich special obligation support liberals conservatives typically accept notion subsidizing elderly poor also chronically poor incomes likely fall rather rise proper responsibility state disagree whether mma best possible way democrats believe statecontrolled drug prices crucial control costs republicans believe america needs subsidized voucher system allows poor purchase drugs marketplace agree drug benefits meanstested poor paying less everyone else paying mma also singles wealthy seniors novel way meanstesting medicare part b benefits part b also called supplementary medical insurance smi voluntary program covering physician outpatient care nearly seniors participate present premium 25 percent 6660 per month total cost benefit seniors regardless health income amount medical care need though patients pay roughly 20 percent coinsurance per doctor visit way medicare always parts b universal entitlement welfare benefit beginning 2007 however part b beneficiaries incomes 80000 individuals 160000 married couple pay gradually escalating premiums individuals earning 200000 couples earning 400000 paying premiums 80 percent cost savings change likely minor compared cost medicare whole since higher premiums affect estimated 12 million seniors 35 million medicare principle establishes future reform may significant namely idea meanstesting potential route costcutting liberal democratic senator dianne feinstein aforementioned conservative senator nickles wrote together washington post lowincome families pay 75 percent bill ross perot checkup course idea still makes sides bit nervous liberals fear unraveling medicare universal entitlement conservatives fear outofcontrol taxes successful wageearners bitter debate crucial point consensus suggests real fights rich take care poor everyone agrees need public assistance middleclass whose prospects obligations complex ambiguous suggests real disagreements state subsidies health care everyone agrees exist subsidies spent health care delivered 160 liberals conservatives 160 mma debate also made clear liberals conservatives fundamentally different ideas relationship medicine state elderly disagree assumptions world works priorities regarding important neither side finally happy medicare bill passed conservatives liberals perceived mma better nothing less disastrous could overwhelmingly republican bill said many exceptions including conservative lawmakers bitterly opposed legislation excessive unnecessary misguided liberal lawmakers supported way put drug entitlement place could expanded future conservative idea medicare reform rooted three basic principles first government control medical pricing inadequate incentives individuals control healthcare costs lead waste inefficiencies conservatives seek replace traditional medicare premium support system basically means giving seniors vouchers allowing purchase privatesector healthcare plan suits needs believe improve efficiency health care delivery antos put thus maintain improve quality care cutting costs freeing resources investment new medical technologies second conservatives believe government control drug prices whether purchasing medicare drugs directly setting prices drugs way medicare sets prices physician services would cripple pharmaceutical industry argue price many drugs artificially high profits necessary recoup money spent past research failures make investments necessary finding better drugs future government sets drug prices low investors pull drug business fear making abnormally low returns result would great slowdown medical progress finally conservatives believe medicine must balanced human goods individuals society whole worry benign tyranny medicine crowd public necessities limit human aspirations believe privatized system would ensure adequate public resources defense education priorities allow individuals decide whether put discretionary income toward marginally better health care toward goods education grandchildren vacations home improvements example give higher subjective value voucher premium support system argue would better balance obligation society provide basic health care elderly need individuals make personal decisions always limited resources liberals tend share central goal conservatives better medicine elderly differ priorities assumptions first believe governmentrun program ensure seniors access quality care voucher system believe would leave poorest sickest seniors worse private plans would cherrypick healthiest seniors premiums sick would increase poor would left great disruptions great inadequacies care including high outofpocket costs restrictions doctors caps certain therapies second liberals believe government use buying power demand lower drug prices lessen economic burden poor seniors believe drug companies profitable manipulative charging much drugs producing drugs promise advantages generic alternatives often fanciful real point lower drug prices canada western europe staterun healthcare systems negotiate prices directlyand believe america believe drug access present important drug development future liberals accept tradeoff two finally liberals see health care right less likely weigh economic civic human goods believe real luxuries life enjoyed small percentage wealthy americans raising taxes would fund egalitarian constantly improving healthcare system elderly also believe valuable resources squandered unnecessary wars corporate porkmoney could used pay health care home comes controlling rising healthcare costs believe government exert buying power reduce prices believe lower quality care real world course wish govern must moderate theories power much greater incentive since claim credit delivering goods mma neither conservatives liberals got ideal reforms conservatives wanted openended competition private plans traditional medicare lost liberals wanted governmentnegotiated drug prices drug benefits virtually deductibles lost new law tinker around edges example creating new medicare advantage program replace existing medicarechoice new program allowing seniors choose slightly greater variety tightly regulated health maintenance organizations hmos preferred provider organizations ppos alternatives traditional medicare new law creates health savings accounts small scale long run limited measures may prove seeds fundamental reforms major feature medicare bill new drug benefit overshadows new benefit combines liberal conservative elements satisfies theoretical orthodoxies neither includes real limited drug entitlement drugs prices set marketplace government fiat moderate expensive reform whether prudent addresses deeper issues remains open question 160 success failure 160 fact medicare created scratch would almost certainly include prescription drug benefit also good reasons believe adding universal drug benefit unnecessary unwise sense urgency artificial real battle seniorfriendly voters young old presumed crisis never really existed samuelson reported washington post government survey medicare recipients 2002 asked following question last six months much problem get prescription medicine needed answers 864 percent problem 94 percent small problem 42 percent big problem one could imagined targeted subsidy lowincome seniors need national acceptance drugs one things seniors spend money politically ambitious drug coverage already become must deliver issue country become political expectation moreover unclear survey 2002 meshes realities high number lowincome medicare beneficiaries eligible drug subsidies deepening erosion employeebased drug coverage retirees clearly existed real hardship though hardly national crisis clearly parties believed needed pass prescription drug benefit order remain attractive senior seniorfriendly voters given realities certain wisdom way mmas drug benefit designed establishes baseline coverage seniors thus assures universal access least urgently needed medications provides genuine insurance catastrophic drug costs suddenly losing ones financial resources desperate effort stay alive mma also establishes principle everything paid government medicine must balanced national priorities human goods middleclass individuals support middling drug bills hole doughnut mockery received sensible guiding principles practice course many unanswered questions remain far early make clear predictions longterm consequences new law drive companies offer drug benefits retirees stop create artificial demand expensive drugs limited medical benefits privatesector organizations drug benefit relies upon come existence doughnut hole eventually filled government impose price controls cost new drug benefits far outstrips current expectations modest changes like meanstesting benefits medical savings accounts pave way toward fundamental reforms increased access prescription drugs affect overall health seniors thus trajectory aging death drug benefit reduce costs medicare part part b keeping seniors healthy increase medicare costs preventing acute causes death favor long expensive chronic diseases last question important one one strongest arguments adding prescription drug benefit medicare would prevent beneficiaries needing using expensive therapies ailments could ameliorated prevented using less expensive drugs certainly true cases also difficult quantify medicare whole drugs keep people alive prevent certain diseases also mean new costs new diseases road never would existed early death would best way solve medicares economic woes drug therapies may indeed cut costs allow individuals remain selfsufficient notion cure way economic problems involved caring elderly fallacy people simply sicker later life die chronic conditions instead acute episodes questions unanswerable important ask point grave shortcomings new law mma puts serious confrontation pending financial problems medicare whole fails reckon deeper human generational medical realities underlie sense impending crisis deeply fails grasp even consider novelty world come world aging babyboomers fewer children geographically scattered high rates divorce greater likelihood living long enough suffer diseases like alzheimers create longterm states dependence hardest decisions medicare future may ultimately faced middleclass members middleaged generation specifically members generation x 40s 50s decide willing pay willing give balance demands aging parents dependent children financial balance finally hits may choose higher taxes lower benefits sending child harvard parent sunrise assisted living raising retirement age cutting funding national defense forcing proud father become eligible medicaid giving inheritance pay nursing home 160 dilemmas progress 160 despite bitter disagreements medicare liberals conservatives share two basic assumptions ideal selfdetermination ideal medical progress want choice aging believe drugs people unequivocal good even disagree best achieve goals different ways prone utopianism believing right policies create world medicare crisis largely solved fantasy shared liberal conservative thinkers alike whether packaged rhetoric new vouchers new entitlements reality medicare crisis permanent long continue see aging death crises feel need spend increasing amounts aging ill medicare confronts us impossibility winning war time limited capacity rapidly improving medical technologies fulfill rapidly rising expectations problems largely success success seems bring novel miseries whether dying alone nursing home living heart attack suffer years dementia betraying aging declining parents meet demands growing children real human cost prescriptiondrug world cost would fools pay also fools ignore copyright public interest issue 156 summer 2004 national affairs inc 160 eric cohen editor new atlantis director project biotechnology american democracy ethics public policy center 160 | 2,665 |
<p>This essay is the sixth in a series from the book <a href="http://www.aei.org/publication/economic-freedom-and-human-flourishing-perspectives-from-political-philosophy/" type="external">Economic Freedom and Human Flourishing: Perspectives from Political Philosophy</a>, edited by AEI’s Michael R. Strain and Stan A. Veuger. Check back in every Tuesday <a href="http://www.aei.org/spotlight/human-flourishing-home/" type="external">for additional essays in the series</a>.</p>
<p>The deep links between human flourishing and economic liberty are both vitally important and terribly underappreciated. Under the influence of modern economics, we too often now fall into viewing the economy as a kind of machine to be managed by technicians. This leads us to ignore the central place of economics in the human experience; to overlook its moral, social, and political character; and therefore to lose sight of its philosophical roots. In the process, we neglect the moral preconditions for the market economy, as well as some of the foremost moral and practical problems it poses for us.</p>
<p>Considering the link between economic liberty and human flourishing through the lens of the thought of Edmund Burke is a good way to be reminded of the moral and political depths of economic questions, because Burke thought about economics almost exclusively as a function of such deeper questions. He considered the “political economy” to be one coherent whole, and he thought about it in some ways that can inform our contemporary understanding. Such an exercise can be especially valuable for friends of free enterprise because Burke arrived by the end of his life at an argument for the market economy that we would find quite familiar, but which he reached by some much less familiar paths.</p>
<p>Burke was not an economist, of course, but more important he was a great critic of technical and technocratic ways of thinking about the lives of societies, and so his economic thought presents itself as a kind of critique of a lot of what now passes for economic thinking. The mechanistic understanding of the modern economy would be anathema to Burke. For him, economic life was best understood from the bottom up. He suggested that the power of markets, in our modern parlance, was that they enabled decisions to be made close to the ground and so aggregated society’s knowledge in much the same way that our other core social institutions do.</p>
<p>Burke thus tended to think about economic relations in the way he thought about social relations—as something interpersonal that happens in those middle layers of society that were so important to him. That is still largely true, but it is not always true, and as we consider the relevance of Burke’s economic thinking to our time, we should also reflect on what has changed and what that might mean.</p>
<p>The key to Burke’s economics, as to much of the rest of his social and political thinking, was his belief in the incorrigible complexity of society. That belief was absolutely central to the arguments he made about both liberty and human flourishing and to his stout opposition, in what must strike us now as very modern terms, to government intervention in economic exchange. Let us, then, seek a sense of Burke’s economics in his own terms.</p>
<p>At first glance, Burke’s defense of the commercial society is a kind of tragic case. He recognizes the downsides and dark sides of the emerging market economy but argues that the alternatives would be worse, even (or especially) for the people most disadvantaged in commercial societies.</p>
<p>In Reflections on the Revolution in France, when he takes up the economic complaints of the revolutionaries and of their supporters in Britain, Burke takes note of “the innumerable servile, degrading, unseemly, unmanly, and often most unwholesome and pestiferous occupations, to which by the social economy so many wretches are inevitably doomed.” <a href="http://www.aei.org/spotlight/human-flourishing-burke/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=Burke&amp;utm_content=HumanFlourishingSeries#footnote" type="external">1</a> He can see why the conditions of so many workers would lead some observers to demand radical change. But he argues that the costs of remedying their situations by the sorts of extreme economic measures that the French would adopt—the costs not only to society as a whole but even to the particular wretches involved—would be far worse than their current suffering.</p>
<p>Unlike his acquaintance Adam Smith, Burke generally does not make a case for economic freedom as a transformative force that could dramatically improve the living conditions of the poor. He tends to emphasize the dangers of intervention and the harms of mercantilism more than the benefits and advantages of laissez-faire.</p>
<p>But I say this is so only at first glance because Burke’s arguments about economics were actually rather minor elements of a larger argument about liberty and about human flourishing. Understood in that larger context, his essentially Smithian economic conclusions turn out to be rooted in more than a tragic acknowledgment of the absence of superior alternatives. We can reach Burke’s view of human flourishing through his understanding of liberty and then look again at his explicitly economic arguments to see where they fit in.</p>
<p>Burke had a lot to say about liberty, but he was certainly not what we might today call a libertarian. In fact, he was moved to articulate his vision of human liberty precisely in opposition to a highly individualist, choice-centered understanding of what freedom entails and enables.</p>
<p>We might see that most clearly in one of Burke’s lesser-known writings about the French Revolution. In early 1789, he received a letter from a young Frenchman named Charles-Jean-Francois DePont, whom he had met in London the year before. DePont would later be the formal addressee of Reflections on the Revolution in France, which was published as though it were a letter to him from Burke. But this actual exchange of letters between the two men happened before Burke had made any public statements about the revolution, and so before his views were known. DePont had clearly expected praise for the French when he asked for Burke’s views, and an affirmative answer to his question about whether the revolution seemed to Burke to be an example of liberty in action.</p>
<p>What he actually received, of course, was decidedly not an affirmative answer. The French surely deserve liberty, Burke wrote in his letter to DePont, but they have mistaken the meaning of the term. True liberty “is not solitary, unconnected, individual, selfish liberty, as if every man was to regulate the whole of his conduct by his own will. The liberty I mean is social freedom. It is that state of things in which liberty is assured by the equality of restraint. . . . This kind of liberty is indeed but another name for justice; ascertained by wise laws, and secured by well-constructed institutions.” <a href="http://www.aei.org/spotlight/human-flourishing-burke/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=Burke&amp;utm_content=HumanFlourishingSeries#footnote" type="external">2</a></p>
<p>Burke suggests in these remarks that radical individualism is the opposite of justice, and in that sense the opposite also of genuine liberty, and argues that freedom is a function of social relations and is obtained by equal self-restraint in a successful regime. His phrase “social freedom” is intended as a kind of counterpart to “individual liberty,” a term much favored by the revolutionaries. And he argues that such social freedom, or liberty properly understood, is the deepest source of Britain’s strength.</p>
<p>Self-restraint is, as he says, at the core of this idea of liberty. He put the point even more forcefully in Reflections the following year:</p>
<p>Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites. In proportion as their love to justice is above their rapacity, in proportion as their soundness and sobriety of understanding is above their vanity and presumption, in proportion as they are more disposed to listen to the counsels of the wise and good, in preference to the flattery of knaves. Society cannot exist, unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere; and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without. It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters. <a href="http://www.aei.org/spotlight/human-flourishing-burke/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=Burke&amp;utm_content=HumanFlourishingSeries#footnote" type="external">3</a></p>
<p>This is an idea of liberty that is deeply intertwined with a particular notion of human flourishing. It is flourishing as a liberation from blinding passion and appetite—a freedom not only from outside constraint but also from an inner anarchy. And that kind of freedom is achieved in society, with the help of its institutions of moral formation.</p>
<p>At the heart of this vision of flourishing is therefore a sense of the interconnectedness of society—the way in which every human being is ensconced in a dense web of relationships that give society its shape and strength. Liberty is not a gift of society—it is the right of every person. But it is a right that can be exercised only within society and that requires immensely complicated social and political arrangements for its exercise and its perpetuation.</p>
<p>A year after publishing Reflections, and in response to some of its critics, Burke offered his most explicit articulation of this vision of society. In a pamphlet entitled An Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs, he makes it clear that his social vision begins precisely from the fact that we are born into a preexisting set of institutions and relationships:</p>
<p>Dark and inscrutable are the ways by which we come into the world. The instincts which give rise to this mysterious process of nature are not of our making. But out of physical causes, unknown to us, perhaps unknowable, arise moral duties, which, as we are able perfectly to comprehend, we are bound indispensably to perform. Parents may not be consenting to their moral relation; but consenting or not, they are bound to a long train of burthensome duties towards those with whom they have never made a convention of any sort. Children are not consenting to their relation, but their relation, without their actual consent, binds them to its duties; or rather it implies their consent because the presumed consent of every rational creature is in unison with the predisposed order of things. Men come in that manner into a community with the social state of their parents, endowed with all the benefits, loaded with all the duties of their situation. If the social ties and ligaments, spun out of those physical relations which are the elements of the commonwealth, in most cases begin, and always continue, independently of our will, so without any stipulation, on our part, are we bound by that relation called our country, which comprehends (as it has been well said) “all the charities of all.” Nor are we left without powerful instincts to make this duty as dear and grateful to us, as it is awful and coercive. <a href="http://www.aei.org/spotlight/human-flourishing-burke/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=Burke&amp;utm_content=HumanFlourishingSeries#footnote" type="external">4</a></p>
<p>Each human being arrives in the world as a new member of an old order, and far from a constraint upon our freedom that must be overcome, this fact is what makes our freedom possible. The primary reason for that, Burke argues, is that human beings have to be formed for freedom and are not born with that form. It is a social achievement. Social theories that begin with the free and rational individual alone seemed to him to beg a question they can never answer: where does this free person come from? Every person, after all, comes from a family—which is not a liberal institution—and enters the world both unable to exercise freedom and encumbered by all kinds of social relations that operate as restraints. To get from that beginning to the exercise of liberty, let alone to a society of free people exercising their liberty, requires much more than the absence of restraint.</p>
<p>It requires a social order, a political order, an economic order, and a moral order. The only genuine liberty, Burke argued in 1774, “is a liberty connected with order: that not only exists along with order and virtue but that cannot exist at all without them. It inheres in good and steady government, as in its substance and vital principle.” <a href="http://www.aei.org/spotlight/human-flourishing-burke/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=Burke&amp;utm_content=HumanFlourishingSeries#footnote" type="external">5</a></p>
<p>Human flourishing, in this sense, is possible only in a rich and complex social order adapted to enable it. And that adaptation is key for Burke. A free society is not found at the end of a syllogism or on the right side of an equation. It is a matter of gradual evolution, a long-term trial and error process. Society’s institutions are means of learning how to enable flourishing and happiness.</p>
<p>That is the case, Burke argues, not because there are no principles of justice or natural law that should guide society but because we cannot access those principles as directly as we would like. We cannot generally access them directly through the sort of rational science of politics that the enlightenment promised, nor can we do so through the natural-law arguments of the church. We generally cannot know them directly at all. But we can come to know them indirectly through the experience of social and political life itself. The institutions of our society are always seeking them out, and the shapes those institutions take are a function of that process of seeking.</p>
<p>The historical experience of social and political life for Burke consists in essence of a kind of rubbing up against the principles of natural justice, and the institutions and practices that survive that experience—that are found by men and women across generations to provide them with flourishing and happy lives—take on something of the shape of those principles, because only those that have that shape do survive that process. So over time, provided they develop through continuous, incremental change at the margins rather than sharp breaks and jostles, societies come to express in their institutions, charters, traditions, and habits a kind of simulacrum of the standard of justice. Society as it exists after such long experience comes to offer an approximation of society as it should exist.</p>
<p>This is the essence of Burke’s conservatism. It is rooted in a profound epistemological modesty and involves a rejection of highly technical ways of thinking about social life and social change and an emphasis on evolved institutions that stand between the individual and the nation as a whole and channel dispersed social knowledge (as opposed to engineered institutions that stand above it all and apply centralized technical knowledge). Those kinds of social institutions, and that mode of social change, make possible the balance of order and freedom that allows for genuine human liberty, and therefore for human flourishing.</p>
<p>With that in mind, we can more fully appreciate Burke’s economics. Burke’s tragic view of the benefits of capitalism is fundamentally a rejection of the alternatives, which even in his time involved technocratic attempts to manage social relations in ways that seemed to him likely only to undermine the potential for human flourishing. But in that rejection is also an affirmation of an alternative understanding of human flourishing—an alternative to technocratic liberalism.</p>
<p>We can see this most clearly in Burke’s most extended discussion of economics. In the last years of his life, Burke became deeply involved in a debate about a proposal in Parliament to manage the wages of farm workers—essentially a minimum wage for agricultural laborers. He was a staunch opponent of the idea, and he put his reasons in writing in the form of a kind of&#160;memo to Prime Minister William Pitt, which was published shortly after his death as “Thoughts and Details on Scarcity.”</p>
<p>Burke opens his case with a statement of his general outlook on the subject:</p>
<p>To provide for us in our necessities is not in the power of Government. It would be a vain presumption in statesmen to think they can do it. The people maintain them, and not they the people. It is in the power of Government to prevent much evil; it can do very little positive good in this, or perhaps in any thing else. <a href="http://www.aei.org/spotlight/human-flourishing-burke/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=Burke&amp;utm_content=HumanFlourishingSeries#footnote" type="external">6</a></p>
<p>He goes on to argue that the proposed legislation is premised on the notion that a contract between an employer and an employee involves the former abusing the latter, but that in fact the nature of contracts involves finding an arrangement that reconciles different interests. “In the case of the farmer and the labourer, their interests are always the same, and it is absolutely impossible that their free contracts can be onerous to either party.” <a href="http://www.aei.org/spotlight/human-flourishing-burke/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=Burke&amp;utm_content=HumanFlourishingSeries#footnote" type="external">7</a> He then frames potential objections to this view in a most ungenerous light:</p>
<p>I shall be told by the zealots of the sect of regulation that this may be true, and may be safely committed to the convention of the farmer and the labourer, when the latter is in the prime of his youth, and at the time of his health and vigour, and in ordinary times of abundance. But in calamitous seasons, under accidental illness, in declining life, and with the pressure of a numerous offspring, the future nourishers of the community but the present drains and blood-suckers of those who produce them, what is to be done? <a href="http://www.aei.org/spotlight/human-flourishing-burke/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=Burke&amp;utm_content=HumanFlourishingSeries#footnote" type="external">8</a></p>
<p>But this argument, too, he says, fails to take account of the nature of economic relationships:</p>
<p>And, first, I premise that labour is, as I have already intimated, a commodity, and as such, an article of trade. If I am right in this notion, then labour must be subject to all the laws and principles of trade, and not to regulations foreign to them, and that may be totally inconsistent with those principles and those laws. When any commodity is carried to market, it is not the necessity of the vender, but the necessity of the purchaser that raises the price. The extreme want of the seller has rather (by the nature of things with which we shall in vain contend) the direct contrary operation. If the goods at market are beyond the demand, they fall in their value; if below it, they rise. The impossibility of the subsistence of a man, who carries his labour to a market, is totally beside the question in this way of viewing it. The only question is, what is it worth to the buyer? But if authority comes in and forces the buyer to a price, who is this in the case (say) of a farmer, who buys the labour of ten or twelve labouring men, and three or four handycrafts, what is it, but to make an arbitrary division of his property among them? <a href="http://www.aei.org/spotlight/human-flourishing-burke/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=Burke&amp;utm_content=HumanFlourishingSeries#footnote" type="external">9</a></p>
<p>Such jerks of authority, Burke suggests, are generally well-intentioned—driven by a desire to equalize unequal conditions. But the nature of a free economy means that such egalitarianism frequently has disastrous consequences:</p>
<p>A perfect equality will indeed be produced; that is to say, equal want, equal wretchedness, equal beggary, and on the part of the partitioners, a woeful, helpless, and desperate disappointment. Such is the event of all compulsory equalizations. They pull down what is above. They never raise what is below: and they depress high and low together beneath the level of what was originally the lowest. <a href="http://www.aei.org/spotlight/human-flourishing-burke/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=Burke&amp;utm_content=HumanFlourishingSeries#footnote" type="external">10</a></p>
<p>And the notion that the agricultural economy should be treated differently than commerce in the cities is equally ignorant of basic economic principles, Burke argues:</p>
<p>A greater and more ruinous mistake cannot be fallen into, than that the trades of agriculture and grazing can be conducted upon any other than the common principles of commerce; namely, that the producer should be permitted, and even expected, to look to all possible profit which, without fraud or violence, he can make; to turn plenty or scarcity to the best advantage he can; to keep back or to bring forward his commodities at his pleasure; to account to no one for his stock or for his gain. On any other terms he is the slave of the consumer; and that he should be so is of no benefit to the consumer. No slave was ever so beneficial to the master as a freeman that deals with him on an equal footing by convention, formed on the rules and principles of contending interests and compromised advantages. <a href="http://www.aei.org/spotlight/human-flourishing-burke/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=Burke&amp;utm_content=HumanFlourishingSeries#footnote" type="external">11</a></p>
<p>The same is true of the people who stand between the farmer and the market:</p>
<p>What is true of the farmer is equally true of the middle man; whether the middle man acts as factor, jobber, salesman, or speculator, in the markets of grain. These traders are to be left to their free course; and the more they make, and the richer they are, and the more largely they deal, the better both for the farmer and consumer, between whom they form a natural and most useful link of connection; though, by the machinations of the old evil counsellor, Envy, they are hated and maligned by both parties. <a href="http://www.aei.org/spotlight/human-flourishing-burke/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=Burke&amp;utm_content=HumanFlourishingSeries#footnote" type="external">12</a></p>
<p>Indeed, Burke turns out to be immensely impressed by the power of markets to apply knowledge that their would-be regulators could never possess:</p>
<p>The balance between consumption and production makes price. The market settles, and alone can settle, that price. Market is the meeting and conference of the consumer and producer, when they mutually discover each other’s wants. Nobody, I believe, has observed with any reflection what market is, without being astonished at the truth, the correctness, the celerity, the general equity, with which the balance of wants is settled. They who wish the destruction of that balance, and would fain by arbitrary regulation decree, that defective production should not be compensated by encreased price, directly lay their axe to the root of production itself. <a href="http://www.aei.org/spotlight/human-flourishing-burke/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=Burke&amp;utm_content=HumanFlourishingSeries#footnote" type="external">13</a></p>
<p>Burke concludes with a general statement about the proper relation between government and the economy. “My opinion,” he writes, “is against an over-doing of any sort of administration, and more especially against this most momentous of all meddling on the part of authority; the meddling with the subsistence of the people.” <a href="http://www.aei.org/spotlight/human-flourishing-burke/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=Burke&amp;utm_content=HumanFlourishingSeries#footnote" type="external">14</a></p>
<p>This Burkean case for a free economy as an essential component of a genuinely free society is rooted in a view of human flourishing that emphasizes the moral preconditions for freedom in a complex, layered society. It proceeds from a profound epistemic humility. And it advances a model of gradual, incremental change through bottom-up trial and error at the margins.</p>
<p>It understands the system of economic liberty as an embodiment of a traditionalist view of society, and therefore as itself a kind of precondition for human flourishing. But its commitment to the market economy is not dogmatic or absolute but prudent and practical, and subservient to a commitment to the genuine liberty of virtuous citizens.</p>
<p>It is also, I would hasten to say, the product of observing the emergence of a commercial society in Britain but not yet of the emergence of the industrial economy, with its mass scale and its immense transformative, even revolutionary, social consequences. Burke’s capitalism is an inextricable element of his fundamentally social conservatism, but it is so in part because he did not expect the market economy to overturn the social order. He saw it, rather, as an embodiment of the social order, and he viewed those who would seek to regulate and manage the economy as disrupting stable social arrangements.</p>
<p>In the subsequent centuries, things did not quite turn out that way. The market economy has in fact turned out to be a profoundly disruptive and revolutionary social force—overturning traditional arrangements in every realm of life, for good and bad. The advantages it has provided us are those that Burke had hoped it might: immense wealth and with it immense freedom. But the challenges it has posed for us are actually often those that Burke had thought it would prevent: social dislocation, insecurity, and breakdown.</p>
<p>While the route Burke took to his defense of the market economy is very instructive for us, therefore, especially because it gets near the root of his case for tradition as a means of change and adaptation, it does not make Burke simply a capitalist in our modern terms. He was a traditionalist and valued markets for their embodiment of a kind of humility and for their channeling of knowledge from the bottom up.</p>
<p>That made him a friend of markets to the extent that they support and uphold the complex social order that enables human flourishing. They surely do so to a very great extent, but never perfectly. And it is precisely the friends of markets who should bemost willing to acknowledge that, and to seek for ways to address it that themselves partake of humility about human knowledge and power, for the sake of liberty and human flourishing.</p>
<p>1. Edmund Burke, The Writings and Speeches of Edmund Burke, ed. Paul Langford (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), VIII, 209.</p>
<p>2.&#160;Edmund Burke, The Correspondence of Edmund Burke, ed. Thomas Copeland (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1978), VI, 42.</p>
<p>3.&#160;Burke, Writings, VIII, 332.</p>
<p>4.&#160;Edmund Burke, Further Reflections on the Revolution in France, ed. Daniel Ritchie (Indianapolis, IN: Liberty Fund, 1992), 161.</p>
<p>5.&#160;Burke, Writings, III, 59.</p>
<p>6.&#160;Ibid., IX, 120.</p>
<p>7.&#160;Ibid., 124.</p>
<p>8.&#160;Ibid., 126.</p>
<p>9.&#160;Ibid.</p>
<p>10.&#160;Ibid., 127.</p>
<p>11.&#160;Ibid., 130.</p>
<p>12.&#160;Ibid., 132.</p>
<p>13.&#160;Ibid., 133.</p>
<p>14.&#160;Ibid., 145.</p> | false | 1 | essay sixth series book economic freedom human flourishing perspectives political philosophy edited aeis michael r strain stan veuger check back every tuesday additional essays series deep links human flourishing economic liberty vitally important terribly underappreciated influence modern economics often fall viewing economy kind machine managed technicians leads us ignore central place economics human experience overlook moral social political character therefore lose sight philosophical roots process neglect moral preconditions market economy well foremost moral practical problems poses us considering link economic liberty human flourishing lens thought edmund burke good way reminded moral political depths economic questions burke thought economics almost exclusively function deeper questions considered political economy one coherent whole thought ways inform contemporary understanding exercise especially valuable friends free enterprise burke arrived end life argument market economy would find quite familiar reached much less familiar paths burke economist course important great critic technical technocratic ways thinking lives societies economic thought presents kind critique lot passes economic thinking mechanistic understanding modern economy would anathema burke economic life best understood bottom suggested power markets modern parlance enabled decisions made close ground aggregated societys knowledge much way core social institutions burke thus tended think economic relations way thought social relationsas something interpersonal happens middle layers society important still largely true always true consider relevance burkes economic thinking time also reflect changed might mean key burkes economics much rest social political thinking belief incorrigible complexity society belief absolutely central arguments made liberty human flourishing stout opposition must strike us modern terms government intervention economic exchange let us seek sense burkes economics terms first glance burkes defense commercial society kind tragic case recognizes downsides dark sides emerging market economy argues alternatives would worse even especially people disadvantaged commercial societies reflections revolution france takes economic complaints revolutionaries supporters britain burke takes note innumerable servile degrading unseemly unmanly often unwholesome pestiferous occupations social economy many wretches inevitably doomed 1 see conditions many workers would lead observers demand radical change argues costs remedying situations sorts extreme economic measures french would adoptthe costs society whole even particular wretches involvedwould far worse current suffering unlike acquaintance adam smith burke generally make case economic freedom transformative force could dramatically improve living conditions poor tends emphasize dangers intervention harms mercantilism benefits advantages laissezfaire say first glance burkes arguments economics actually rather minor elements larger argument liberty human flourishing understood larger context essentially smithian economic conclusions turn rooted tragic acknowledgment absence superior alternatives reach burkes view human flourishing understanding liberty look explicitly economic arguments see fit burke lot say liberty certainly might today call libertarian fact moved articulate vision human liberty precisely opposition highly individualist choicecentered understanding freedom entails enables might see clearly one burkes lesserknown writings french revolution early 1789 received letter young frenchman named charlesjeanfrancois depont met london year depont would later formal addressee reflections revolution france published though letter burke actual exchange letters two men happened burke made public statements revolution views known depont clearly expected praise french asked burkes views affirmative answer question whether revolution seemed burke example liberty action actually received course decidedly affirmative answer french surely deserve liberty burke wrote letter depont mistaken meaning term true liberty solitary unconnected individual selfish liberty every man regulate whole conduct liberty mean social freedom state things liberty assured equality restraint kind liberty indeed another name justice ascertained wise laws secured wellconstructed institutions 2 burke suggests remarks radical individualism opposite justice sense opposite also genuine liberty argues freedom function social relations obtained equal selfrestraint successful regime phrase social freedom intended kind counterpart individual liberty term much favored revolutionaries argues social freedom liberty properly understood deepest source britains strength selfrestraint says core idea liberty put point even forcefully reflections following year men qualified civil liberty exact proportion disposition put moral chains upon appetites proportion love justice rapacity proportion soundness sobriety understanding vanity presumption proportion disposed listen counsels wise good preference flattery knaves society exist unless controlling power upon appetite placed somewhere less within must without ordained eternal constitution things men intemperate minds free passions forge fetters 3 idea liberty deeply intertwined particular notion human flourishing flourishing liberation blinding passion appetitea freedom outside constraint also inner anarchy kind freedom achieved society help institutions moral formation heart vision flourishing therefore sense interconnectedness societythe way every human ensconced dense web relationships give society shape strength liberty gift societyit right every person right exercised within society requires immensely complicated social political arrangements exercise perpetuation year publishing reflections response critics burke offered explicit articulation vision society pamphlet entitled appeal new old whigs makes clear social vision begins precisely fact born preexisting set institutions relationships dark inscrutable ways come world instincts give rise mysterious process nature making physical causes unknown us perhaps unknowable arise moral duties able perfectly comprehend bound indispensably perform parents may consenting moral relation consenting bound long train burthensome duties towards never made convention sort children consenting relation relation without actual consent binds duties rather implies consent presumed consent every rational creature unison predisposed order things men come manner community social state parents endowed benefits loaded duties situation social ties ligaments spun physical relations elements commonwealth cases begin always continue independently without stipulation part bound relation called country comprehends well said charities left without powerful instincts make duty dear grateful us awful coercive 4 human arrives world new member old order far constraint upon freedom must overcome fact makes freedom possible primary reason burke argues human beings formed freedom born form social achievement social theories begin free rational individual alone seemed beg question never answer free person come every person comes familywhich liberal institutionand enters world unable exercise freedom encumbered kinds social relations operate restraints get beginning exercise liberty let alone society free people exercising liberty requires much absence restraint requires social order political order economic order moral order genuine liberty burke argued 1774 liberty connected order exists along order virtue exist without inheres good steady government substance vital principle 5 human flourishing sense possible rich complex social order adapted enable adaptation key burke free society found end syllogism right side equation matter gradual evolution longterm trial error process societys institutions means learning enable flourishing happiness case burke argues principles justice natural law guide society access principles directly would like generally access directly sort rational science politics enlightenment promised naturallaw arguments church generally know directly come know indirectly experience social political life institutions society always seeking shapes institutions take function process seeking historical experience social political life burke consists essence kind rubbing principles natural justice institutions practices survive experiencethat found men women across generations provide flourishing happy livestake something shape principles shape survive process time provided develop continuous incremental change margins rather sharp breaks jostles societies come express institutions charters traditions habits kind simulacrum standard justice society exists long experience comes offer approximation society exist essence burkes conservatism rooted profound epistemological modesty involves rejection highly technical ways thinking social life social change emphasis evolved institutions stand individual nation whole channel dispersed social knowledge opposed engineered institutions stand apply centralized technical knowledge kinds social institutions mode social change make possible balance order freedom allows genuine human liberty therefore human flourishing mind fully appreciate burkes economics burkes tragic view benefits capitalism fundamentally rejection alternatives even time involved technocratic attempts manage social relations ways seemed likely undermine potential human flourishing rejection also affirmation alternative understanding human flourishingan alternative technocratic liberalism see clearly burkes extended discussion economics last years life burke became deeply involved debate proposal parliament manage wages farm workersessentially minimum wage agricultural laborers staunch opponent idea put reasons writing form kind of160memo prime minister william pitt published shortly death thoughts details scarcity burke opens case statement general outlook subject provide us necessities power government would vain presumption statesmen think people maintain people power government prevent much evil little positive good perhaps thing else 6 goes argue proposed legislation premised notion contract employer employee involves former abusing latter fact nature contracts involves finding arrangement reconciles different interests case farmer labourer interests always absolutely impossible free contracts onerous either party 7 frames potential objections view ungenerous light shall told zealots sect regulation may true may safely committed convention farmer labourer latter prime youth time health vigour ordinary times abundance calamitous seasons accidental illness declining life pressure numerous offspring future nourishers community present drains bloodsuckers produce done 8 argument says fails take account nature economic relationships first premise labour already intimated commodity article trade right notion labour must subject laws principles trade regulations foreign may totally inconsistent principles laws commodity carried market necessity vender necessity purchaser raises price extreme want seller rather nature things shall vain contend direct contrary operation goods market beyond demand fall value rise impossibility subsistence man carries labour market totally beside question way viewing question worth buyer authority comes forces buyer price case say farmer buys labour ten twelve labouring men three four handycrafts make arbitrary division property among 9 jerks authority burke suggests generally wellintentioneddriven desire equalize unequal conditions nature free economy means egalitarianism frequently disastrous consequences perfect equality indeed produced say equal want equal wretchedness equal beggary part partitioners woeful helpless desperate disappointment event compulsory equalizations pull never raise depress high low together beneath level originally lowest 10 notion agricultural economy treated differently commerce cities equally ignorant basic economic principles burke argues greater ruinous mistake fallen trades agriculture grazing conducted upon common principles commerce namely producer permitted even expected look possible profit without fraud violence make turn plenty scarcity best advantage keep back bring forward commodities pleasure account one stock gain terms slave consumer benefit consumer slave ever beneficial master freeman deals equal footing convention formed rules principles contending interests compromised advantages 11 true people stand farmer market true farmer equally true middle man whether middle man acts factor jobber salesman speculator markets grain traders left free course make richer largely deal better farmer consumer form natural useful link connection though machinations old evil counsellor envy hated maligned parties 12 indeed burke turns immensely impressed power markets apply knowledge wouldbe regulators could never possess balance consumption production makes price market settles alone settle price market meeting conference consumer producer mutually discover others wants nobody believe observed reflection market without astonished truth correctness celerity general equity balance wants settled wish destruction balance would fain arbitrary regulation decree defective production compensated encreased price directly lay axe root production 13 burke concludes general statement proper relation government economy opinion writes overdoing sort administration especially momentous meddling part authority meddling subsistence people 14 burkean case free economy essential component genuinely free society rooted view human flourishing emphasizes moral preconditions freedom complex layered society proceeds profound epistemic humility advances model gradual incremental change bottomup trial error margins understands system economic liberty embodiment traditionalist view society therefore kind precondition human flourishing commitment market economy dogmatic absolute prudent practical subservient commitment genuine liberty virtuous citizens also would hasten say product observing emergence commercial society britain yet emergence industrial economy mass scale immense transformative even revolutionary social consequences burkes capitalism inextricable element fundamentally social conservatism part expect market economy overturn social order saw rather embodiment social order viewed would seek regulate manage economy disrupting stable social arrangements subsequent centuries things quite turn way market economy fact turned profoundly disruptive revolutionary social forceoverturning traditional arrangements every realm life good bad advantages provided us burke hoped might immense wealth immense freedom challenges posed us actually often burke thought would prevent social dislocation insecurity breakdown route burke took defense market economy instructive us therefore especially gets near root case tradition means change adaptation make burke simply capitalist modern terms traditionalist valued markets embodiment kind humility channeling knowledge bottom made friend markets extent support uphold complex social order enables human flourishing surely great extent never perfectly precisely friends markets bemost willing acknowledge seek ways address partake humility human knowledge power sake liberty human flourishing 1 edmund burke writings speeches edmund burke ed paul langford oxford oxford university press 2000 viii 209 2160edmund burke correspondence edmund burke ed thomas copeland chicago university chicago press 1978 vi 42 3160burke writings viii 332 4160edmund burke reflections revolution france ed daniel ritchie indianapolis liberty fund 1992 161 5160burke writings iii 59 6160ibid ix 120 7160ibid 124 8160ibid 126 9160ibid 10160ibid 127 11160ibid 130 12160ibid 132 13160ibid 133 14160ibid 145 | 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<p>Perhaps we should be referring to William Byron as the fourth. At the age of 19, the North Carolinian has been announced by team owner <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Rick_Hendrick/" type="external">Rick Hendrick</a> as one of his drivers next year in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series.</p>
<p>Byron becomes the fourth young driver to join one of the major teams for next season, hence William the Fourth.</p>
<p>It may seem as though Byron is being coronated before ever stepping into a Cup car after winning seven races in the Camping World Truck Series in his first season and three during his current rookie year in the Xfinity Series. Those are impressive stats and unprecedented, so he deserves his opportunity to move to the big leagues. (Joey Logano’s stumble when he arrived at age 18 is still a fresh memory, but Byron will be 20 by the end of this season.)</p>
<p>For all his talent, Byron is part of the broader movement toward younger drivers by the front-line teams. Hendrick previously signed 24-year-old Alex Bowman to replace <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Dale_Earnhardt/" type="external">Dale Earnhardt</a>, Jr.; Team Penske has called in its option on the services of 23-year-old <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Ryan-Blaney/" type="external">Ryan Blaney</a>; and <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Joe_Gibbs/" type="external">Joe Gibbs</a> Racing has done likewise with <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Erik-Jones/" type="external">Erik Jones</a>, who is 21.</p>
<p>Byron presents himself as confident, but not cocky. Don’t expect motor racing’s version of <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Bryce-Harper/" type="external">Bryce Harper</a>.</p>
<p>“It’s definitely surprising,” Byron said of his rapid success. “I didn’t expect it out of myself. I feel like I’ve put the work into it and I’m learning on the job. That’s been the biggest thing for me, to learn from the best people I can have around me.”</p>
<p>The switch to younger drivers is inevitable, but particularly timely when it comes to the current sponsorship landscape. Teams are receiving less money from sponsors as a result of external and internal influences. In the current market, sponsors have a multitude of choices in various racing venues and other sports. And, when they look at NASCAR, they see a series where TV ratings and attendance have declined.</p>
<p>For team owners, the sponsor numbers, when it comes to how many millions are paid, look better with a younger driver in the seat. The younger drivers are inclined to accept more old-fashioned deals, like a percentage of the purse, and forgo the recent trend of retainers priced well into seven figures.</p>
<p>There are no specific figures available from the contract of Byron. But his team owner in the Xfinity Series, Earnhardt Jr., has confirmed the retainers are not what they used to be. As NASCAR’s Most Popular Driver, who has enjoyed taking home a retainer for much of his career, Earnhardt Jr. should know. (It’s all relative. It was Hendrick who started the trend when he signed <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jeff_Gordon/" type="external">Jeff Gordon</a> and lured him away from Ford with a $750,000 offer in 1992. Byron has probably received a retainer better than that, but not anywhere close to what a driver in a similar circumstance might have been offered five years ago.)</p>
<p>The NASCAR TV numbers are still strong — an average viewership in the millions and nearly half the events on the schedule have decent attendance figures. But perception about future returns is everything in business, so sponsorships are being pegged to current numbers and likely with various options for the future. Future success, meanwhile, now depends more than ever on the fresh, young faces in NASCAR.</p>
<p>The sponsorship problems explain why a high-paid former champion, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Matt_Kenseth/" type="external">Matt Kenseth</a>, is on the market after being replaced by Jones. There was a time when champion status was golden, a circumstance that describes the career of <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Kurt_Busch/" type="external">Kurt Busch</a>. A lot of pundits thought <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Roger_Penske/" type="external">Roger Penske</a> was making a mistake when he signed former champion Busch to succeed Rusty Wallace, himself a champion. Sponsor Miller Lite wanted a champion and Penske wanted Kenseth, who elected not to leave the team of <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jack_Roush/" type="external">Jack Roush</a>. So, Penske hired Busch instead.</p>
<p>The hot ticket currently is accomplished youth. It helps that 25-year-old <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Kyle-Larson/" type="external">Kyle Larson</a> has hit his stride and Logano finally came into his own in his mid-20s. Along with Blaney, who scored his maiden victory this year, they prove the young drivers can not only win races, they can become dominant players and championship contenders, which is a sponsor’s dream.</p>
<p>The young drivers obviously offer an opportunity for sponsors to engage a younger fan base, which is money in the bank for marketing programs. But the youngsters are also cost-effective for team owners now living in the charter system. Hendrick looks to be balkanizing his current sponsorship by splitting Axalta between the No. 88 of Bowman and the No. 5 car to be driven by Byron, who will also have backing from Liberty University. It gives the appearance of a smaller budget than this year behind the departing <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Kasey_Kahne/" type="external">Kasey Kahne</a>, whose sponsors are also leaving.</p>
<p>Hendrick will also continue to pay Kahne’s retainer in 2018 during the final year of his contract and looks to be forming an alliance with a team where Kahne will drive and earn his purse percentage.</p>
<p>The owner of Hendrick Automotive Group, Hendrick has on occasion likened his racing team to the car business. “I know the bad times are coming sooner or later,” he once said, “and I want to be ready for them.” Well, the bad times have arrived in terms of sponsorship.</p>
<p>It’s also a problem vexing others, such as Stewart-Haas Racing, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Richard_Childress_Racing/" type="external">Richard Childress Racing</a> and <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Richard_Petty/" type="external">Richard Petty</a> Motosports. They are all holding out hope that come this fall they’ll be able to announce new sponsors and a full slate of entries. Meanwhile, the careers of veterans Kenseth, Busch and <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Danica_Patrick/" type="external">Danica Patrick</a>, plus new arrivals <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Ty-Dillon/" type="external">Ty Dillon</a> and Darrell “Bubba” Wallace hang in the balance until the sponsorship picture comes into focus for these teams.</p>
<p>After Byron won the Xfinity race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in July, Hendrick was asked about the teenager’s future in the Cup.</p>
<p>“We’re not ready to cross that bridge yet,” he replied. But after Kahne won the Brickyard 400 the following day, qualifying him for the playoffs, and Bowman was signed up to represent Nationwide Insurance in the No. 88 Chevy, the timing was right to announce the arrival of Byron.</p>
<p>The driver, who started competing in the online iRacing series before he was old enough for a driver’s license, gives every appearance of living up to the opportunity presented by Hendrick Motorsports, where he will join a relatively young lineup that includes <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Chase-Elliott/" type="external">Chase Elliott</a> and seven-time champion <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jimmie_Johnson/" type="external">Jimmie Johnson</a>.</p>
<p>“His character is unbelievable,” said Hendrick “Very, very bright. He spends all his time either studying, or iRacing, in a simulator or in a racecar. His rapid rate of success has just blown us all away.”</p> | false | 1 | perhaps referring william byron fourth age 19 north carolinian announced team owner rick hendrick one drivers next year monster energy nascar cup series byron becomes fourth young driver join one major teams next season hence william fourth may seem though byron coronated ever stepping cup car winning seven races camping world truck series first season three current rookie year xfinity series impressive stats unprecedented deserves opportunity move big leagues joey loganos stumble arrived age 18 still fresh memory byron 20 end season talent byron part broader movement toward younger drivers frontline teams hendrick previously signed 24yearold alex bowman replace dale earnhardt jr team penske called option services 23yearold ryan blaney joe gibbs racing done likewise erik jones 21 byron presents confident cocky dont expect motor racings version bryce harper definitely surprising byron said rapid success didnt expect feel like ive put work im learning job thats biggest thing learn best people around switch younger drivers inevitable particularly timely comes current sponsorship landscape teams receiving less money sponsors result external internal influences current market sponsors multitude choices various racing venues sports look nascar see series tv ratings attendance declined team owners sponsor numbers comes many millions paid look better younger driver seat younger drivers inclined accept oldfashioned deals like percentage purse forgo recent trend retainers priced well seven figures specific figures available contract byron team owner xfinity series earnhardt jr confirmed retainers used nascars popular driver enjoyed taking home retainer much career earnhardt jr know relative hendrick started trend signed jeff gordon lured away ford 750000 offer 1992 byron probably received retainer better anywhere close driver similar circumstance might offered five years ago nascar tv numbers still strong average viewership millions nearly half events schedule decent attendance figures perception future returns everything business sponsorships pegged current numbers likely various options future future success meanwhile depends ever fresh young faces nascar sponsorship problems explain highpaid former champion matt kenseth market replaced jones time champion status golden circumstance describes career kurt busch lot pundits thought roger penske making mistake signed former champion busch succeed rusty wallace champion sponsor miller lite wanted champion penske wanted kenseth elected leave team jack roush penske hired busch instead hot ticket currently accomplished youth helps 25yearold kyle larson hit stride logano finally came mid20s along blaney scored maiden victory year prove young drivers win races become dominant players championship contenders sponsors dream young drivers obviously offer opportunity sponsors engage younger fan base money bank marketing programs youngsters also costeffective team owners living charter system hendrick looks balkanizing current sponsorship splitting axalta 88 bowman 5 car driven byron also backing liberty university gives appearance smaller budget year behind departing kasey kahne whose sponsors also leaving hendrick also continue pay kahnes retainer 2018 final year contract looks forming alliance team kahne drive earn purse percentage owner hendrick automotive group hendrick occasion likened racing team car business know bad times coming sooner later said want ready well bad times arrived terms sponsorship also problem vexing others stewarthaas racing richard childress racing richard petty motosports holding hope come fall theyll able announce new sponsors full slate entries meanwhile careers veterans kenseth busch danica patrick plus new arrivals ty dillon darrell bubba wallace hang balance sponsorship picture comes focus teams byron xfinity race indianapolis motor speedway july hendrick asked teenagers future cup ready cross bridge yet replied kahne brickyard 400 following day qualifying playoffs bowman signed represent nationwide insurance 88 chevy timing right announce arrival byron driver started competing online iracing series old enough drivers license gives every appearance living opportunity presented hendrick motorsports join relatively young lineup includes chase elliott seventime champion jimmie johnson character unbelievable said hendrick bright spends time either studying iracing simulator racecar rapid rate success blown us away | 620 |
<p>Washington</p>
<p>National Gallery of Art</p>
<p>Through Nov. 30</p>
<p>Andrew Wyeth is one of America’s best-known and beloved artists. His “Christina’s World” is as famous as Emanuel Leutze’s “Washington Crossing the Delaware” or Andy Warhol’s “Campbell’s Soup Cans.” Few artists have been showered with such distinctions: the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Congressional Gold Medal and memberships in distinguished European art academies. Yet many thoughtful critics have disparaged his work, calling it saccharine, light on content, pandering and lacking in artistic skill.</p>
<p>Despite his enormous popularity, Wyeth (1917-2009) was a curiously insular artist. His only teacher was his father, the great painter and illustrator N.C. Wyeth. The younger Wyeth studied the work of many other artists, but their influences were submerged in an idiosyncratic style that, once hardened, varied little as he aged. He found inspiration for his painting mainly from just two rural settings, and his subjects were often drawn from his immediate surroundings.</p>
<p>The National Gallery has long been Wyeth’s champion. In 1987 it mounted a major show with 140 of the “Helga Pictures,” a series of recently revealed images of a voluptuous young woman, often in the nude, that were seemingly unknown to the artist’s wife. The works created a national sensation when two made the covers of Time and Newsweek. Today, the museum continues to promote Wyeth as a first-rate artist worthy of a solo exhibition in the same vein as its previous shows on Winslow Homer and Edward Hopper, painters universally acknowledged as American masters.</p>
<p>“Andrew Wyeth: Looking Out, Looking In” comprises 60 beautifully displayed works featuring windows. All were painted during four decades (1947-88) around Wyeth’s home in Chadds Ford, Pa., and Cushing, Maine, where the artist summered. In both places he befriended neighbors and painted portraits of them and their dwellings.</p>
<p>Most of the subjects in the exhibition are unremarkable: a hayloft, shuttered windows, a tattered curtain, weathered siding, fruit on a ledge. Some include views of windows as part of an entire house or room, but most are more fragmented, depicting windows as isolated parts of a larger whole, creating a troubling sense of incompleteness.</p>
<p>The works are in several mediums—mainly watercolors, but also pencil, drybrush and tempera, a laborious medium in which egg yolks bind pigment to a hard surface, often gesso. Wyeth used this ancient medium, revived in the 20th century, to create a detailed, nuanced rendering much different from the sketchy, broad-brushed surfaces of his watercolors.</p>
<p>Against the advice of his father, the young Wyeth developed a palette with a limited range of colors: brown, green, white, gray and black, with touches of red and blue acting almost as exclamation points. The sameness of tone in many of the watercolors is jejune when seen in so many examples.</p>
<p>A case in point is the panoramic landscape “Back Way” (1982), where the white of the paper intended to be snow looks exactly like, well, white paper, while the murky brown foliage of the foreground registers merely as a series of inert brush strokes. Other watercolors, such as “Alvaro’s Bedroom” (1965) and “Night Light at Kuerners” (1960) fail because their stolid patches of surface-hugging paint muddle the subjects they seek to portray.</p>
<p>Yet occasionally, as in “Snowed In” (1980), a watercolor of buildings in a wintery landscape, there are masterly, nearly monochromatic arrangements full of light and atmosphere, skillfully formed by a deft arrangement of shape.</p>
<p>But Wyeth’s tempera paintings are the show’s highlights. Not only are they brighter and more complex than the dashed-off watercolors, but more sophisticated compositionally because they have been refined through a series of preparatory drawings.</p>
<p>One of these, “Evening at Kuerners” (1970), depicts a house and outbuilding set in a barren landscape with leafless trees whose spiky, fingerlike branches claw the sky. In this penumbral world only the whiteness of the house, with its illuminated windows, stands out, but in an ominous, sinister way, rather like the Bates’s home in “Psycho.” The painting evokes a sense of dread also seen in several of the still lifes, including “Untitled” (1983), a disquieting portrayal of a shattered skull on a window ledge. Wyeth’s artist son Jamie recognized this emotional substratum when he wrote that his father’s art was “terrifying.”</p>
<p>Wyeth’s words often endowed his works with mystical meaning and symbolism, interesting to the ear but not obvious to the eye. Hence his claim that the exhibition’s “Wind From the Sea” (1947), a painting of a landscape seen through a window partially covered by billowing curtains, is a metaphorical portrait of the woman depicted in “Christina’s World.” One of the authors of the exhibition’s sumptuous companion book writes that sometimes “the distance between the surface image of a Wyeth painting” and its symbolism “is so great that without commentary from the artist, it is doubtful the link could be known at all.” One wonders about the quality of art that in some instances needs to be explained by its author to be understood.</p>
<p>Very few artists emerge unscathed from a retrospective exhibition, even one as narrow as this, and Wyeth is no exception. The quality of his work varies: There are some riveting and unsettling paintings and several excellent, well-wrought drawings dashed off with aplomb. But there are also clumsy, foggy and nearly incoherent works where the artist strives, but fails, to be both a realist and an abstractionist.</p>
<p>Wyeth said, “If you can combine realism and abstraction, you’ve got something terrific.” Often his work is neither of these things, as seen in “The Reefer Study” (1977), a watercolor of a stairwell, staircase and window, which is unintelligible and almost amateurish in both its confused formal arrangement and delineation of space.</p>
<p>Nor do Wyeth’s windows have the powerful symbolism of Johannes Vermeer’s, whose radiant light consecrates the quotidian, nor the sacredness of Jan van Eyck’s luminous glass, a metaphor for the holy figures it illuminates, nor even the sophisticated compositional role of Henri Matisse’s paintings that brilliantly create isolation and loneliness.</p>
<p>One wonders why Wyeth’s advocates at the National Gallery thought he and the exhibition’s visitors would be well served by such a restricted selection of his art. Yet it is doubtful that even a major retrospective would have been more satisfying, because, with some notable exceptions, his work is formally and emotionally limited, despite its fame.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, Wyeth’s celebrity will attract a large audience to this show. So it’s a pity that the National Gallery hasn’t made it more accessible to fans with no knowledge of Wyeth other than “Christina’s World.” The companion book will certainly look impressive on a coffee table, but most visitors aren’t going to read its long essays while viewing the show. And even if they do, they will find very little factual material on the works they’re seeing, a lacuna that will not be filled by the scanty dog-tag wall labels, which are meager fare for the information-hungry visitor. Regrettably there’s not even the usual glossy exhibition guide or audio tour.</p>
<p>Other museums are building rich websites for their shows—the one for the Wyeth exhibition is bare bones—and online catalogs with links so that visitors, including the armchair ones, can get up to speed even before they enter the galleries. And the old-fashioned audio guide and handouts limited to just a few of the exhibited objects are being rapidly replaced by helpful bespoke apps that will deliver lots of useful information to the visitor’s mobile devices.</p>
<p>The National Gallery needs to get with the program.</p>
<p>Mr. Cole, the former chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities, is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p> | false | 1 | washington national gallery art nov 30 andrew wyeth one americas bestknown beloved artists christinas world famous emanuel leutzes washington crossing delaware andy warhols campbells soup cans artists showered distinctions presidential medal freedom congressional gold medal memberships distinguished european art academies yet many thoughtful critics disparaged work calling saccharine light content pandering lacking artistic skill despite enormous popularity wyeth 19172009 curiously insular artist teacher father great painter illustrator nc wyeth younger wyeth studied work many artists influences submerged idiosyncratic style hardened varied little aged found inspiration painting mainly two rural settings subjects often drawn immediate surroundings national gallery long wyeths champion 1987 mounted major show 140 helga pictures series recently revealed images voluptuous young woman often nude seemingly unknown artists wife works created national sensation two made covers time newsweek today museum continues promote wyeth firstrate artist worthy solo exhibition vein previous shows winslow homer edward hopper painters universally acknowledged american masters andrew wyeth looking looking comprises 60 beautifully displayed works featuring windows painted four decades 194788 around wyeths home chadds ford pa cushing maine artist summered places befriended neighbors painted portraits dwellings subjects exhibition unremarkable hayloft shuttered windows tattered curtain weathered siding fruit ledge include views windows part entire house room fragmented depicting windows isolated parts larger whole creating troubling sense incompleteness works several mediumsmainly watercolors also pencil drybrush tempera laborious medium egg yolks bind pigment hard surface often gesso wyeth used ancient medium revived 20th century create detailed nuanced rendering much different sketchy broadbrushed surfaces watercolors advice father young wyeth developed palette limited range colors brown green white gray black touches red blue acting almost exclamation points sameness tone many watercolors jejune seen many examples case point panoramic landscape back way 1982 white paper intended snow looks exactly like well white paper murky brown foliage foreground registers merely series inert brush strokes watercolors alvaros bedroom 1965 night light kuerners 1960 fail stolid patches surfacehugging paint muddle subjects seek portray yet occasionally snowed 1980 watercolor buildings wintery landscape masterly nearly monochromatic arrangements full light atmosphere skillfully formed deft arrangement shape wyeths tempera paintings shows highlights brighter complex dashedoff watercolors sophisticated compositionally refined series preparatory drawings one evening kuerners 1970 depicts house outbuilding set barren landscape leafless trees whose spiky fingerlike branches claw sky penumbral world whiteness house illuminated windows stands ominous sinister way rather like batess home psycho painting evokes sense dread also seen several still lifes including untitled 1983 disquieting portrayal shattered skull window ledge wyeths artist son jamie recognized emotional substratum wrote fathers art terrifying wyeths words often endowed works mystical meaning symbolism interesting ear obvious eye hence claim exhibitions wind sea 1947 painting landscape seen window partially covered billowing curtains metaphorical portrait woman depicted christinas world one authors exhibitions sumptuous companion book writes sometimes distance surface image wyeth painting symbolism great without commentary artist doubtful link could known one wonders quality art instances needs explained author understood artists emerge unscathed retrospective exhibition even one narrow wyeth exception quality work varies riveting unsettling paintings several excellent wellwrought drawings dashed aplomb also clumsy foggy nearly incoherent works artist strives fails realist abstractionist wyeth said combine realism abstraction youve got something terrific often work neither things seen reefer study 1977 watercolor stairwell staircase window unintelligible almost amateurish confused formal arrangement delineation space wyeths windows powerful symbolism johannes vermeers whose radiant light consecrates quotidian sacredness jan van eycks luminous glass metaphor holy figures illuminates even sophisticated compositional role henri matisses paintings brilliantly create isolation loneliness one wonders wyeths advocates national gallery thought exhibitions visitors would well served restricted selection art yet doubtful even major retrospective would satisfying notable exceptions work formally emotionally limited despite fame nevertheless wyeths celebrity attract large audience show pity national gallery hasnt made accessible fans knowledge wyeth christinas world companion book certainly look impressive coffee table visitors arent going read long essays viewing show even find little factual material works theyre seeing lacuna filled scanty dogtag wall labels meager fare informationhungry visitor regrettably theres even usual glossy exhibition guide audio tour museums building rich websites showsthe one wyeth exhibition bare bonesand online catalogs links visitors including armchair ones get speed even enter galleries oldfashioned audio guide handouts limited exhibited objects rapidly replaced helpful bespoke apps deliver lots useful information visitors mobile devices national gallery needs get program mr cole former chairman national endowment humanities senior fellow ethics public policy center | 723 |
<p>When women in striking red cloaks and white bonnets reminiscent of the costumes from “The Handmaid’s Tale” started showing up at protests for women’s rights this year, it seemed like an odd marketing strategy for Hulu.</p>
<p>But this was no PR stunt: the outfits, worn by enslaved women in the drama and created by Emmy nominees Ane Crabtree (costume designer) and Sheena Wichary (costume supervisor) leaped from the small to the big screen thanks to viewers who saw a connection between the craft and reality, and knew the outfits spoke louder than chants or signs.</p>
<p>Not so long ago, the notion that a below-the-line craft could be part of viewers’ conversations was nearly unheard of. But production values have become so spectacular on TV that audiences have started taking note of the heretofore almost sub-rosa existence of categories like cinematography, production design, costume design, hair, makeup and sound, and made them a vital part of any awards season conversation.</p>
<p>“We have the internet working for us now,” says UCLA professor and former Costume Designers Guild president <a href="http://variety.com/t/deborah-nadoolman-landis/" type="external">Deborah Nadoolman Landis</a>, referring to crafts across the board. “Studios are no longer controlling information about the little people working behind the scenes. We’re starting to build our own value.”</p>
<p>“Handmaid’s Tale” captured the public interest early on, with the red cloaks standing out as one of the few bright points in the otherwise dark-paletted, dystopic show in which nearly all other costumes have an intentionally plain, retro feel.</p>
<p>Other nominated costumes had different uses. In Netflix’s “House of Cards,” which picked up its first costume nominations for Johanna Argan and Kemal Harris this year, the subtle use of primary and black-and-white colors in outfits were designed to develop character, particularly with the president of the United States (Robin Wright) unafraid to appear sensual while still projecting power.</p>
<p>On ABC’s “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/dancing-with-the-stars/" type="external">Dancing With the Stars</a>,” on the other hand, costumes are always part of the buzz; nominees Daniela Gschwendtner and Steven Lee and team didn’t have to be too subtle with their spooky Halloween episode costumes — they just had to be able to create them in a very short time span and make them flexible enough to endure vigorous dance moves.</p>
<p>Where costumes cannot venture, visual effects have taken a great leap, as on HBO’s “Westworld,” which earned nominations for supervisor Jay Worth and his team for the detailed, realistic inner workings of robot “hosts,” aided by animation from visual effects studio Important Looking Pirates. The seamless blend of futuristic computer creations with the Wild West made the show buzzworthy through its entire first season.</p>
<p>Alas, it competes with other visually stunning vfx series, including Starz’s “American Gods,” whose first episode featured a Viking battle, a flame-eyed buffalo and a truly all-consuming sex scene; that series cast a wide net of effects from designer Kevin Tod Haug and his team. On fellow Starz show, “Black Sails,” Erik Henry and team iterated more than 30,000 asset frames each episode to fill an underwater graveyard with 18th century pirate mayhem.</p>
<p>Hair and makeup are their own kinds of special effects, and the ones used to transform actors into real-life people often get parsed closely. National Geographic’s “Genius” had to walk Albert Einstein’s distinctive hairstyle through the decades, ending up with his classic “halo” of fluffed gray hair, and earned nominations for Tash Lees and team. FX’s “Feud: Bette and Joan” had to recreate legends Bette Davis and Joan Crawford in addition to their film characters, including “What Ever Happened to Baby Jane’s” outlandish white-face pancake, which earned Eryn Krueger Mekash and team their nominations.</p>
<p>But it was NBC’s “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/saturday-night-live/" type="external">Saturday Night Live</a>” that dove into modern recreations of our current president and his former communications director Sean Spicer, transforming Alec Baldwin and Melissa McCarthy respectively into believable, spot-on caricatures of the politicos. “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/snl/" type="external">SNL</a>” was so proud of the effect head makeup artist and nominee Louie Zakarian and team created that the show filmed “Spicer” literally rolling down the streets of Manhattan behind his podium.</p>
<p>Production design took viewers into private, vaunted enclaves this season, giving insight into the worlds of Buckingham Palace (Netflix’s “The Crown”) and Vatican City (HBO’s “The Young Pope”). Each required meticulous recreation and creative imagination, and earned nominations for their designers Martin Childs and Ludovica Ferrario, respectively. Their challenges were similar: use public and hitherto-rarely seen private areas to mirror relationships and reality among their elevated protagonists, and each made audiences feel like they were getting a personal glimpse into a secret world.</p>
<p>More quotidian existences still ring true for audiences, though; the science and science-fiction details embedded in the nerdery of CBS’ “The Big Bang Theory” helped earn John Shaffner his nomination, while HBO’s “Silicon Valley’s” Richard Toyon called upon actual real-world tech companies to participate in one episode that earned him a nomination (“Hooli-Con”) – companies that provided their own booth set-ups, merchandise and staff.</p>
<p>But it was on Netflix’s “Stranger Things” that production and set design perhaps shone the strongest for Gen X viewers, with everything from banana-seat bikes to a wood-paneled basement that perfectly evoked 1980s suburbia, earning Chris Trujillo a nomination.</p>
<p>With other series, it’s about fashioning a unique, big-picture look to stand out with audiences. Few shows have ever used jarring, off-kilter camera angles and dim lighting to develop character and story better than USA Network’s “Mr. Robot,” which earned DP Tod Campbell a nom. Similarly, FX’s “Fargo’s” Coen brothers-inspired wide, patient shots of snowy, barren landscapes (shot by nominee Dana Gonzales) makes the series instant recognizable and artistic.</p>
<p>That said, not every beautiful shot needs to be meticulously planned; CBS’ “The Amazing Race’s” around-the-world cinematography is always stunning, always on-the-fly and never the same thing twice, thanks to nominee Peter Rieveschl and team.</p>
<p>Yet visuals are not the only quality that preoccupies audiences; clever and extensive use of sound and intentional music draw fans these days, too. Partly this is savvy marketing, online and off: the CW’s “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend,” whose darkly bouncy tunes earned a music and lyrics nomination for Adam Schlesinger, star Rachel Bloom and Jack Dolgen, has YouTube clips of tunes from the show with more than 1 million views, and offered official sheet music online this year.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, BBC America’s “Planet Earth II” features extended musical clips on YouTube to promote relaxation, and the soundtrack (by music composition nominees Jacob Shea and Jasha Klebe) was released for commercial purchase.</p>
<p>When it comes to music supervision, Zach Cowie (nominated for Netflix’s “Master of None” with Kerri Drootin) says he’s been thrilled to hear some of the “relatively obscure music” he brought onto the show in bars, coffee shops and hotel lobbies. And nothing could make an Emmy-nominated music supervisor happier — except, perhaps, winning on Sept. 9-10.</p>
<p>This music awareness has increased in the past few years, says Cowie, who credits creative risks shows are taking. “That said, people may be noticing now simply because [music is] getting more room to breathe. Can you even imagine hearing two-plus minutes of a song on a TV show in the early ‘90s?”</p>
<p>For below-the-line artisans, it truly is a whole different world to master.</p> | false | 1 | women striking red cloaks white bonnets reminiscent costumes handmaids tale started showing protests womens rights year seemed like odd marketing strategy hulu pr stunt outfits worn enslaved women drama created emmy nominees ane crabtree costume designer sheena wichary costume supervisor leaped small big screen thanks viewers saw connection craft reality knew outfits spoke louder chants signs long ago notion belowtheline craft could part viewers conversations nearly unheard production values become spectacular tv audiences started taking note heretofore almost subrosa existence categories like cinematography production design costume design hair makeup sound made vital part awards season conversation internet working us says ucla professor former costume designers guild president deborah nadoolman landis referring crafts across board studios longer controlling information little people working behind scenes starting build value handmaids tale captured public interest early red cloaks standing one bright points otherwise darkpaletted dystopic show nearly costumes intentionally plain retro feel nominated costumes different uses netflixs house cards picked first costume nominations johanna argan kemal harris year subtle use primary blackandwhite colors outfits designed develop character particularly president united states robin wright unafraid appear sensual still projecting power abcs dancing stars hand costumes always part buzz nominees daniela gschwendtner steven lee team didnt subtle spooky halloween episode costumes able create short time span make flexible enough endure vigorous dance moves costumes venture visual effects taken great leap hbos westworld earned nominations supervisor jay worth team detailed realistic inner workings robot hosts aided animation visual effects studio important looking pirates seamless blend futuristic computer creations wild west made show buzzworthy entire first season alas competes visually stunning vfx series including starzs american gods whose first episode featured viking battle flameeyed buffalo truly allconsuming sex scene series cast wide net effects designer kevin tod haug team fellow starz show black sails erik henry team iterated 30000 asset frames episode fill underwater graveyard 18th century pirate mayhem hair makeup kinds special effects ones used transform actors reallife people often get parsed closely national geographics genius walk albert einsteins distinctive hairstyle decades ending classic halo fluffed gray hair earned nominations tash lees team fxs feud bette joan recreate legends bette davis joan crawford addition film characters including ever happened baby janes outlandish whiteface pancake earned eryn krueger mekash team nominations nbcs saturday night live dove modern recreations current president former communications director sean spicer transforming alec baldwin melissa mccarthy respectively believable spoton caricatures politicos snl proud effect head makeup artist nominee louie zakarian team created show filmed spicer literally rolling streets manhattan behind podium production design took viewers private vaunted enclaves season giving insight worlds buckingham palace netflixs crown vatican city hbos young pope required meticulous recreation creative imagination earned nominations designers martin childs ludovica ferrario respectively challenges similar use public hithertorarely seen private areas mirror relationships reality among elevated protagonists made audiences feel like getting personal glimpse secret world quotidian existences still ring true audiences though science sciencefiction details embedded nerdery cbs big bang theory helped earn john shaffner nomination hbos silicon valleys richard toyon called upon actual realworld tech companies participate one episode earned nomination hoolicon companies provided booth setups merchandise staff netflixs stranger things production set design perhaps shone strongest gen x viewers everything bananaseat bikes woodpaneled basement perfectly evoked 1980s suburbia earning chris trujillo nomination series fashioning unique bigpicture look stand audiences shows ever used jarring offkilter camera angles dim lighting develop character story better usa networks mr robot earned dp tod campbell nom similarly fxs fargos coen brothersinspired wide patient shots snowy barren landscapes shot nominee dana gonzales makes series instant recognizable artistic said every beautiful shot needs meticulously planned cbs amazing races aroundtheworld cinematography always stunning always onthefly never thing twice thanks nominee peter rieveschl team yet visuals quality preoccupies audiences clever extensive use sound intentional music draw fans days partly savvy marketing online cws crazy exgirlfriend whose darkly bouncy tunes earned music lyrics nomination adam schlesinger star rachel bloom jack dolgen youtube clips tunes show 1 million views offered official sheet music online year meanwhile bbc americas planet earth ii features extended musical clips youtube promote relaxation soundtrack music composition nominees jacob shea jasha klebe released commercial purchase comes music supervision zach cowie nominated netflixs master none kerri drootin says hes thrilled hear relatively obscure music brought onto show bars coffee shops hotel lobbies nothing could make emmynominated music supervisor happier except perhaps winning sept 910 music awareness increased past years says cowie credits creative risks shows taking said people may noticing simply music getting room breathe even imagine hearing twoplus minutes song tv show early 90s belowtheline artisans truly whole different world master | 764 |
<p>Unlike drama, unlike fiction, the movies don’t do failure very well. They are essentially a heroic medium, like tragedy or epic poetry, in which even defeat must be made to seem an achievement. Indeed, it is perhaps the only achievement fully worthy the artist’s attention. Just think of Hector or Oedipus or Beowulf or Roland or King Lear. I think Alexander Payne (Election, Citizen Ruth) understands this in About Schmidt, the movie he directs from a screenplay he developed, along with Jim Taylor, from a novel by Louis Begley, but he does not always succeed in skirting the fatal tendency to portray his Hector as pathetic, rather than heroic, as Willie Loman rather than Marshall Will Kane.</p>
<p>At least he keeps Jack Nicholson from yielding to his fatal temptation, which is overacting. With Payne’s snaffle between his teeth and blinders firmly fastened down, Nicholson turns in what may be the finest performance of his career as Warren Schmidt, a retired insurance man from Omaha — Mr Payne’s home town, whither the action has been transplanted from Long Island. His Lomanish quality at times almost suggests self-pity, as when he tells us in voiceover of how oppressive he finds the presence of his wife Helen (June Squibb) — “Who is this old woman living in my house? Everything she does irritates me” — until she dies and he suddenly realizes how much she meant to him. He tells us of his having wanted to be somebody, “not like Henry Ford or Walt Disney but someone semi-important,” but settling for the security of the insurance company job.</p>
<p>Fortunately, this kind of set-up stuff, and a more authentic and interesting voice emerges as he pours out his life story in letters to a six-year-old child, Ndugu, in Africa whom he has “sponsored,” for a trifling sum each month, in response to a television advertisement. As a means of defusing the dangerous self-indulgence of voiceover narration, this is hard to beat. It introduces a note of whimsey and self-deprecation, since Ndugu must be utterly mystified by 90 per cent of what his benefactor has to tell him, but it also serves as a constant reminder of the latter’s bumbling good intentions.</p>
<p>After his wife’s death, Schmidt proposes to go to Denver to stay with his daughter, Jeannie (Hope Davis), for a while before her wedding to a dim-witted waterbed salesman called Randall Hertzel (Dermot Mulroney). But she puts him off, obviously wanting no part of him in close proximity, and he embarks instead on a mock-heroic quest — which becomes a voyage of self-discovery, as heroic and mock-heroic quests alike almost invariably do in the movies — in the behemoth of a Winnebago his late wife had made him buy. But Warren has by now reached the age at which there is not a lot left to discover. He travels to his birthplace, now a tire store, and his old fraternity at the University of Kansas, his alma mater. No one is interested in anything he has to say. He meets a younger couple who seem friendly and sympathetic, but he ends up making an embarrassing pass at the wife and has to make a quick getaway.</p>
<p>It is just because there is no obvious moment of divine revelation or self-knowledge, no catastrophic loss or wise teacher or life-changing precept to effect the transformation, that we are persuaded when he writes, after a bit of soul-searching while observing the stars from the top of his recreational vehicle one night: “And so Ndugu, after my night in the wilderness, I awoke like a man transformed.” Now, he says, he knows what he has to do: to stop his daughter’s wedding to the “nincompoop” Randall. “And nothing,” he says, “is going to stop me.” At last his quest has an object.</p>
<p>But things do stop him. When he arrives at the home of the appalling Randall’s even more appalling mother (Kathy Bates), he has to fight her off. Jeannie takes his intervention in ill part, hitting the ceiling when he pleads with her: “You’re making a big mistake; don’t marry this guy” — and appealing to her: “Just look at these people.” Most embarrassing of all, Randall is effusive in his admiration of him. Like Nicholson himself under Payne’s firm directorial hand, his character has to suck it up. The voyage of self-discovery with all that it suggests of emotional (and other forms of) liberation finally leaves him untouched. He still has to suck it up as he has been sucking it up all his life.</p>
<p>What is most impressive about the film, I think, is that this is not seen as a tragedy. It is too ordinary for that. Warren’s speech at the wedding reception is truly a great cinematic moment — a celebration of (gasp) emotional continence, of politeness, of a refusal to make a fuss — and is effective partly because our expectations, both of Jack Nicholson and of the long-running movie romance with personal authenticity, go entirely the other way. Nicholson’s ability to convey that sense of personal authenticity is what made him a star. But Payne crosses us up, he doesn’t allow us the easy satisfaction of a hero whose noisy insistence on his own way of looking at things or doing things produces an inevitable but implausible triumph for him. This guy knows better, but he also knows that his knowledge is not wanted or needed, and accepting that with a good grace is one of the hardest things we ever have to do, and the hardest thing of all for a movie.</p>
<p>There are a few problems with the film. First, we don’t see why relations between Warren and Jeannie are so strained. At one point when she reproaches him with not being involved in her life until he wants to persuade her to dump Randall, and also in buying a cheap casket for her mother, reasons are hinted at, but the matter isn’t investigated any further. Second, why does Jeannie want to marry Randall? Warren states what is the obvious when he tells her that she is way out of his league, but she doesn’t seem to want to know. What sad history of hers makes it worth settling for him?</p>
<p>Finally, we have to wonder why this man appears to have no friends, and pours his heart out to a six year old child in Tanzania. It is in many ways a charming idea for a movie, but it leaves us unsatisfied. How has this isolation happened? The part that is meant to be inspiring, where Ndugu draws him a picture in thanks for his $22 a month contribution and a tear rolls down his cheek as he thinks that here, at least, is something he has accomplished, some place in the world where he has made a difference, is actually rather depressing. After 66 years all he has to show for his life is the thanks of a six year old he has never met for a contribution that is a ridiculously small part of himself? What happened to the rest of him? Is it all, as he suspects before Ndugu’s picture arrives, just a waste?</p>
<p>It sort of looks as if that is what Payne is telling us. But he is also telling us that it is an accomplishment just to be able to take what life has to dish out to us.</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | false | 1 | unlike drama unlike fiction movies dont failure well essentially heroic medium like tragedy epic poetry even defeat must made seem achievement indeed perhaps achievement fully worthy artists attention think hector oedipus beowulf roland king lear think alexander payne election citizen ruth understands schmidt movie directs screenplay developed along jim taylor novel louis begley always succeed skirting fatal tendency portray hector pathetic rather heroic willie loman rather marshall kane least keeps jack nicholson yielding fatal temptation overacting paynes snaffle teeth blinders firmly fastened nicholson turns may finest performance career warren schmidt retired insurance man omaha mr paynes home town whither action transplanted long island lomanish quality times almost suggests selfpity tells us voiceover oppressive finds presence wife helen june squibb old woman living house everything irritates dies suddenly realizes much meant tells us wanted somebody like henry ford walt disney someone semiimportant settling security insurance company job fortunately kind setup stuff authentic interesting voice emerges pours life story letters sixyearold child ndugu africa sponsored trifling sum month response television advertisement means defusing dangerous selfindulgence voiceover narration hard beat introduces note whimsey selfdeprecation since ndugu must utterly mystified 90 per cent benefactor tell also serves constant reminder latters bumbling good intentions wifes death schmidt proposes go denver stay daughter jeannie hope davis wedding dimwitted waterbed salesman called randall hertzel dermot mulroney puts obviously wanting part close proximity embarks instead mockheroic quest becomes voyage selfdiscovery heroic mockheroic quests alike almost invariably movies behemoth winnebago late wife made buy warren reached age lot left discover travels birthplace tire store old fraternity university kansas alma mater one interested anything say meets younger couple seem friendly sympathetic ends making embarrassing pass wife make quick getaway obvious moment divine revelation selfknowledge catastrophic loss wise teacher lifechanging precept effect transformation persuaded writes bit soulsearching observing stars top recreational vehicle one night ndugu night wilderness awoke like man transformed says knows stop daughters wedding nincompoop randall nothing says going stop last quest object things stop arrives home appalling randalls even appalling mother kathy bates fight jeannie takes intervention ill part hitting ceiling pleads youre making big mistake dont marry guy appealing look people embarrassing randall effusive admiration like nicholson paynes firm directorial hand character suck voyage selfdiscovery suggests emotional forms liberation finally leaves untouched still suck sucking life impressive film think seen tragedy ordinary warrens speech wedding reception truly great cinematic moment celebration gasp emotional continence politeness refusal make fuss effective partly expectations jack nicholson longrunning movie romance personal authenticity go entirely way nicholsons ability convey sense personal authenticity made star payne crosses us doesnt allow us easy satisfaction hero whose noisy insistence way looking things things produces inevitable implausible triumph guy knows better also knows knowledge wanted needed accepting good grace one hardest things ever hardest thing movie problems film first dont see relations warren jeannie strained one point reproaches involved life wants persuade dump randall also buying cheap casket mother reasons hinted matter isnt investigated second jeannie want marry randall warren states obvious tells way league doesnt seem want know sad history makes worth settling finally wonder man appears friends pours heart six year old child tanzania many ways charming idea movie leaves us unsatisfied isolation happened part meant inspiring ndugu draws picture thanks 22 month contribution tear rolls cheek thinks least something accomplished place world made difference actually rather depressing 66 years show life thanks six year old never met contribution ridiculously small part happened rest suspects ndugus picture arrives waste sort looks payne telling us also telling us accomplishment able take life dish us 160 | 590 |
<p>The Arab world has always been seen in western eyes as a place of conquest, to be exploited, controlled and tamed.</p>
<p>When Arab streets exploded with fury, from Tunis to Sanaa, pan-Arabism seemed, then, like a nominal notion. Neither did the so-called ‘Jasmine Revolution’ use slogans that affirmed its Arab identity, nor did angry Egyptian youth raise the banner proclaiming Arab unity atop the high buildings adjacent to Tahrir Square.</p>
<p>Oddly, the Arabism of the ‘Arab Spring’ was almost as if a result of convenience. It was politically convenient for western governments to stereotype Arab nations as if they are exact duplicates of one another, and that national sentiments, identities, expectations and popular revolts are all rooted in the same past and correspond with a precise reality in the present. Thus, many in the west expected that the fall of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali of Tunisia, especially since it was followed by the abdication of Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, would lead to a domino effect. “ <a href="http://www.economist.com/node/18805423" type="external">Who’s next?</a>’ was a pretentious question that many asked, some with no understanding of the region and its complexity.</p>
<p>After initial hesitation, the US, along with its western allies, moved quickly to influence the outcome in some Arab countries. Their mission was to ensure a smooth transition in countries whose fate had been decided by the impulsive revolts, to speed up the toppling of their enemies and to prop up their allies so that they would not suffer a similar fate.</p>
<p>The outcome was real devastation. Countries where the west and their allies—and, expectedly enemies were involved—became infernos, not of revolutionary fervor, but of militant chaos, terrorism and unabated wars. Libya, Syria and Yemen are the obvious examples.</p>
<p>In a way, the west, its media and allies assigned themselves as gatekeepers of determining, not only the fate of the Arabs, but in molding their identities as well. Coupled with the collapse of the whole notion of nationhood in some Arab countries— <a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2016/02/libya-arab-spring-7-ways-human-rights-are-under-attack/" type="external">Libya, for example</a>—the US is now taking upon itself the responsibility of devising future scenarios of broken down Arab states.</p>
<p>In his testimony before a US Senate committee to discuss the Syria ceasefire, Secretary of State, <a href="https://www.rt.com/usa/333419-kerry-plan-ceasefire-syria/" type="external">John Kerry revealed that his country is preparing a ‘Plan B”</a> should the ceasefire fail. Kerry refrained from offering specifics; however, he offered clues. It may be “too late to keep Syria as a whole, if we wait much longer,” he indicated.</p>
<p>The possibility of dividing Syria was not a random warning, but situated in a large and growing edifice of intellectual and media text in the US and other western countries. It was <a href="http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2015/10/06/syrias-one-hope-may-be-as-dim-as-bosnias-once-was/" type="external">articulated by Michael O’Hanlon of the Brookings Institute</a> in a Reuter’s op-ed last October. He called for the US to find a ‘common purpose with Russia’, while keeping in mind the ‘Bosnia model.’</p>
<p>“In similar fashion, a future Syria could be a confederation of several sectors: one largely Alawite—another Kurdish—a third, primarily Druse—a fourth, largely made up of Sunni Muslims; and then a central zone of intermixed groups in the country’s main population belt from Damascus to Aleppo.”</p>
<p>What is dangerous about O’Hanlon’s solution for Syria is not the complete disregard of Syria’s national identity. Frankly, many western intellectuals never even subscribed to the notion that Arabs were nations in the western definition of nationhood, in the first place. (Read Aaron David Miller article: <a href="http://foreignpolicy.com/2013/02/27/tribes-with-flags/" type="external">Tribes with Flags</a>) No, the real danger lies in the fact that such a divisive dismantling of Arab nations is very much plausible, and historical precedents abound.</p>
<p>It is no secret that the modern formation of Arab countries are largely the outcome of dividing the Arab region within the Ottoman Empire into mini-states. That was the result of political necessities and compromises that arose from the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Sykes-Picot-Agreement" type="external">Sykes-Picot Agreement</a> in 1916. The US, then, was more consumed with its South American environs, and the rest of the world was largely a Great Game that was mastered by Britain and France.</p>
<p>The British-French agreement, with the consent of Russia, was entirely motivated by sheer power, economic interests, political hegemony and little else. This explains why most of the borders of Arab countries were perfect straight lines. Indeed, they were charted by a pencil and ruler, not organic evolution of geography based on multiple factors and protracted history of conflict or concord.</p>
<p>It has been almost one hundred years since colonial powers divided the Arabs, although they are yet to respect the very boundaries that they have created. Moreover, they have invested much time, energy, resources and, at times, all out wars to ensure that the arbitrary division never truly ends.</p>
<p>Not only does the west loathe the term ‘Arab unity’, it also loathes whoever dares infuse what they deem to be hostile, radical terminology. Egypt’s second President, Jamal Abdel Nasser, argued that true liberation and freedom of Arab nations was <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/focus/arabunity/2008/02/200852517252821627.html" type="external">intrinsically linked to Arab unity</a>.</p>
<p>Thus, it was no surprise that the struggle for Palestine occupied a central stage in the rhetoric of Arab nationalism throughout the 1950s and 60s. Abdel Nasser was raised to the status of a national hero in the eyes of most Arabs, and a pariah in the eyes of the west and Israel.</p>
<p>To ensure that Arabs are never to unite, the west invested in their further disunity. In 2006/07, former US Secretary of State, <a href="http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2005/jun/19/20050619-125547-1468r/?page=all" type="external">Condoleezza Rice</a>, made it clear that the US would cease its support of the Palestinian Authority shall <a href="https://content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1587969,00.html" type="external">Fatah and Hamas</a> unite. Earlier, when, resistance in Iraq reached a point that the American occupiers found unbearable, they invested in <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2014/07/07/world/meast/iraq-division-lister/" type="external">dividing the ranks</a> of the Iraqis based on sectarian lines. Their intellectuals pondered the possibility of <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/01/opinion/01biden.html?pagewanted=all&amp;_r=1&amp;" type="external">dividing Iraq into three autonomous states</a>: Shia, Sunni and Kurdish.</p>
<p>Libya was too broken up after NATO’s intervention turned a regional uprising into a <a href="https://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/middle-east/all-sides-in-libyan-conflict-guilty-of-war-crimes-un-says-1.2548081" type="external">bloody war</a>. Since then, France, Britain, the US and others have backed some parties against others. Whatever sense of nationhood that existed after the end of Italian colonization of that country has been decimated as Libyans reverted to their regions and tribes to survive the upheaval.</p>
<p>A rumored ‘Plan B’ to divide Libya to three separate protectorates of Tripolitania, Cyrenaica and Fezzan was recently <a href="http://www.ansamed.info/ansamed/en/news/sections/politics/2016/02/24/ambassador-rejects-idea-of-dividing-libya-into-three_d187e6ba-aa0b-4928-b83a-b1471dc007a9.html" type="external">rejected by the Libyan Ambassador to Rome</a>. However, Libyans presently seem to be the least relevant party in determining the future of their own country.</p>
<p>The Arab world has always been seen in western eyes as a place of conquest, to be exploited, controlled and tamed. That mindset continues to define the relationship. While Arab unity is to be dreaded, further divisions often appear as ‘Plan B’, when the current status quo, call it ‘Plan A’, seems impossible to sustain.</p>
<p>What is truly interesting is that, despite the lack of a pan-Arab vision in Arab countries that experienced popular revolts five years ago, few events in modern history has brought the Arabs together like the chants of freedom in Tunis, the cries of victories in Egypt and <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/yemen/12171785/Yemen-is-becoming-the-new-Syria-and-Britain-is-directly-to-blame.html" type="external">screams of pain in Yemen</a> and Syria. It is that very collective identity, <a href="https://english.alarabiya.net/en/sports/2016/02/18/Algerians-cheer-Palestine-football-team-against-own-countrymen.html" type="external">often unspoken but felt</a>, that drives millions of Arabs to hold on to however faint a hope that their nations will survive the ongoing onslaught and prospective western division.</p> | false | 1 | arab world always seen western eyes place conquest exploited controlled tamed arab streets exploded fury tunis sanaa panarabism seemed like nominal notion neither socalled jasmine revolution use slogans affirmed arab identity angry egyptian youth raise banner proclaiming arab unity atop high buildings adjacent tahrir square oddly arabism arab spring almost result convenience politically convenient western governments stereotype arab nations exact duplicates one another national sentiments identities expectations popular revolts rooted past correspond precise reality present thus many west expected fall zine el abidine ben ali tunisia especially since followed abdication hosni mubarak egypt would lead domino effect whos next pretentious question many asked understanding region complexity initial hesitation us along western allies moved quickly influence outcome arab countries mission ensure smooth transition countries whose fate decided impulsive revolts speed toppling enemies prop allies would suffer similar fate outcome real devastation countries west alliesand expectedly enemies involvedbecame infernos revolutionary fervor militant chaos terrorism unabated wars libya syria yemen obvious examples way west media allies assigned gatekeepers determining fate arabs molding identities well coupled collapse whole notion nationhood arab countries libya examplethe us taking upon responsibility devising future scenarios broken arab states testimony us senate committee discuss syria ceasefire secretary state john kerry revealed country preparing plan b ceasefire fail kerry refrained offering specifics however offered clues may late keep syria whole wait much longer indicated possibility dividing syria random warning situated large growing edifice intellectual media text us western countries articulated michael ohanlon brookings institute reuters oped last october called us find common purpose russia keeping mind bosnia model similar fashion future syria could confederation several sectors one largely alawiteanother kurdisha third primarily drusea fourth largely made sunni muslims central zone intermixed groups countrys main population belt damascus aleppo dangerous ohanlons solution syria complete disregard syrias national identity frankly many western intellectuals never even subscribed notion arabs nations western definition nationhood first place read aaron david miller article tribes flags real danger lies fact divisive dismantling arab nations much plausible historical precedents abound secret modern formation arab countries largely outcome dividing arab region within ottoman empire ministates result political necessities compromises arose sykespicot agreement 1916 us consumed south american environs rest world largely great game mastered britain france britishfrench agreement consent russia entirely motivated sheer power economic interests political hegemony little else explains borders arab countries perfect straight lines indeed charted pencil ruler organic evolution geography based multiple factors protracted history conflict concord almost one hundred years since colonial powers divided arabs although yet respect boundaries created moreover invested much time energy resources times wars ensure arbitrary division never truly ends west loathe term arab unity also loathes whoever dares infuse deem hostile radical terminology egypts second president jamal abdel nasser argued true liberation freedom arab nations intrinsically linked arab unity thus surprise struggle palestine occupied central stage rhetoric arab nationalism throughout 1950s 60s abdel nasser raised status national hero eyes arabs pariah eyes west israel ensure arabs never unite west invested disunity 200607 former us secretary state condoleezza rice made clear us would cease support palestinian authority shall fatah hamas unite earlier resistance iraq reached point american occupiers found unbearable invested dividing ranks iraqis based sectarian lines intellectuals pondered possibility dividing iraq three autonomous states shia sunni kurdish libya broken natos intervention turned regional uprising bloody war since france britain us others backed parties others whatever sense nationhood existed end italian colonization country decimated libyans reverted regions tribes survive upheaval rumored plan b divide libya three separate protectorates tripolitania cyrenaica fezzan recently rejected libyan ambassador rome however libyans presently seem least relevant party determining future country arab world always seen western eyes place conquest exploited controlled tamed mindset continues define relationship arab unity dreaded divisions often appear plan b current status quo call plan seems impossible sustain truly interesting despite lack panarab vision arab countries experienced popular revolts five years ago events modern history brought arabs together like chants freedom tunis cries victories egypt screams pain yemen syria collective identity often unspoken felt drives millions arabs hold however faint hope nations survive ongoing onslaught prospective western division | 677 |
<p>Earlier this week, a single federal district judge in California issued an injunction immediately and permanently barring the Department of Defense from enforcing the federal law, colloquially known as “Don't Ask, Don't Tell” (DADT), that authorizes the discharge of members of the armed forces on account of homosexual activity.</p>
<p>Judge Virginia A. Phillips's brazen and error-strewn ruling in Log Cabin Republicans v. United States provides a useful case study of the all-too-familiar phenomenon of liberal judicial activism — in brief, the wrongful judicial overriding of a democratic enactment in order to advance the agenda of the Left. As in many other recent and ongoing cases involving claims of gay rights, this case study needs to be broadened to expose the complicit actions of the officials who were duty-bound to defend the law but who instead acted to undermine it. In this DADT case, those officials include Attorney General Eric Holder and then-Solicitor General Elena Kagan.</p>
<p>Let's begin with the Ninth Circuit's rogue ruling in May 2008 in the case of Witt v. Department of Air Force. In that case, a Ninth Circuit panel ruled that the DADT law, rather than receiving deferential “rational basis” review, should instead be subjected to some ill-defined “heightened scrutiny.” Under the standard that the panel devised, the government would have to show that the application of Don't Ask, Don't Tell to a specific individual significantly furthered an important government interest and that less intrusive means could not achieve substantially the same end. Despite relevant Supreme Court precedent, the panel failed to consider whether the military context weighed in favor of deferential review.</p>
<p>In its petition for rehearing, the Department of Justice (DOJ) in the Bush administration argued that the Witt decision misconstrued Supreme Court precedent, conflicted with precedents from the Supreme Court and other circuits, and created an unworkable rule that would disrupt military affairs. When the Ninth Circuit, over vigorous dissents, denied DOJ's request for rehearing in December 2008, it was clear that DOJ's next step would be to seek Supreme Court reversal of the Witt decision.</p>
<p>Notwithstanding President Obama's policy stance in favor of repealing DADT, there was little reason to believe that the change of administrations in January 2009 would alter DOJ's direction on Witt. With the exceptions of laws that intrude on executive-branch prerogatives or that are unquestionably unconstitutional, DOJ's established practice is to vigorously defend federal laws. Indeed, in the course of her confirmation hearing to become Solicitor General, Elena Kagan, who as Harvard law school dean had vehemently condemned DADT as “a profound wrong — a moral injustice of the first order,” assured senators that she would set aside her own personal views on DADT and would “with vigor” “advance … the interests of the United States, as principally expressed in legislative enactments and executive policy.” “Under prevailing Equal Protection law,” she emphasized, DADT is “subject to rational basis scrutiny,” and “the rational basis standard is very easy to satisfy.” Indeed, “courts frequently grant Congress even greater deference than usual when military matters are involved.”</p>
<p>Yet when the time came to seek Supreme Court review of Witt, Kagan punted. In a letter to the Senate explaining Kagan's decision, Attorney General Holder implausibly explained that DOJ had decided not to seek Supreme Court review because there wasn't yet a final judgment in the case (the Ninth Circuit had sent the case back to the district court to apply its heightened scrutiny) and because of “practical litigation considerations.” But contrary to Holder's argument, there's ample reason to believe that the Supreme Court would have granted an Obama administration request for review of the rogue Ninth Circuit ruling, and the “practical litigation considerations” cut in favor of not subjecting the military — during a time of war, no less — to litigation burdens that would be eliminated by a reversal.</p>
<p>Political considerations provide a far more compelling explanation of the decision not to seek review of Witt. The gay-rights lobby would surely have seen an Obama administration appeal of a ruling by the notorious Ninth Circuit as a most unpromising vehicle for its constitutional attack on DADT. And a Solicitor General positioning herself for elevation to the Supreme Court would be eager to duck a highly controversial case that would put her at odds with an influential political constituency. Conversely, leaving the Ninth Circuit's decision in effect would offer numerous advantages. District-court proceedings (in Witt and other cases) under the Witt standard would predictably generate defeats for DADT (especially if senior political appointees at DOJ supervised the litigation), which defeats would then be affirmed by the Ninth Circuit. Those defeats would then be spun as bolstering the political case for repeal of DADT. Further, the passage of years might mean that DADT would be repealed before Holder or Kagan — or, better yet, their successors — would again face the question of seeking Supreme Court review of the Witt standard.</p>
<p>It is against this backdrop that Judge Phillips addressed the challenge to DADT brought by Log Cabin Republicans on behalf of its members. DOJ argued that the heightened-scrutiny standard that Witt set forth for so-called as-applied challenges (that is, challenges brought by individuals discharged, or facing discharge proceedings, under DADT) did not apply to the Log Cabin Republicans' claims that DADT is facially invalid. But Phillips rejected that argument and proceeded to trial.</p>
<p>At trial, as Judge Phillips notes several times (in slightly different formulations) in her opinion, DOJ “called no witnesses, put on no affirmative case, and only entered into evidence the legislative history of [DADT].” Why did DOJ fail to put on any real defense? Why did it refuse, for example, to call as witnesses some of the military leaders who continue to support DADT? Rank incompetence would be one possible explanation, but no one familiar with the quality of the career professionals at DOJ would credit that answer. The obvious — indeed, I would submit, the only plausible — explanation is that President Obama's political appointees at DOJ, who were deeply involved in the case (Solicitor General Elena Kagan even tended to the details of a discovery dispute), hamstrung the career lawyers from putting on their best case. For an administration seeking to placate gay-rights activists and to push Congress to repeal DADT, it would have been politically awkward to be presenting and crediting as witnesses the very folks who would be the administration's most visible opponents in the battle over DADT repeal.</p>
<p>Judge Phillips also deserves her ample share of blame. Under the Supreme Court's prevailing standard for facial challenges, a plaintiff can succeed in a facial challenge to a law only by establishing that the law is unconstitutional in all its applications. Under proper application of that standard, it is difficult to imagine how a facial challenge to DADT could possibly succeed, as DADT would surely permissibly apply, say, to a service member who engaged in a long series of homosexual acts by use of force. Oddly, Judge Phillips articulated this standard correctly in her order denying summary judgment, but by the time of her final ruling she had confused herself into thinking that the Supreme Court had lowered its standard. (Even then, she misapplied the lower standard.)</p>
<p>Judge Phillips's injunction purporting to bar the Department of Defense (DOD) from enforcing DADT “against any person” is also plainly overbroad. Log Cabin Republicans did not bring a class action, and the relief that Jud ge Phillips is empowered to grant shouldn't directly benefit anyone who is not a member of (and not made known to DOD to be a member of) Log Cabin Republicans. And, like Judge Vaughn Walker in his anti-Proposition 8 ruling inventing a constitutional right to same-sex marriage, it's appalling that Judge Phillips, in overriding the resolution that a Democratic-dominated Congress and President Clinton reached seventeen years ago on a sensitive matter of military discipline, would decline to stay her judgment pending appeal and instead seek to implement it immediately.</p>
<p>In the immediate aftermath of Judge Phillips's ruling, there was a swirl of media speculation over whether DOJ would file an appeal. It would have been scandalous if DOJ had chosen not to appeal and if it had let a ruling by a single district judge bring an end to DADT. But given DOJ's appeal earlier this week of the rulings by a federal judge against the Defense of Marriage Act (another federal law that DOJ has been <a href="http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?llr=zehopscab&amp;et=1103784572482&amp;s=277&amp;e=0017_QFfPiGB02QZRSDEa5a2wpZLQKF2khitvenli87ORfmxZB4U__nHgPSn2yjkK_s70gs016hpilFMJLyajuuGK-EwUDsfGPhY3Nc96L6Bl61_rdCs37GS2yfOicTspKmrim56hw0cgWr-KF4IqZr4sKvFPl9VJRDBN8ji_0GzpQAllA_fKLHPnnPaWSC3676NdMQL8JsQUIw2X-xek-LGHm7N9fTfa-HVf22yCE9TaEHfh4aeVAJ_g==" type="external">sabotaging</a>), it is no surprise that DOJ has just filed a notice of appeal of Judge Phillips's ruling.</p>
<p>The fact that DOJ has filed a formal notice of appeal shouldn't distract from the deeper scandal that the political appointees at DOJ have been only pretending to mount a vigorous defense of DADT while in fact operating to undermine it. Unfortunately, you can expect that same charade to continue through the course of an appeal to the Ninth Circuit.</p>
<p>Ed Whelan is President of the <a href="http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?llr=zehopscab&amp;et=1103784572482&amp;s=277&amp;e=0017_QFfPiGB00lWmdA54G7pLbvPOyAulTTEtn6wv-ETo7riqgCk8Q-_TcVwqRtvlLazg_Wj4HguhnwsdOphHFjlf4pWO7GdcaG6y02VnJ_sVc=" type="external">Ethics and Public Policy Center</a>&#160;and a regular contributor to National Review Online's <a href="http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?llr=zehopscab&amp;et=1103784572482&amp;s=277&amp;e=0017_QFfPiGB03uX4VtDK28Usx2BUvo7SYzJF3LWAWsBPCxAex2nEnTLgYDHhGyJeWJme9qVBdMFSM7nFmM3r6D-64XKUpzBAS9q4HttLE2I5QZbla8cnjg0a_mgfDFNZmFySmnxenil08=" type="external">Bench Memos</a>&#160;blog on constitutional law and judicial nominations.</p> | false | 1 | earlier week single federal district judge california issued injunction immediately permanently barring department defense enforcing federal law colloquially known dont ask dont tell dadt authorizes discharge members armed forces account homosexual activity judge virginia phillipss brazen errorstrewn ruling log cabin republicans v united states provides useful case study alltoofamiliar phenomenon liberal judicial activism brief wrongful judicial overriding democratic enactment order advance agenda left many recent ongoing cases involving claims gay rights case study needs broadened expose complicit actions officials dutybound defend law instead acted undermine dadt case officials include attorney general eric holder thensolicitor general elena kagan lets begin ninth circuits rogue ruling may 2008 case witt v department air force case ninth circuit panel ruled dadt law rather receiving deferential rational basis review instead subjected illdefined heightened scrutiny standard panel devised government would show application dont ask dont tell specific individual significantly furthered important government interest less intrusive means could achieve substantially end despite relevant supreme court precedent panel failed consider whether military context weighed favor deferential review petition rehearing department justice doj bush administration argued witt decision misconstrued supreme court precedent conflicted precedents supreme court circuits created unworkable rule would disrupt military affairs ninth circuit vigorous dissents denied dojs request rehearing december 2008 clear dojs next step would seek supreme court reversal witt decision notwithstanding president obamas policy stance favor repealing dadt little reason believe change administrations january 2009 would alter dojs direction witt exceptions laws intrude executivebranch prerogatives unquestionably unconstitutional dojs established practice vigorously defend federal laws indeed course confirmation hearing become solicitor general elena kagan harvard law school dean vehemently condemned dadt profound wrong moral injustice first order assured senators would set aside personal views dadt would vigor advance interests united states principally expressed legislative enactments executive policy prevailing equal protection law emphasized dadt subject rational basis scrutiny rational basis standard easy satisfy indeed courts frequently grant congress even greater deference usual military matters involved yet time came seek supreme court review witt kagan punted letter senate explaining kagans decision attorney general holder implausibly explained doj decided seek supreme court review wasnt yet final judgment case ninth circuit sent case back district court apply heightened scrutiny practical litigation considerations contrary holders argument theres ample reason believe supreme court would granted obama administration request review rogue ninth circuit ruling practical litigation considerations cut favor subjecting military time war less litigation burdens would eliminated reversal political considerations provide far compelling explanation decision seek review witt gayrights lobby would surely seen obama administration appeal ruling notorious ninth circuit unpromising vehicle constitutional attack dadt solicitor general positioning elevation supreme court would eager duck highly controversial case would put odds influential political constituency conversely leaving ninth circuits decision effect would offer numerous advantages districtcourt proceedings witt cases witt standard would predictably generate defeats dadt especially senior political appointees doj supervised litigation defeats would affirmed ninth circuit defeats would spun bolstering political case repeal dadt passage years might mean dadt would repealed holder kagan better yet successors would face question seeking supreme court review witt standard backdrop judge phillips addressed challenge dadt brought log cabin republicans behalf members doj argued heightenedscrutiny standard witt set forth socalled asapplied challenges challenges brought individuals discharged facing discharge proceedings dadt apply log cabin republicans claims dadt facially invalid phillips rejected argument proceeded trial trial judge phillips notes several times slightly different formulations opinion doj called witnesses put affirmative case entered evidence legislative history dadt doj fail put real defense refuse example call witnesses military leaders continue support dadt rank incompetence would one possible explanation one familiar quality career professionals doj would credit answer obvious indeed would submit plausible explanation president obamas political appointees doj deeply involved case solicitor general elena kagan even tended details discovery dispute hamstrung career lawyers putting best case administration seeking placate gayrights activists push congress repeal dadt would politically awkward presenting crediting witnesses folks would administrations visible opponents battle dadt repeal judge phillips also deserves ample share blame supreme courts prevailing standard facial challenges plaintiff succeed facial challenge law establishing law unconstitutional applications proper application standard difficult imagine facial challenge dadt could possibly succeed dadt would surely permissibly apply say service member engaged long series homosexual acts use force oddly judge phillips articulated standard correctly order denying summary judgment time final ruling confused thinking supreme court lowered standard even misapplied lower standard judge phillipss injunction purporting bar department defense dod enforcing dadt person also plainly overbroad log cabin republicans bring class action relief jud ge phillips empowered grant shouldnt directly benefit anyone member made known dod member log cabin republicans like judge vaughn walker antiproposition 8 ruling inventing constitutional right samesex marriage appalling judge phillips overriding resolution democraticdominated congress president clinton reached seventeen years ago sensitive matter military discipline would decline stay judgment pending appeal instead seek implement immediately immediate aftermath judge phillipss ruling swirl media speculation whether doj would file appeal would scandalous doj chosen appeal let ruling single district judge bring end dadt given dojs appeal earlier week rulings federal judge defense marriage act another federal law doj sabotaging surprise doj filed notice appeal judge phillipss ruling fact doj filed formal notice appeal shouldnt distract deeper scandal political appointees doj pretending mount vigorous defense dadt fact operating undermine unfortunately expect charade continue course appeal ninth circuit ed whelan president ethics public policy center160and regular contributor national review onlines bench memos160blog constitutional law judicial nominations | 894 |
<p>The special counsel overseeing the investigation into Russia’s role in the 2016 election is interviewing senior intelligence officials as part of a widening probe that now includes an examination of whether President Donald Trump attempted to obstruct justice, officials said.</p>
<p>The move by Special Counsel Robert Mueller to investigate Trump’s own conduct marks a major turning point in the nearly year-old FBI investigation, which until recently focused on Russian meddling during the presidential campaign and on whether there was any coordination between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin. Investigators have also been looking for any evidence of possible financial crimes among Trump associates, officials said.</p>
<p>Trump had received private assurances from former FBI Director James Comey starting in January that he was not personally under investigation. Officials say that changed shortly after Comey’s firing.</p>
<p>Five people briefed on the requests, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly, said Daniel Coats, the current director of national intelligence, Adm. Mike Rogers, head of the National Security Agency, and Rogers’ recently departed deputy, Richard Ledgett, agreed to be interviewed by Mueller’s investigators as early as this week. The investigation has been cloaked in secrecy and it’s unclear how many others have been questioned by the FBI.</p>
<p>The NSA said in statement that it will “fully cooperate with the special counsel,” and declined to comment further. The office of Director of National Intelligence and Ledgett declined to comment.</p>
<p>The White House now refers all questions about the Russia investigation to Trump’s personal lawyer, Marc Kasowitz. “The FBI leak of information regarding the President is outrageous, inexcusable and illegal,” said Mark Corallo, a spokesman for Kasowitz.</p>
<p>The officials said Coats, Rogers and Ledgett would appear voluntarily, though it remains unclear whether they will describe in full their conversations with Trump and other top officials, or will be directed by the White House to invoke executive privilege. It is doubtful the White House could ultimately use executive privilege to try to block them from speaking to Mueller’s investigators. Experts point out that the Supreme Court ruled during the Watergate scandal that officials cannot use privilege to withhold evidence in criminal prosecutions.</p>
<p>The obstruction of justice investigation into the president began days after Comey was fired on May 9, according to people familiar with the matter. Mueller’s office has now taken up that work, and the preliminary interviews scheduled with intelligence officials indicate his team is actively pursuing potential witnesses inside and outside the government.</p>
<p>The interviews suggest Mueller sees the attempted obstruction of justice question as more than just a “he said, he said” dispute between the president and the fired FBI director, an official said.</p>
<p>Probing the president for possible crimes is a complicated affair, even if convincing evidence of a crime is found. The Justice Department has long held that it would not be appropriate to indict a sitting president. Instead, experts say the onus would be on Congress to review any findings of criminal misconduct and then decide whether to initiate impeachment proceedings.</p>
<p>Comey confirmed publicly in congressional testimony on March 20 that the bureau was investigating possible coordination between the Trump campaign and the Russians.</p>
<p>Comey’s statement before the House Intelligence Committee upset Trump, who has repeatedly denied that any coordination with the Russians took place. Trump had wanted Comey to disclose publicly that he wasn’t personally under investigation but the FBI director refused to do so.</p>
<p>Soon after, Trump spoke to Coats and Rogers about the Russia investigation.</p>
<p>Officials said one of the exchanges of potential interest to Mueller took place on March 22, less than a week after Coats was confirmed by the Senate to serve as the nation’s top intelligence official.</p>
<p>Coats was attending a briefing at the White House together with officials from several other government agencies. When the briefing ended, as The Post previously reported, Trump asked everyone to leave the room except for Coats and CIA Director Mike Pompeo.</p>
<p>Coats told associates that Trump had asked him if he could intervene with Comey to get the bureau to back off its focus on former national security adviser Michael Flynn in its Russia probe, according to officials. Coats later told lawmakers that he never felt pressured to intervene.</p>
<p>A day or two after the March 22 meeting, Trump telephoned Coats and Rogers to separately ask them to issue public statements denying the existence of any evidence of coordination between his campaign and the Russian government.</p>
<p>Coats and Rogers refused to comply with the president’s requests, officials said.</p>
<p>It is unclear whether Ledgett had direct contact with Trump or other top officials about the Russia probe, but he wrote an internal NSA memo documenting the president’s phone call with Rogers, according to officials.</p>
<p>As part of the probe, the special counsel has also gathered Comey’s written accounts of his conversations with Trump. The president has accused Comey of lying about those encounters.</p>
<p>Mueller is overseeing a host of investigations involving people who are or were in Trump’s orbit, people familiar with the probe said. The investigation is examining possible contacts with Russian operatives as well as any suspicious financial activity related to those individuals.</p>
<p>Last week, Comey told the Senate Intelligence Committee that he had informed Trump that there was no investigation of the president’s personal conduct, at least while he was leading the FBI.</p>
<p>Comey’s carefully worded comments, and those of Andrew McCabe, who took over as acting FBI director, suggested to some officials that a probe of Trump for attempted obstruction may have been launched after Comey’s departure, particularly in light of Trump’s alleged statements regarding Flynn.</p>
<p>“I took it as a very disturbing thing, very concerning, but that’s a conclusion I’m sure the special counsel will work towards, to try and understand what the intention was there, and whether that’s an offense,” Comey testified last week.</p>
<p>Mueller has not publicly discussed his work, and a spokesman for the special counsel declined to comment.</p>
<p>Accounts by Comey and other officials of their conversations with the president could become central pieces of evidence if Mueller decides to pursue an obstruction case.</p>
<p>Investigators will also look for any statements the president may have made publicly and privately to people outside the government about his reasons for firing Comey and his concerns about the Russia probe and other related investigations, people familiar with the matter said.</p>
<p>Comey testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee last week that he was certain his firing was due to the president’s concerns about the Russia probe, rather than over his handling of a now-closed FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server as secretary of state, as the White House had initially asserted. “It’s my judgment that I was fired because of the Russia investigation,” Comey said. “I was fired, in some way, to change – or the endeavor was to change the way the Russia investigation was being conducted.”</p>
<p>The fired FBI director said ultimately it was up to Mueller to make a determination whether the president crossed a legal line.</p>
<p>In addition to describing his interactions with the president, Comey told the intelligence committee that while he was FBI director he told Trump on three separate occasions that he was not under investigation as part of a counter-intelligence probe involving Russian meddling in the election.</p>
<p>Republican lawmakers seized on Comey’s testimony to point out Trump wasn’t in the FBI’s crosshairs when Comey led the FBI.</p>
<p>After Comey’s testimony in which he acknowledged telling Trump that he was not under investigation, Trump tweeted that he felt “total and complete vindication.” It is unclear if McCabe, Comey’s successor, has informed Trump of the change in the scope of the probe.</p>
<p>Related</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">Ex-FBI chief Comey says he was fired to blunt Russian investigation</a></p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">Attorney General Jeff Sessions: no knowledge of collusion with Russia</a></p>
<p /> | false | 1 | special counsel overseeing investigation russias role 2016 election interviewing senior intelligence officials part widening probe includes examination whether president donald trump attempted obstruct justice officials said move special counsel robert mueller investigate trumps conduct marks major turning point nearly yearold fbi investigation recently focused russian meddling presidential campaign whether coordination trump campaign kremlin investigators also looking evidence possible financial crimes among trump associates officials said trump received private assurances former fbi director james comey starting january personally investigation officials say changed shortly comeys firing five people briefed requests spoke condition anonymity authorized discuss matter publicly said daniel coats current director national intelligence adm mike rogers head national security agency rogers recently departed deputy richard ledgett agreed interviewed muellers investigators early week investigation cloaked secrecy unclear many others questioned fbi nsa said statement fully cooperate special counsel declined comment office director national intelligence ledgett declined comment white house refers questions russia investigation trumps personal lawyer marc kasowitz fbi leak information regarding president outrageous inexcusable illegal said mark corallo spokesman kasowitz officials said coats rogers ledgett would appear voluntarily though remains unclear whether describe full conversations trump top officials directed white house invoke executive privilege doubtful white house could ultimately use executive privilege try block speaking muellers investigators experts point supreme court ruled watergate scandal officials use privilege withhold evidence criminal prosecutions obstruction justice investigation president began days comey fired may 9 according people familiar matter muellers office taken work preliminary interviews scheduled intelligence officials indicate team actively pursuing potential witnesses inside outside government interviews suggest mueller sees attempted obstruction justice question said said dispute president fired fbi director official said probing president possible crimes complicated affair even convincing evidence crime found justice department long held would appropriate indict sitting president instead experts say onus would congress review findings criminal misconduct decide whether initiate impeachment proceedings comey confirmed publicly congressional testimony march 20 bureau investigating possible coordination trump campaign russians comeys statement house intelligence committee upset trump repeatedly denied coordination russians took place trump wanted comey disclose publicly wasnt personally investigation fbi director refused soon trump spoke coats rogers russia investigation officials said one exchanges potential interest mueller took place march 22 less week coats confirmed senate serve nations top intelligence official coats attending briefing white house together officials several government agencies briefing ended post previously reported trump asked everyone leave room except coats cia director mike pompeo coats told associates trump asked could intervene comey get bureau back focus former national security adviser michael flynn russia probe according officials coats later told lawmakers never felt pressured intervene day two march 22 meeting trump telephoned coats rogers separately ask issue public statements denying existence evidence coordination campaign russian government coats rogers refused comply presidents requests officials said unclear whether ledgett direct contact trump top officials russia probe wrote internal nsa memo documenting presidents phone call rogers according officials part probe special counsel also gathered comeys written accounts conversations trump president accused comey lying encounters mueller overseeing host investigations involving people trumps orbit people familiar probe said investigation examining possible contacts russian operatives well suspicious financial activity related individuals last week comey told senate intelligence committee informed trump investigation presidents personal conduct least leading fbi comeys carefully worded comments andrew mccabe took acting fbi director suggested officials probe trump attempted obstruction may launched comeys departure particularly light trumps alleged statements regarding flynn took disturbing thing concerning thats conclusion im sure special counsel work towards try understand intention whether thats offense comey testified last week mueller publicly discussed work spokesman special counsel declined comment accounts comey officials conversations president could become central pieces evidence mueller decides pursue obstruction case investigators also look statements president may made publicly privately people outside government reasons firing comey concerns russia probe related investigations people familiar matter said comey testified senate intelligence committee last week certain firing due presidents concerns russia probe rather handling nowclosed fbi investigation hillary clintons use private email server secretary state white house initially asserted judgment fired russia investigation comey said fired way change endeavor change way russia investigation conducted fired fbi director said ultimately mueller make determination whether president crossed legal line addition describing interactions president comey told intelligence committee fbi director told trump three separate occasions investigation part counterintelligence probe involving russian meddling election republican lawmakers seized comeys testimony point trump wasnt fbis crosshairs comey led fbi comeys testimony acknowledged telling trump investigation trump tweeted felt total complete vindication unclear mccabe comeys successor informed trump change scope probe related exfbi chief comey says fired blunt russian investigation attorney general jeff sessions knowledge collusion russia | 761 |
<p>Gargantuan international conferences replete with diplomats, “international civil servants,” various “nongovernmental organization” (NGO) representatives, and the world press have been a staple feature of world politics since the Second World War. One does not fear sinning against charity by suggesting that many of these extravaganzas (in which the international ruling class cavorts, off-hours, in the sybaritic style to which it has become accustomed) are, in the Bard’s familiar words, “a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” But there are exceptions, and they can be important.</p>
<p>The Helsinki Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, which produced the “Helsinki Accords” in 1975, was one such exception. When Leonid Brezhnev signed the Helsinki Final Act in 1975, he probably thought he was taking out a ninety-nine-year lease on Stalin’s external empire. As things turned out, he was signing its death warrant. For “Basket Three” of the Final Act pledged the signatory nations of Europe and North America to certain human rights commitments. And those commitments in turn inspired the formation of “Helsinki monitoring groups,” which were to become the backbone of the human rights resistance in Central and Eastern Europe in the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s: groups that were essential to the nonviolent collapse of communism in the Revolution of 1989 and the New Russian Revolution of 1991.</p>
<p>The September 1994 International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo might be another such exception, with yet another ironic outcome. The UN bureaucrats, Scandinavian politicos, Clinton Administration “global affairs” mavens, radical environmentalists, feminists, and population controllers who planned the conference intended it to be nothing less than the Great Cairo Turkey Shoot: a political slaughter in which the enemies of “individual autonomy,” “sustainable growth,” “global carrying capacity,” “reproductive rights,” “gender equity,” abortion-on-demand, and the sexual revolution would be utterly, decisively routed. But they were not. Indeed, the Cairo conference just may have marked a turning point in the international debate over population and development. It is too early to know for sure, but it is just possible that the radicals’ attempt to take the Cairo conference by storm set in motion moral and cultural dynamics that will, over time, result in the defeat of the radicals’ agenda.</p>
<p>Which, if it were to come to pass, would be a bouleversement of world- historical proportions.</p>
<p>Cairo was the third in a series of decennial international population conferences. The first International Conference on Population was held in 1974 at Budapest, and the second (under the enlarged banner of “Population and Development”) was convened in Mexico City in 1984. Planning for both of these meetings, within the UN bureaucracy and among the thousands of NGO activists who participate in UN-sponsored programs, was dominated by strident doomsayers and hard-core population controllers of the Garrett Hardin/Paul Ehrlich (“the battle to feed all humanity is over”) school. That people were essentially a problem, even a pollutant, rather than a resource; that social, political, economic, and ecological catastrophe was right around the corner, unless drastic steps were taken to stabilize and then reverse world population trends- these were the themes, familiar to even the most casual student of the American anti-natalist lobby, that set the agenda for Budapest and Mexico City.</p>
<p>As it happened, these notions, and the prescriptions for coercive, governmentally enforced programs of fertility reduction that flowed from them, did not sit well with many of the putative beneficiaries of “population control”: namely, the countries of the developing world. At Budapest, for example, the population technocrats were challenged both empirically and culturally: empirically, in that it was made plain that population patterns varied widely around the world, as the result of a complex interaction of economic, social, and cultural factors; and culturally, in that it became clear that there were many different understandings of how population issues should be addressed, even among those who shared the belief that there was a “population problem.” “Development is the best contraceptive” became the slogan (crude, but not inaccurate) that the Third World counterposed to the Hardin/Ehrlich anti-natalist hysteria of the well-to-do “North.”</p>
<p>Ten years later, the population controllers suffered an outright defeat at Mexico City. Not satisfied with the results of their massive efforts to export mechanical and chemical means of contraception to the Third World (some of which had met considerable resistance on both moral- cultural and medical grounds), UN and private sector population agencies had increasingly turned to abortion as a means of family planning and population control. The Chinese policy of coercive abortion was, of course, the most draconian of such enterprises, but its extremism was merely the cruelest face of a general policy actively supported by the anti-natalists throughout the developing world. The population controllers came to Mexico City expecting the conference to give its sanction to abortion-on-demand, in the name of family planning. Yet they were soundly rebuffed. For the conference, with vigorous support from the Reagan Administration, adopted a final report that stated flatly that abortion was not a legitimate means of population control.</p>
<p>This was an ideological defeat for the population controllers, not least because the attention focused on the brutality of the Chinese program graphically demonstrated the lengths to which the controllers were willing to go; having seen what lay at the end of the road, some countries were prepared to question the legitimacy of embarking on the journey in the first place. But the Mexico City conference also had serious financial consequences: it resulted in restrictions on funding for abortion in UN programs; it eliminated such funding from the population components of many nations’ foreign aid budgets; and, on the domestic front, it became the international legal instrument with which the Reagan and Bush Administrations forbade federal support for any public or private aid program that included abortion among its family planning activities.</p>
<p>As may be imagined, all of this stuck, hard, in the collective craw of the population controllers at the UN and World Bank, and among such major activist NGOs as Planned Parenthood of America and the International Planned Parenthood Federation. For not only had they suffered an ideological and financial defeat at Mexico City; they also seemed to understand, however dimly, that they had suffered a moral drubbing as well. It seemed that many people-by their lights unenlightened, authoritarian, conservative, to be sure, but influential nonetheless-believed that the population controllers were not only wrong, they were bad. And since a powerful conviction of its inherent righteousness has been perhaps the chief psychological characteristic of the population control movement for well over a century, it was this moral rejection that cut most deeply, and inflamed the controllers’ determination to “go beyond Mexico City” at the next decennial conference.</p>
<p>The U.S. presidential election of November 1992 promised the population controllers relief, and indeed more than relief. Bill Clinton and Al Gore had, after all, run on the most radical “social issues” platform in American history, committing themselves to federal funding of abortion- on-demand in the U.S. at any stage of a pregnancy; deploring “explosive population growth” in the Third World; and pledging to use federal tax dollars to fund “greater family planning efforts” in U.S. foreign aid programs. Moreover, the Democratic Party’s most vocal activists included men and women, heterosexual and homosexual, who were deeply committed to securing, in American law and public policy, the sexual revolution’s core principle of individual autonomy and its severance of sexual relations from marriage. Little wonder, then, that the controllers, determined as they were to “go beyond Mexico City,” read the electoral entrails of November 3, 1992 as a mandate for radical change in U.S. population policy and, a posteriori, in the agenda of the third International Conference on Population and Development, which was to be held in Cairo in September 1994.</p>
<p>Their expectations were met in full. Indeed, among all the twists and turns of Clinton Administration policy on issues both foreign and domestic, one constant has been an unyielding commitment to abortion-on- demand at home and massive efforts at “population control” abroad. On Clinton’s first day in office, which happened to coincide with the twentieth annual “March for Life” in Washington, he signed five executive orders widening the scope of federal involvement with, and funding of, elective abortion. Rigorous pro-Roe litmus tests were applied to all Clinton nominees to the federal judiciary; and few doubted that the Administration wished to see abortion included as a mandated “service” in any national health care reform. Nor, in a time of fiscal restraint, did the Administration hesitate to beef up the population control portion of its foreign assistance budget. Thus ten months after taking office, the President’s chief foreign aid administrator, J. Brian Atwood, announced a five-year, $75 million commitment to fund the activities of the International Planned Parenthood Federation. (Mr. Atwood defended these and other population control expenditures on the bizarre grounds that the “core” of the chaos in Somalia, in which U.S. troops were then embroiled, was overpopulation. Somali vital statistics may not be the world’s finest, but a reasonable estimate is that Somalia, whose territory is a little larger than that of California, Washington state, Maryland, and Massachusetts combined, had a population in 1992 of some seven million, forty million fewer than the aggregate population of those four states.)</p>
<p>It has never been clear whether the key players in the Clinton Administration really believed that the 42.8 percent of the popular vote they garnered in 1992 constituted a genuine mandate for radical change, or whether that slim plurality impelled the more ideologically fervent members of the Administration to strike while an iron likely to cool quickly was still hot. Whatever the answer, it is indisputably the case that the Administration, led by Undersecretary of State for Global Affairs Timothy Wirth, decided that merely “going beyond Mexico City” was an insufficiently grand goal for the Cairo conference. In league with several Scandinavian and West European countries, UN and World Bank population technocrats, and feminist, anti-natalist, and environmentalist NGOs, the Clintonites sought to engineer a dramatic shift in the focus of the Cairo conference. The packaging (“Population and Development”) would remain, but the content would be dramatically altered-with the earth’s “carrying capacity,” “gender equality, equity, and empowerment of women,” and “reproductive rights” supplanting mere “population and development” as the issues of moment. Which amounted, in brief, to a brazen attempt to use international law and the leverage of Western foreign aid programs to establish the sexual revolution, as lived in Stockholm and Hollywood, as the model of humane culture for the twenty-first century.</p>
<p>This radically altered agenda first came into focus in April 1994, when the third meeting of the Cairo conference preparatory committee (Prep- Com III) took place in New York. Among other things, this meeting underscored the ferocity of Undersecretary Wirth and his allies, who were taking no chances that open debate might put sand in the gears of their political machine. The chairman of Prep-Com III, as he would be of the Cairo conference, was Dr. Fred Sai, usually introduced as the “representative of Ghana,” but in real life (so to speak), the president of the International Planned Parenthood Federation. Nongovernmental members of the U.S. delegation to the New York session included Bella Abzug, Jeannie Rosoff, president of the Alan Guttmacher Institute (the research arm of Planned Parenthood), Patricia Waak, director of the Audubon Society’s population program, and staff members of the Pew Charitable Trusts and the Rockefeller Foundation, two major funders of population control activism. Those who wished to challenge the regnant Clintonite orthodoxies were treated as mere irritants. A seminar sponsored by the United States Catholic Conference, for instance, a registered UN NGO, was denied space in the UN itself; the organizers of the seminar were forbidden to post notice of their meeting; UN officials and population activist NGOs contrived to schedule two other seminars at the same time as the USCC meeting; and meanwhile the shell organization “Catholics for a Free Choice” was given room to operate within the UN complex.</p>
<p>Moreover, this ugliness spilled over from the periphery into the Prep- Com’s formal sessions. When Msgr. Diarmuid Martin of the Vatican delegation criticized the proposed Cairo draft document for its ethical hollowness, he was chastised publicly from the chair by Dr. Sai, who complained that the Holy See was trying to foist its notions of sexual morality on the world. Sai’s remarks were boisterously applauded by a gallery packed with anti-natalist NGO activists. (Sai’s boorish conduct toward the Holy See delegation may have set something of a record for a UN committee chairman, but his anti-Vatican bias was hardly original in substance. At an earlier UN session, Prime Minister Gro Harlem Brundtland of Norway had complained bitterly of obstacles placed in the Cairo conference’s path by a “small state with no natural inhabitants.”)</p>
<p>It was no surprise, then, that Prep-Com III produced a truly radical draft document for the Cairo conference, in which only six of 118 pages were devoted to the conference’s ostensible topic of “population and development,” with the bulk of the rest given over to proposals for a lifestyle revolution of awesome proportions.</p>
<p>Not that the classic population controllers did not do well at Prep-Com III. There was no serious challenge to the shibboleths of “overpopulation,” and the controllers got a pledge of serious money, the draft document having committed the international community to a massive increase in funding for population control activities, up from the current $6 billion to $17 billion by 2000. (The increase was to be paid for by increased American, Japanese, and Scandinavian contributions to the UN Fund for Population Activities [UNFPA], as well as by cutbacks in UN-sponsored education, health care, industrial development, and disaster relief.)</p>
<p>Still, it was the philosophical shift embedded in the Cairo draft document that marked a sea change in the debate. For the draft document’s view of the human condition and the human prospect was rooted in that concept of the radically autonomous individual with which Americans have become all too familiar through the sexual revolution, the deconstructionist decay of the American academy, and the philosophical musings of several Supreme Court justices. “Choice,” the mantra of U.S. proponents of abortion-on-demand (along with “gay rights,” “alternative forms of marriage,” and all the rest of it), became the antiphon of the draft Cairo document produced by Prep-Com III. The results, to put it gently, were striking.</p>
<p>“Marriage” was the dog that didn’t bark in the Cairo draft document. In fact, the only time the word “marriage” appeared in the draft document’s chapter on “the family” was in a passage deploring “coercion and discrimination in policies and practices related to marriage.” But this was hardly surprising, in that the draft document, while frequently noting the importance of “the family in its various forms,” said absolutely nothing about the importance of families rooted in stable marriages for the physical and mental well-being of children. Nor did the draft document have much else to say about the natural and moral bond between parents and children and its importance for achieving many of the document’s laudable goals, such as improved health care and education for youngsters. Indeed, the document sundered the moral relationship between parents and teenage children by treating sexual activity after puberty as a “right” to be exercised at will, and by suggesting that state population and “reproductive health care” agencies be the primary interlocutors of young men and women coming to grips with their sexuality.</p>
<p>The Cairo draft document also proposed establishing a new category of internationally recognized human rights, viz., “reproductive rights,” of which the right to abortion-on-demand was, not surprisingly, the centerpiece. Indeed, it seemed at times as if the codification of an internationally recognized (and, presumably, enforced) “right to abortion” was the primary goal of the Clinton Administration for Cairo. Shortly before Prep-Com III, on March 16, 1994, Secretary of State Warren Christopher had sent a cable to all U.S. diplomatic stations abroad, stating that “the U.S. believes that access to safe, legal, and voluntary abortion is a fundamental right of all women,” and emphasizing that the U.S. objective at Cairo was to get “stronger language on the importance” of “abortion services” into the conference final report. Christopher’s cable, for all its ignorance of the state of the abortion debate in the U.S., at least had the merit of intelligibility; the draft Cairo document followed the familiar UN pattern of Orwellian euphemism, in which coercive family planning policies became “fertility regulation,” and abortion-on-demand was transmuted into “safe motherhood” and “reproductive rights.”</p>
<p>In a contradiction familiar to U.S. veterans of the abortion wars, the Cairo draft document then married the philosophy of the imperial autonomous self to a program of large-scale state coercion in the service of “reproductive rights,” “gender equity,” and, of course, population control. Further, the draft document mandated states to override parental prerogatives (known, in UN-speak, as “social barriers to sexual and reproductive health information and care”) in the matter of adolescent sexual education. The draft document also called for state intrusion into the doctor-patient relationship: after warning that “health care providers” must not “restrict the access of adolescents to the services and information they need,” the document required states to ensure that those “providers” have the proper “attitudes” toward their teenage patients. One need not doubt that the “attitudes” to be enforced here were those of Dr. Joycelyn Elders. (Undersecretary Wirth seemed particularly exercised on the subject of teenage sexuality. At the conclusion of one session with a senior Vatican official prior to the Cairo conference, Wirth is said to have summed up his case in these pellucid terms: “Young people have to know about their bodies.”)</p>
<p>The draft document produced by Prep-Com III also had a nasty totalitarian edge to it. In a striking passage that reflected the affinity between the Kultur of Oprah Winfrey, Phil Donahue, and Linda Bloodworth-Thomasson, on the one hand, and the agenda of Bella Abzug and International Planned Parenthood, on the other, governments were instructed to “use the entertainment media, including radio and television soap operas and drama, folk theater, and other traditional media” to proselytize for the draft document’s ideology and “program of action.” And in order to insure that the usual male reprobates got the word, the draft document instructed governments to get the message of “reproductive rights” and “gender equity” out by instituting programs that “reach men in their workplaces, at home, and where they gather for recreation,” while adolescent boys should be “reached through schools, youth organizations, or wherever they congregate.” In sum, there was to be no area of life-home, workplace, gym, ballpark-into which state- sponsored propaganda on “reproductive rights and reproductive health” did not intrude.</p>
<p>Those of us who had thought that this approach to public policy had been consigned to the trash heap of history in 1989 had evidently been mistaken.</p>
<p>Given their success at Prep-Com III, the smugness and even arrogance displayed by the UN and Clinton Administration planners of the Cairo conference was, if not exactly admirable, quite understandable. They seemed to have perfected a modus operandi that would enable them to steamroller Cairo in the same way (an expectation that was doubtless further enhanced by the fact that more than sixty representatives of International Planned Parenthood would be coming to Cairo as official delegates from many countries). Not only would Cairo “go beyond Mexico City”; it would adopt the radicals’ lifestyle agenda without too much fuss and bother. Critics like the Holy See could easily be brushed aside, as they had been in New York.</p>
<p>Yet even before the Cairo conference convened on Labor Day 1994, some cracks in the coalition that the conference planners were counting on began to show. In the United States-and most especially in the higher altitudes of the Clinton Administration-it is simply assumed that the “empowerment of women,” abortion-on-demand, the libertine mores of the sexual revolution, and government propaganda (even coercion) on family planning go hand-in-glove. However, that is not necessarily the way things work in other parts of the world, or even, for that matter, among the truly radical radicals in the West. Thus, in the wake of Prep-Com III, certain feminist organizations, of a far more belligerent kidney than, say, the National Organization for Women, began planning mock trials, to take place in Cairo, of the World Bank, International Planned Parenthood, and the UNFPA, charging them with oppressing women through coercive governmental birth control programs. As it was to turn out, the feminist sans-culotterie could not win; but they were harbingers of an unanticipated irony in the outcome of the conference.</p>
<p>In any case, the most consequential thing that the planners of the Cairo conference had failed to take into account was the moral power of Pope John Paul II. That the Cairo conference did not adopt, but in fact rejected, key aspects of its planners’ agenda was the result of a variety of factors: nervousness in Latin America, resistance from Islamic societies, and resentment in certain African countries of what they saw as Western cultural imperialism. But the sine qua non of the defeat suffered by the international advocates of the sexual revolution was the public campaign of opposition to the Cairo draft document mounted throughout the summer of 1994 by John Paul II.</p>
<p>This was not a voluble campaign; in its public (as distinguished from private, i.e., diplomatic) dimension, it consisted of a series of twelve ten-minute reflections that the Pope offered at his public audiences during June, July, and August 1994. But by identifying the fundamental ethical errors of the draft document’s approach, and by defining a compelling moral alternative to UN-sponsored libertinism, John Paul II set in motion a resistance movement with considerable potency.</p>
<p>In these reflections, the Pope emphasized that the right to life is the basic human right, “written in human nature,” and the foundation of any meaningful scheme of “human rights”; spoke of the family as the “primary cell” of society and as a “natural institution” with rights that any just state must respect; defined marriage “as a stable union of a man and a woman who are committed to the reciprocal gift of self and open to creating new life, [which] is not only a Christian value, but an original value of creation”; defended the equal human dignity of women, insisted that women must not be reduced to being objects of male pleasure, and argued that “perfection for woman is not to be like man, making herself masculine to the point of losing her specific qualities as a woman”; noted that sexuality has a “language of its own at the service of love and cannot be lived at the purely instinctual level”; argued that stable marriages were essential for the welfare of children; pointed out that the Church does not support an “ideology of fertility at all costs,” but rather proposes a marital ethic in which the decision “whether or not to have a child” is not “motivated by selfishness or carelessness, but by a prudent, conscious generosity that weighs the possibilities and circumstances, and especially gives priority to the welfare of the unborn child”; rejected coercive or “authoritarian” family planning programs as a violation of the married couple’s basic human rights and argued that the foundations of justice in a state are undermined when it does not recognize the unborn child’s moral claim to protection; declared that discrimination against women in “workplace, culture, and politics” must be eliminated in the name of an “authentic emancipation” that does not “deprive woman herself of what is primarily or exclusively hers”; and argued that radical individualism is inhuman, as is a “sexuality apart from ethical references.”</p>
<p>Throughout the summer of 1994, Undersecretary Wirth continued to insist that “we have no fight with the Vatican.” Nonetheless, an argument of considerable amperage had clearly been engaged. In the wake of the confrontation with the Holy See’s delegation at Prep-Com III, Wirth himself began a tour of the American hierarchy, focusing on the resident U.S. cardinals. It would not be unrealistic to suggest that in addition to explaining the Administration’s position, the Undersecretary was searching for a weak link in the chain of American Catholic episcopal support for John Paul II and the Holy See. He did not find it. Instead, a letter to President Clinton from the then six resident U.S. cardinals (Hickey of Washington, Bernardin of Chicago, Law of Boston, O’Connor of New York, Bevilacqua of Philadelphia, Mahony of Los Angeles), joined as a co-signatory by the president of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops (NCCB), Archbishop William H. Keeler of Baltimore, was hand- delivered to the White House. The letter expressed the prelates’ grave concern over “your Administration’s promotion of abortion, contraception, sterilization, and the redefinition of the family” and urged the President to reverse the Administration’s “destructive” agenda for Cairo. In addition, the NCCB unanimously adopted a statement in which the bishops, as “religious leaders and as U.S. citizens,” declared themselves “outraged that our government is leading the effort to foster global acceptance of abortion.” And lest it be thought that worries over Cairo were exclusively Catholic, it should be noted that eleven evangelical leaders, including Charles Colson, James Dobson, Charles Swindoll, Billy Melvin, and Bill Bright, cosigned a letter of their own urging the President “not to make the United States an exporter of violence and death.”</p>
<p>By the end of the summer, the Pope’s decisive clarification of the moral issues at stake in Cairo had not only put the impending conference on the front pages of the prestige press, it had also had a powerful political effect. Undersecretary Wirth, by now a somewhat improbable figure, continued to plead, against all the evidence, that the administration had “no fight with the Vatican.” But his superiors evidently disagreed, and were even more evidently worried; for on August 25, Vice President Al Gore, who was to lead the U.S. delegation in the early days of the Cairo conference, gave a speech at the National Press Club in Washington in which he stated that “the U.S. has not sought, does not seek, and will not seek to establish any international right to abortion.” Any attempt to suggest otherwise was a “red herring.” Yet, as the Holy See’s press spokesman, Joaquin Navarro-Valls, pointed out at a press conference in Rome a few days later, Gore’s statement did not square with the draft document, whose definition of “reproductive health care” as including “pregnancy termination” had been a U.S. initiative. (Navarro-Valls, in what was perhaps an exercise of charity, did not point out that Gore’s Press Club speech was also inconsistent with the Christopher cable of March 16, with the Administration’s domestic policy, and with its foreign aid programs.)</p>
<p>There is some reason to believe that the Vice President was misinformed, rather than deliberately disingenuous, on these matters. And no doubt the Vice President was genuinely concerned about charges of administration anti-Catholicism, reignited when a Reuters story of August 19 quoted Faith Mitchell, the State Department’s population coordinator, as blaming Vatican disagreement with the Cairo draft document on “the fact that the conference is really calling for a new role for women, calling for girls’ education and improving the status of women.” <a href="" type="internal">*</a> But whatever else it clarified or obscured, the Gore/Navarro- Valls exchange made it unmistakably clear that a great battle loomed in Cairo, where the “private sector advisers” to the U.S. delegation included Pamela Maraldo, president of Planned Parenthood of America and, in what the Administration may inexplicably have thought was a concession to religious concerns, the Rev. Joan Brown Campbell, general secretary of the National Council of Churches.</p>
<p>Perhaps the less ideological and more politically astute members of the U.S. delegation hoped that the moral issues could somehow be finessed. But on the very first day of the conference, any such hopes were dashed: Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto of Pakistan-unmistakably a woman, unmistakably Harvard-educated, and unmistakably a major political figure-took to the rostrum, defended the “sanctity of life” on religious grounds, and condemned the Cairo draft document for trying to “impose adultery, sex education . . . and abortion” on all countries. Predictably, the media gave more attention to distaff Norwegian prime minister Brundtland’s defense of “choice” as the essence of the moral issue of abortion. But Bhutto’s impassioned rejection of abortion-on- demand, featured on page one of both the New York Times and the Washington Post and accompanied by pictures of the Pakistani and Norwegian leaders, easily won the battle of feminist iconography-and should have rebutted, once and for all, the charge that the Vatican was holding up consensus on the Cairo document for narrow sectarian reasons.</p>
<p>The opening day statements were followed by five days of negotiating impasse on the document’s abortion language, its discussion of the family, and its approach to adolescent sexuality. During that first week, anti-Catholic sentiment and decidedly undiplomatic criticism of the Holy See were freely vented by NGO activists and official delegates alike. Nicolaas Biegman, the Dutch conference vice chairman, complained after four days that “all we read [about] is abortion, abortion, abortion. I deeply regret it. I think it’s a pity.” Columbia University’s Allan Rosenfield, who represented the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, opined that “the Catholic women of the world do not buy into statements from the elderly celibate clergy.” Another expert in ecclesiology, Alexander Sanger, president of Planned Parenthood of New York City, told the New York Times that “there are two churches, one where the hierarchy talks to the presidents of countries, and then there’s the church of the people. The people are picking and choosing what parts of Catholicism they want to carry over to their personal lives.” Colombia’s Miguel Trias, who heads a government-sponsored family planning organization, fretted that “these Latin American countries are trying to make the Vatican happy. But in 2,000 years the Vatican has never been happy.”</p>
<p>Nor was this kind of unpleasantness limited to press conferences. Gail Quinn, a member of the Holy See delegation and executive director of the U.S. bishops’ Pro-Life Secretariat, was booed and hissed in a formal session of the conference when she rose to explain the Vatican’s objections to some abortion language in the proposed final report; the delegate from Benin had to admonish the chair, the ubiquitous Dr. Sai, that free speech was supposed to be sacrosanct in UN deliberations. Later, while walking past two American representatives in a “delegates- only” area of the conference Center, Quinn heard one of the Americans say to another, in a deliberately audible stage whisper, “There goes that bitch.”</p>
<p>All of which should have suggested, at least to the knowledgeable, that the Holy See’s delegation was having a considerable impact at Cairo. As, indeed, it was. For contrary to reports in the Times and elsewhere that the Holy See had suffered a significant setback, by the end of the first week of the Cairo conference, the Vatican had in fact achieved a great deal. The final report now stated, unambiguously, that “in no case should abortion be promoted as a method of family planning.” The notion of enshrining abortion-on-demand as an internationally recognized basic human right-the centerpiece of the Wirth approach to Cairo-had been abandoned by its proponents, who tacitly conceded that there was no international consensus supporting the claim. The rights and responsibilities of parents in respect of their teenage children had been reaffirmed, and the worst of the euphemistic language about the structure of the family had been changed, so that the Cairo document could not credibly be appealed to on behalf of “gay marriage” and other innovations.</p>
<p>The last major sticking point involved the “safety” of abortions-an important question for the Holy See, which believes that no abortion can be “safe” since, by definition, it results in the death of an innocent human being. The language in dispute stated that “in circumstances where abortion is legal, such abortion should be safe.” At the level of moral principle, this was clearly unacceptable to the Vatican, being as it was the equivalent of saying that “in circumstances where female circumcision is legal, it should be performed with novocaine.” The language was finally altered to read, “in circumstances where abortion is not against the law, such abortion should be safe”-on the surface a minor change, but one that holds out the prospect of legal reform and that does not concede the rectitude of permissive abortion laws.</p>
<p>The New York Times insisted on reporting these debates as a matter of “the Vatican and its few remaining allies” obstructing the course of human progress. But there were other dynamics at work at Cairo, as at Budapest and Mexico City, and it seemed possible that they could frustrate the more ambitious plans of both population controllers and lifestyle radicals in the future. The controllers’ agenda (one of whose historic roots is, frankly, a set of eugenic phobias about “those kind of people”) continues to cause serious concern in Latin America, Africa, and Asia, where political leaders understand that it is their populations, not that of, say, Norway, which are to be brought “under control.” The resistance of Islamic, Latin American, and some African countries to the libertinism enshrined in the Cairo draft document was also of significance for the future. One need not admire many aspects of life in those societies to applaud their recognition that the sexual revolution’s promises of a permissive cornucopia (in Zbigniew Brzezinski’s telling phrase) are a snare and a delusion. And, as that recognition becomes increasingly widespread in an America struggling with unprecedented levels of illegitimacy, welfare dependency, and spousal and child abuse, we may also see a dramatic change in our domestic politics. For as the Clinton Administration’s defeat at Cairo graphically illustrates, you cannot have it both ways: you cannot strengthen the family and the serious moral commitments necessary to sustain the family by treating the community of father, mother, and children as one option in a limitless menu of “lifestyle alternatives.”</p>
<p>Over the long haul, though, the most significant development at the Cairo conference may have been that of a shift in controlling paradigms: from “population control” to “the empowerment of women.” As one Indonesian delegate put it toward the end of the meeting, “We have stopped calling women the receptors of contraceptives. We now call them agents of change.” Americans long familiar with the alliance between feminism and libertinism may instinctively regard this shift, with reason, as simply an amplification of the moral crisis of modernity. But at Cairo there were interesting suggestions that, in different cultural and historical contexts, the issue of “empowerment” may not cut the way it does in Western Europe and in some parts of the United States.</p>
<p>Benazir Bhutto’s speech was one example of that intriguing possibility. For Bhutto’s very presence at Cairo, coupled with the content of her remarks, posed a sharp question: why should the “empowerment of women” be necessarily linked to the codification in international law (and national statutes) of the sexual revolution? Who says “A” does not necessarily have to say “B”-at least in non-Western cultures and traditional societies. (Indeed, it is worth remembering that American and Western European pro-life feminists, the vast majority of whom are deeply committed Christians, have resolutely declined to say “B.”) Perhaps the question can be pressed even further, though: in the developing world, why shouldn’t “the empowerment of women”-meaning that women should be educated, healthy, and no longer treated as property for purposes of marriage-serve to strengthen the roles of women as wives, mothers, and primary educators of their children? Might “the empowerment of women,” in cultures whose women would regard Bella Abzug and Pamela Maraldo as something like aliens from Alpha Centauri, lead to a revitalization of the traditional family and a reaffirmation of the distinctively maternal power of women?</p>
<p>Joan Dunlop, president of the International Women’s Health Coalition, found it “really extraordinary that in an international UN forum we are talking about sexual and reproductive health and the empowerment of women. These are things that many people of different cultures can understand.” Indeed. But the question is, how? The travail of the conference translators at Cairo suggests the volatility of this “empowerment” language (and the rest of the armamentarium of fem-speak) and the difficulty of predicting precisely how it will shape lives in radically different societies and cultures.</p>
<p>French translators had to resuscitate a nineteenth-century term (sante genesique) in the effort to render “reproductive health” in their language. “Family leave” had almost everybody but the Americans stumped; the Arabic translation refers to parents leaving each other after a birth, while the Russian translation spoke of the entire family taking a vacation together. The Chinese thought “sexual exploitation” was an easy one, for they could rely on Chairman Mao’s critique of capitalists. (They could also have used his doctor’s memoirs, in which the chairman is remembered as an unregenerate sexual predator who ingested ground elks’ horns as an antidote to impotence.) But the Arabs were caught between American buzz words and their own religious sensibilities. “Sexually active unmarried individuals”-who are committing criminal acts under Islamic law-thus became “sexually active as-yet-to-be married individuals.” The Russians couldn’t figure out how to translate “unwanted pregnancies” so that the phrase did not denote “undesirable pregnancies”; and that was relatively mild, compared to the Russian translation of “reproductive health,” which comes out as “health that reproduces itself again and again” (the Arabic cuts even closer to the bone of the abortion issue, as “reproductive health” becomes “health concerning the begetting of children”).</p>
<p>One veteran population activist, Jason Finkle of the University of Michigan, worried that “all kinds of things have now been packed into the trunk of population: women’s and children’s health, female literacy, women’s labor rights. I’m fearful that we’ve gotten away from the focus on population size and growth.” It does not seem, after Cairo, an entirely unreasonable expectation. But some will regard this as something less to be feared than to be-very cautiously-celebrated.</p>
<p>Some things that ought to have happened at Cairo didn’t. There was no concerted challenge to the ideologically charged concept of “overpopulation,” although the work of Nicholas Eberstadt, Julian Simon, Karl Zinsmeister, and others has made clear that the term itself has no credible scientific meaning. This intellectual failure, combined with the clash of moral visions at Cairo, produced a somewhat schizoid final document, which endorses voluntary measures of population control but then sets population targets whose achievement would seem to require coercive governmental intervention in family planning. The resolution of that tension will, over the next decade, tell us much about the future of population policy (and politics) at both the international and national levels.</p>
<p>The conference also failed to confront the UN’s continuing fixation on Third World development as essentially a matter of massive resource transfers from the developed to the developing world. The Holy See did heroic work at Cairo, and in the months between Prep-Com III and the September conference. But it would have added even more to the debate had its representatives taken up the question of governmental criminality and its relationship to the despoilation of the Third World; materials for such a challenge were ready to hand in the 1987 encyclical of John Paul II, Solicitudo Rei Socialis, in which the Pope had urged developing nations to “reform certain unjust structures, and in particular their political institutions, in order to replace corrupt, dictatorial, and authoritarian governments with democratic and participatory ones.” The Holy See might also have taken a leaf from John Paul’s 1991 social encyclical Centesimus Annus and boldly urged the view that human beings are the basic resource for development, because the source of wealth in the modern world is human creativity.</p>
<p>At the grassroots level, it will be a while before the paradigm shift from “population control” to “empowerment of women” takes effect. Meanwhile, huge amounts of money will continue to be poured into family planning programs, many of which are either subtly or overtly coercive. Remedial action on this front will require extreme vigilance over foreign aid budgets, and careful attention will have to be paid to the Clinton Administration as it tries to square its adherence to an international agreement that flatly rejects abortion as a means of family planning with its commitment to huge increases in U.S. aid funding to organizations that actively promote precisely that evil.</p>
<p>So the Battle of Cairo will continue, in other venues. And it will remain, at bottom, a moral struggle: about the dignity and value of human beings, about the rights and responsibilities of women and men, about the relationship between marriage, sexuality, and the rearing of children. Thanks to John Paul II’s refusal to concede the Holy See’s irrelevance in accordance with the prepared media script, the unavoidable moral core of the population argument was forced onto center stage at Cairo. And there it became clear, to those with eyes to see, that the mores of Hollywood, Manhattan’s Upper West Side, and Copenhagen are not universally shared, admired, or sought.</p>
<p>That, in itself, was no mean accomplishment. And it might, just might, presage a more morally and empirically serious population and development debate in the future.</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>
<p><a type="external" href="" />*In the same Reuters report in which Ms. Mitchell suggested that the Church wanted to deny women an education, State Department spokesman Mike McCurry warned the Vatican against negotiating with Iran. A week later, in Cairo, American delegates were seen openly negotiating compromise language on abortion and “reproductive rights” with Iranian delegates.</p> | false | 1 | gargantuan international conferences replete diplomats international civil servants various nongovernmental organization ngo representatives world press staple feature world politics since second world war one fear sinning charity suggesting many extravaganzas international ruling class cavorts offhours sybaritic style become accustomed bards familiar words tale told idiot full sound fury signifying nothing exceptions important helsinki conference security cooperation europe produced helsinki accords 1975 one exception leonid brezhnev signed helsinki final act 1975 probably thought taking ninetynineyear lease stalins external empire things turned signing death warrant basket three final act pledged signatory nations europe north america certain human rights commitments commitments turn inspired formation helsinki monitoring groups become backbone human rights resistance central eastern europe late 1970s throughout 1980s groups essential nonviolent collapse communism revolution 1989 new russian revolution 1991 september 1994 international conference population development cairo might another exception yet another ironic outcome un bureaucrats scandinavian politicos clinton administration global affairs mavens radical environmentalists feminists population controllers planned conference intended nothing less great cairo turkey shoot political slaughter enemies individual autonomy sustainable growth global carrying capacity reproductive rights gender equity abortionondemand sexual revolution would utterly decisively routed indeed cairo conference may marked turning point international debate population development early know sure possible radicals attempt take cairo conference storm set motion moral cultural dynamics time result defeat radicals agenda come pass would bouleversement world historical proportions cairo third series decennial international population conferences first international conference population held 1974 budapest second enlarged banner population development convened mexico city 1984 planning meetings within un bureaucracy among thousands ngo activists participate unsponsored programs dominated strident doomsayers hardcore population controllers garrett hardinpaul ehrlich battle feed humanity school people essentially problem even pollutant rather resource social political economic ecological catastrophe right around corner unless drastic steps taken stabilize reverse world population trends themes familiar even casual student american antinatalist lobby set agenda budapest mexico city happened notions prescriptions coercive governmentally enforced programs fertility reduction flowed sit well many putative beneficiaries population control namely countries developing world budapest example population technocrats challenged empirically culturally empirically made plain population patterns varied widely around world result complex interaction economic social cultural factors culturally became clear many different understandings population issues addressed even among shared belief population problem development best contraceptive became slogan crude inaccurate third world counterposed hardinehrlich antinatalist hysteria welltodo north ten years later population controllers suffered outright defeat mexico city satisfied results massive efforts export mechanical chemical means contraception third world met considerable resistance moral cultural medical grounds un private sector population agencies increasingly turned abortion means family planning population control chinese policy coercive abortion course draconian enterprises extremism merely cruelest face general policy actively supported antinatalists throughout developing world population controllers came mexico city expecting conference give sanction abortionondemand name family planning yet soundly rebuffed conference vigorous support reagan administration adopted final report stated flatly abortion legitimate means population control ideological defeat population controllers least attention focused brutality chinese program graphically demonstrated lengths controllers willing go seen lay end road countries prepared question legitimacy embarking journey first place mexico city conference also serious financial consequences resulted restrictions funding abortion un programs eliminated funding population components many nations foreign aid budgets domestic front became international legal instrument reagan bush administrations forbade federal support public private aid program included abortion among family planning activities may imagined stuck hard collective craw population controllers un world bank among major activist ngos planned parenthood america international planned parenthood federation suffered ideological financial defeat mexico city also seemed understand however dimly suffered moral drubbing well seemed many peopleby lights unenlightened authoritarian conservative sure influential nonethelessbelieved population controllers wrong bad since powerful conviction inherent righteousness perhaps chief psychological characteristic population control movement well century moral rejection cut deeply inflamed controllers determination go beyond mexico city next decennial conference us presidential election november 1992 promised population controllers relief indeed relief bill clinton al gore run radical social issues platform american history committing federal funding abortion ondemand us stage pregnancy deploring explosive population growth third world pledging use federal tax dollars fund greater family planning efforts us foreign aid programs moreover democratic partys vocal activists included men women heterosexual homosexual deeply committed securing american law public policy sexual revolutions core principle individual autonomy severance sexual relations marriage little wonder controllers determined go beyond mexico city read electoral entrails november 3 1992 mandate radical change us population policy posteriori agenda third international conference population development held cairo september 1994 expectations met full indeed among twists turns clinton administration policy issues foreign domestic one constant unyielding commitment abortionon demand home massive efforts population control abroad clintons first day office happened coincide twentieth annual march life washington signed five executive orders widening scope federal involvement funding elective abortion rigorous proroe litmus tests applied clinton nominees federal judiciary doubted administration wished see abortion included mandated service national health care reform time fiscal restraint administration hesitate beef population control portion foreign assistance budget thus ten months taking office presidents chief foreign aid administrator j brian atwood announced fiveyear 75 million commitment fund activities international planned parenthood federation mr atwood defended population control expenditures bizarre grounds core chaos somalia us troops embroiled overpopulation somali vital statistics may worlds finest reasonable estimate somalia whose territory little larger california washington state maryland massachusetts combined population 1992 seven million forty million fewer aggregate population four states never clear whether key players clinton administration really believed 428 percent popular vote garnered 1992 constituted genuine mandate radical change whether slim plurality impelled ideologically fervent members administration strike iron likely cool quickly still hot whatever answer indisputably case administration led undersecretary state global affairs timothy wirth decided merely going beyond mexico city insufficiently grand goal cairo conference league several scandinavian west european countries un world bank population technocrats feminist antinatalist environmentalist ngos clintonites sought engineer dramatic shift focus cairo conference packaging population development would remain content would dramatically alteredwith earths carrying capacity gender equality equity empowerment women reproductive rights supplanting mere population development issues moment amounted brief brazen attempt use international law leverage western foreign aid programs establish sexual revolution lived stockholm hollywood model humane culture twentyfirst century radically altered agenda first came focus april 1994 third meeting cairo conference preparatory committee prep com iii took place new york among things meeting underscored ferocity undersecretary wirth allies taking chances open debate might put sand gears political machine chairman prepcom iii would cairo conference dr fred sai usually introduced representative ghana real life speak president international planned parenthood federation nongovernmental members us delegation new york session included bella abzug jeannie rosoff president alan guttmacher institute research arm planned parenthood patricia waak director audubon societys population program staff members pew charitable trusts rockefeller foundation two major funders population control activism wished challenge regnant clintonite orthodoxies treated mere irritants seminar sponsored united states catholic conference instance registered un ngo denied space un organizers seminar forbidden post notice meeting un officials population activist ngos contrived schedule two seminars time uscc meeting meanwhile shell organization catholics free choice given room operate within un complex moreover ugliness spilled periphery prep coms formal sessions msgr diarmuid martin vatican delegation criticized proposed cairo draft document ethical hollowness chastised publicly chair dr sai complained holy see trying foist notions sexual morality world sais remarks boisterously applauded gallery packed antinatalist ngo activists sais boorish conduct toward holy see delegation may set something record un committee chairman antivatican bias hardly original substance earlier un session prime minister gro harlem brundtland norway complained bitterly obstacles placed cairo conferences path small state natural inhabitants surprise prepcom iii produced truly radical draft document cairo conference six 118 pages devoted conferences ostensible topic population development bulk rest given proposals lifestyle revolution awesome proportions classic population controllers well prepcom iii serious challenge shibboleths overpopulation controllers got pledge serious money draft document committed international community massive increase funding population control activities current 6 billion 17 billion 2000 increase paid increased american japanese scandinavian contributions un fund population activities unfpa well cutbacks unsponsored education health care industrial development disaster relief still philosophical shift embedded cairo draft document marked sea change debate draft documents view human condition human prospect rooted concept radically autonomous individual americans become familiar sexual revolution deconstructionist decay american academy philosophical musings several supreme court justices choice mantra us proponents abortionondemand along gay rights alternative forms marriage rest became antiphon draft cairo document produced prepcom iii results put gently striking marriage dog didnt bark cairo draft document fact time word marriage appeared draft documents chapter family passage deploring coercion discrimination policies practices related marriage hardly surprising draft document frequently noting importance family various forms said absolutely nothing importance families rooted stable marriages physical mental wellbeing children draft document much else say natural moral bond parents children importance achieving many documents laudable goals improved health care education youngsters indeed document sundered moral relationship parents teenage children treating sexual activity puberty right exercised suggesting state population reproductive health care agencies primary interlocutors young men women coming grips sexuality cairo draft document also proposed establishing new category internationally recognized human rights viz reproductive rights right abortionondemand surprisingly centerpiece indeed seemed times codification internationally recognized presumably enforced right abortion primary goal clinton administration cairo shortly prepcom iii march 16 1994 secretary state warren christopher sent cable us diplomatic stations abroad stating us believes access safe legal voluntary abortion fundamental right women emphasizing us objective cairo get stronger language importance abortion services conference final report christophers cable ignorance state abortion debate us least merit intelligibility draft cairo document followed familiar un pattern orwellian euphemism coercive family planning policies became fertility regulation abortionondemand transmuted safe motherhood reproductive rights contradiction familiar us veterans abortion wars cairo draft document married philosophy imperial autonomous self program largescale state coercion service reproductive rights gender equity course population control draft document mandated states override parental prerogatives known unspeak social barriers sexual reproductive health information care matter adolescent sexual education draft document also called state intrusion doctorpatient relationship warning health care providers must restrict access adolescents services information need document required states ensure providers proper attitudes toward teenage patients one need doubt attitudes enforced dr joycelyn elders undersecretary wirth seemed particularly exercised subject teenage sexuality conclusion one session senior vatican official prior cairo conference wirth said summed case pellucid terms young people know bodies draft document produced prepcom iii also nasty totalitarian edge striking passage reflected affinity kultur oprah winfrey phil donahue linda bloodworththomasson one hand agenda bella abzug international planned parenthood governments instructed use entertainment media including radio television soap operas drama folk theater traditional media proselytize draft documents ideology program action order insure usual male reprobates got word draft document instructed governments get message reproductive rights gender equity instituting programs reach men workplaces home gather recreation adolescent boys reached schools youth organizations wherever congregate sum area lifehome workplace gym ballparkinto state sponsored propaganda reproductive rights reproductive health intrude us thought approach public policy consigned trash heap history 1989 evidently mistaken given success prepcom iii smugness even arrogance displayed un clinton administration planners cairo conference exactly admirable quite understandable seemed perfected modus operandi would enable steamroller cairo way expectation doubtless enhanced fact sixty representatives international planned parenthood would coming cairo official delegates many countries would cairo go beyond mexico city would adopt radicals lifestyle agenda without much fuss bother critics like holy see could easily brushed aside new york yet even cairo conference convened labor day 1994 cracks coalition conference planners counting began show united statesand especially higher altitudes clinton administrationit simply assumed empowerment women abortionondemand libertine mores sexual revolution government propaganda even coercion family planning go handinglove however necessarily way things work parts world even matter among truly radical radicals west thus wake prepcom iii certain feminist organizations far belligerent kidney say national organization women began planning mock trials take place cairo world bank international planned parenthood unfpa charging oppressing women coercive governmental birth control programs turn feminist sansculotterie could win harbingers unanticipated irony outcome conference case consequential thing planners cairo conference failed take account moral power pope john paul ii cairo conference adopt fact rejected key aspects planners agenda result variety factors nervousness latin america resistance islamic societies resentment certain african countries saw western cultural imperialism sine qua non defeat suffered international advocates sexual revolution public campaign opposition cairo draft document mounted throughout summer 1994 john paul ii voluble campaign public distinguished private ie diplomatic dimension consisted series twelve tenminute reflections pope offered public audiences june july august 1994 identifying fundamental ethical errors draft documents approach defining compelling moral alternative unsponsored libertinism john paul ii set motion resistance movement considerable potency reflections pope emphasized right life basic human right written human nature foundation meaningful scheme human rights spoke family primary cell society natural institution rights state must respect defined marriage stable union man woman committed reciprocal gift self open creating new life christian value original value creation defended equal human dignity women insisted women must reduced objects male pleasure argued perfection woman like man making masculine point losing specific qualities woman noted sexuality language service love lived purely instinctual level argued stable marriages essential welfare children pointed church support ideology fertility costs rather proposes marital ethic decision whether child motivated selfishness carelessness prudent conscious generosity weighs possibilities circumstances especially gives priority welfare unborn child rejected coercive authoritarian family planning programs violation married couples basic human rights argued foundations justice state undermined recognize unborn childs moral claim protection declared discrimination women workplace culture politics must eliminated name authentic emancipation deprive woman primarily exclusively argued radical individualism inhuman sexuality apart ethical references throughout summer 1994 undersecretary wirth continued insist fight vatican nonetheless argument considerable amperage clearly engaged wake confrontation holy sees delegation prepcom iii wirth began tour american hierarchy focusing resident us cardinals would unrealistic suggest addition explaining administrations position undersecretary searching weak link chain american catholic episcopal support john paul ii holy see find instead letter president clinton six resident us cardinals hickey washington bernardin chicago law boston oconnor new york bevilacqua philadelphia mahony los angeles joined cosignatory president national conference catholic bishops nccb archbishop william h keeler baltimore hand delivered white house letter expressed prelates grave concern administrations promotion abortion contraception sterilization redefinition family urged president reverse administrations destructive agenda cairo addition nccb unanimously adopted statement bishops religious leaders us citizens declared outraged government leading effort foster global acceptance abortion lest thought worries cairo exclusively catholic noted eleven evangelical leaders including charles colson james dobson charles swindoll billy melvin bill bright cosigned letter urging president make united states exporter violence death end summer popes decisive clarification moral issues stake cairo put impending conference front pages prestige press also powerful political effect undersecretary wirth somewhat improbable figure continued plead evidence administration fight vatican superiors evidently disagreed even evidently worried august 25 vice president al gore lead us delegation early days cairo conference gave speech national press club washington stated us sought seek seek establish international right abortion attempt suggest otherwise red herring yet holy sees press spokesman joaquin navarrovalls pointed press conference rome days later gores statement square draft document whose definition reproductive health care including pregnancy termination us initiative navarrovalls perhaps exercise charity point gores press club speech also inconsistent christopher cable march 16 administrations domestic policy foreign aid programs reason believe vice president misinformed rather deliberately disingenuous matters doubt vice president genuinely concerned charges administration anticatholicism reignited reuters story august 19 quoted faith mitchell state departments population coordinator blaming vatican disagreement cairo draft document fact conference really calling new role women calling girls education improving status women whatever else clarified obscured gorenavarro valls exchange made unmistakably clear great battle loomed cairo private sector advisers us delegation included pamela maraldo president planned parenthood america administration may inexplicably thought concession religious concerns rev joan brown campbell general secretary national council churches perhaps less ideological politically astute members us delegation hoped moral issues could somehow finessed first day conference hopes dashed prime minister benazir bhutto pakistanunmistakably woman unmistakably harvardeducated unmistakably major political figuretook rostrum defended sanctity life religious grounds condemned cairo draft document trying impose adultery sex education abortion countries predictably media gave attention distaff norwegian prime minister brundtlands defense choice essence moral issue abortion bhuttos impassioned rejection abortionon demand featured page one new york times washington post accompanied pictures pakistani norwegian leaders easily battle feminist iconographyand rebutted charge vatican holding consensus cairo document narrow sectarian reasons opening day statements followed five days negotiating impasse documents abortion language discussion family approach adolescent sexuality first week anticatholic sentiment decidedly undiplomatic criticism holy see freely vented ngo activists official delegates alike nicolaas biegman dutch conference vice chairman complained four days read abortion abortion abortion deeply regret think pity columbia universitys allan rosenfield represented american college obstetricians gynecologists opined catholic women world buy statements elderly celibate clergy another expert ecclesiology alexander sanger president planned parenthood new york city told new york times two churches one hierarchy talks presidents countries theres church people people picking choosing parts catholicism want carry personal lives colombias miguel trias heads governmentsponsored family planning organization fretted latin american countries trying make vatican happy 2000 years vatican never happy kind unpleasantness limited press conferences gail quinn member holy see delegation executive director us bishops prolife secretariat booed hissed formal session conference rose explain vaticans objections abortion language proposed final report delegate benin admonish chair ubiquitous dr sai free speech supposed sacrosanct un deliberations later walking past two american representatives delegates area conference center quinn heard one americans say another deliberately audible stage whisper goes bitch suggested least knowledgeable holy sees delegation considerable impact cairo indeed contrary reports times elsewhere holy see suffered significant setback end first week cairo conference vatican fact achieved great deal final report stated unambiguously case abortion promoted method family planning notion enshrining abortionondemand internationally recognized basic human rightthe centerpiece wirth approach cairohad abandoned proponents tacitly conceded international consensus supporting claim rights responsibilities parents respect teenage children reaffirmed worst euphemistic language structure family changed cairo document could credibly appealed behalf gay marriage innovations last major sticking point involved safety abortionsan important question holy see believes abortion safe since definition results death innocent human language dispute stated circumstances abortion legal abortion safe level moral principle clearly unacceptable vatican equivalent saying circumstances female circumcision legal performed novocaine language finally altered read circumstances abortion law abortion safeon surface minor change one holds prospect legal reform concede rectitude permissive abortion laws new york times insisted reporting debates matter vatican remaining allies obstructing course human progress dynamics work cairo budapest mexico city seemed possible could frustrate ambitious plans population controllers lifestyle radicals future controllers agenda one whose historic roots frankly set eugenic phobias kind people continues cause serious concern latin america africa asia political leaders understand populations say norway brought control resistance islamic latin american african countries libertinism enshrined cairo draft document also significance future one need admire many aspects life societies applaud recognition sexual revolutions promises permissive cornucopia zbigniew brzezinskis telling phrase snare delusion recognition becomes increasingly widespread america struggling unprecedented levels illegitimacy welfare dependency spousal child abuse may also see dramatic change domestic politics clinton administrations defeat cairo graphically illustrates ways strengthen family serious moral commitments necessary sustain family treating community father mother children one option limitless menu lifestyle alternatives long haul though significant development cairo conference may shift controlling paradigms population control empowerment women one indonesian delegate put toward end meeting stopped calling women receptors contraceptives call agents change americans long familiar alliance feminism libertinism may instinctively regard shift reason simply amplification moral crisis modernity cairo interesting suggestions different cultural historical contexts issue empowerment may cut way western europe parts united states benazir bhuttos speech one example intriguing possibility bhuttos presence cairo coupled content remarks posed sharp question empowerment women necessarily linked codification international law national statutes sexual revolution says necessarily say bat least nonwestern cultures traditional societies indeed worth remembering american western european prolife feminists vast majority deeply committed christians resolutely declined say b perhaps question pressed even though developing world shouldnt empowerment womenmeaning women educated healthy longer treated property purposes marriageserve strengthen roles women wives mothers primary educators children might empowerment women cultures whose women would regard bella abzug pamela maraldo something like aliens alpha centauri lead revitalization traditional family reaffirmation distinctively maternal power women joan dunlop president international womens health coalition found really extraordinary international un forum talking sexual reproductive health empowerment women things many people different cultures understand indeed question travail conference translators cairo suggests volatility empowerment language rest armamentarium femspeak difficulty predicting precisely shape lives radically different societies cultures french translators resuscitate nineteenthcentury term sante genesique effort render reproductive health language family leave almost everybody americans stumped arabic translation refers parents leaving birth russian translation spoke entire family taking vacation together chinese thought sexual exploitation easy one could rely chairman maos critique capitalists could also used doctors memoirs chairman remembered unregenerate sexual predator ingested ground elks horns antidote impotence arabs caught american buzz words religious sensibilities sexually active unmarried individualswho committing criminal acts islamic lawthus became sexually active asyettobe married individuals russians couldnt figure translate unwanted pregnancies phrase denote undesirable pregnancies relatively mild compared russian translation reproductive health comes health reproduces arabic cuts even closer bone abortion issue reproductive health becomes health concerning begetting children one veteran population activist jason finkle university michigan worried kinds things packed trunk population womens childrens health female literacy womens labor rights im fearful weve gotten away focus population size growth seem cairo entirely unreasonable expectation regard something less feared bevery cautiouslycelebrated things ought happened cairo didnt concerted challenge ideologically charged concept overpopulation although work nicholas eberstadt julian simon karl zinsmeister others made clear term credible scientific meaning intellectual failure combined clash moral visions cairo produced somewhat schizoid final document endorses voluntary measures population control sets population targets whose achievement would seem require coercive governmental intervention family planning resolution tension next decade tell us much future population policy politics international national levels conference also failed confront uns continuing fixation third world development essentially matter massive resource transfers developed developing world holy see heroic work cairo months prepcom iii september conference would added even debate representatives taken question governmental criminality relationship despoilation third world materials challenge ready hand 1987 encyclical john paul ii solicitudo rei socialis pope urged developing nations reform certain unjust structures particular political institutions order replace corrupt dictatorial authoritarian governments democratic participatory ones holy see might also taken leaf john pauls 1991 social encyclical centesimus annus boldly urged view human beings basic resource development source wealth modern world human creativity grassroots level paradigm shift population control empowerment women takes effect meanwhile huge amounts money continue poured family planning programs many either subtly overtly coercive remedial action front require extreme vigilance foreign aid budgets careful attention paid clinton administration tries square adherence international agreement flatly rejects abortion means family planning commitment huge increases us aid funding organizations actively promote precisely evil battle cairo continue venues remain bottom moral struggle dignity value human beings rights responsibilities women men relationship marriage sexuality rearing children thanks john paul iis refusal concede holy sees irrelevance accordance prepared media script unavoidable moral core population argument forced onto center stage cairo became clear eyes see mores hollywood manhattans upper west side copenhagen universally shared admired sought mean accomplishment might might presage morally empirically serious population development debate future george weigel distinguished senior fellow ethics public policy center washington dc holds eppcs william e simon chair catholic studies reuters report ms mitchell suggested church wanted deny women education state department spokesman mike mccurry warned vatican negotiating iran week later cairo american delegates seen openly negotiating compromise language abortion reproductive rights iranian delegates | 3,902 |
<p>This article first appeared in the print edition of The Spectator magazine, dated <a href="http://www.spectator.co.uk/issues/4-april-2015/" type="external">4 April 2015</a></p>
<p>To the extent that Britain has philosophers, we do not expect them to address issues of any relevance to the rest of us. They may pursue some hermeneutic byway perhaps, but not the urgent or profound issues of our time.</p>
<p>Roger Scruton has always been an exception in this regard, as in many others. He has spent his adult life thinking and writing about the nature of love, the nation state, belonging, alienation, beauty, home and England. But even his closest readers may gulp at the relevance of his latest subject matter. His new novel, The Disappeared, is set in the north of England and centres on the recent rape-gang cases. It’s a gripping, disturbing narrative dealing with abduction and abuse but also love, escape and a type of redemption. I went to see him last week, a world away from all these subjects, at his farm in&#160;Wiltshire.</p>
<p>‘I’ve been thinking about these things for quite some time,’ he says as we settle into his book- and piano-filled study. ‘The problem of the integration of the Muslim community into our cities.’ He is aware of the landmines on this territory. Thirty years ago he inadvertently stepped on one by publishing a piece by a Bradford headmaster, Ray Honeyford, about multiculturalism in schools. ‘I looked back at my experience [in 1984] with the Salisbury Reviewand the Ray Honeyford case and the huge difficulty that teachers have. Because our political class has transferred to teachers the whole obligation to integrate new immigrant communities… People find themselves with classrooms where nobody can speak English, with customs they can’t relate to and with those problems that Honeyford had with discipline and outright antagonism. That was in Bradford, and of course when I read about the Oxford grooming cases, I just had this vision of a story that would bring these things together — the dreadful situation of the teacher in a modern city, and also the situation of young girls who are vulnerable because their families have not worked out and the various problems that have arisen through secularisation and so on. And so I put together a story out of these things.’</p>
<p>Readers of his columns and works of philosophy may wonder why he chose to tackle this through the medium of the novel. ‘I’ve always taken the view that works of art are not just things that we enjoy. They can convey truths about the world more vividly and to greater effect than ordinary philosophical prose can because they don’t just deal in ideas but show the emotional reality of them. And I think that our society has gone terribly wrong because people have not been confronting the great issues — the loss of the Christian faith, the inability to confront Islam, the loss of the sense of the sacredness of the sexual relation, and the exposure in particular of young women both to external predation and to this moral decay. All these things are real. In my book the principal teacher is someone who is also attracted to the girl victim and that raises another big question — the question of paedophilia, which has a huge hysteria about it in this country because it is the last remaining redoubt of innocence, of childhood, but it’s also the thing that everybody for that reason is assaulting.’ Why assaulting?</p>
<p>‘Well, because innocence and purity are objects of sexual desire. In a healthy society, this desire is maintained, while also maintaining the wall which protects innocence. But that wall has crumbled, which is why there is this sort of public hysteria about paedophilia. It’s the last remaining crime in the sexual area. Putting all these things together just enabled me in a story, in a novel, to connect emotionally, not just intellectually.’</p>
<p>This desire to communicate — to connect — runs throughout all of Scruton’s work but seems to have grown with the years. He has started a family, and discovered a great love of hunting fairly late in life. But as the remaining sun of an English spring day filters across the study, there is also an ever-present sadness. Something like a permanent bruised-ness. The Honeyford affair helped destroy Scruton’s career in the universities and he knows why so few people address these issues.</p>
<p>‘The truth is hard. We don’t need reminding that there is a heavy censorship in all matters to do with immigration, to do with the integration of immigrant communities and in particular the integration of Muslim communities. The police forces of those northern cities were heavily intimidated by the Macpherson report, accusing police forces all over the country of institutional racism, which was an incredible injustice, which means they are going to lean over backwards not to get involved in what’s going on in the local immigrant communities for fear of this. That’s clearly what has happened in Rotherham and also people don’t want to write about it because they’ve also seen the penalties.’</p>
<p>He has been hearing the same stories from teachers for 30 years now. ‘If you’re a schoolteacher and trying to survive in these circumstances and knowing that you’re up against all these assembled forces, then self-censorship is not just likely, it’s necessary. But if you’re a philosopher who is self-employed at the end of his career, then it’s pointless to engage in self-censorship. It’s great, I can just say what is true. People will shout and scream, and all the usual things will be said. But more and more people will realise that this self-censorship is not just counter-productive in itself but has actually worsened the problem because it has prevented people from dealing with it. It has prevented the immigrant communities themselves from dealing with it.’</p>
<p>But things have got better, haven’t they? Hasn’t the discussion at least opened out? We are speaking a couple of days after Trevor Phillips has made another noted intervention, attacking those ‘anti-racists’ who have shut down debate for years. This prompts a classically Scrutonian response: ‘Things have changed now because as always when a battle is lost you can speak freely about it.’</p>
<p>Does he really mean that? I ask with trepidation. ‘The big battle to maintain a proper educational system which will be continuous with the old curriculum and passing on what we have while adapting to all the changes, that big battle was lost, I think.’ When? ‘Over the past 20 years. Certainly by the time that New Labour were in they didn’t have much work to do. When people first raised the question about integrating the new communities it was in a spirit of hope — that one would be able to maintain the core of what we have. It’s the other side who actually want to destroy that core. Certainly the multicultural activists in the Labour party and the universities wanted to destroy the old white Anglo-Saxon education system as they saw it, and produce something completely different — with no conception of what that completely different thing would be, of course. It’s always easier to destroy than to create, and I think that’s what we’ve seen. But then people start again.’</p>
<p>What are the signs of rebirth? ‘I was very impressed visiting Katharine Birbalsingh’s free school the other day — 110 faces, all of them black except for a little handful of Romanians — in which there was real discipline and they were being taught the old curriculum and the teachers were really trying to integrate these children into what they saw as the culture to which they were destined.’</p>
<p>So the battle is for continuity? ‘Yes, and for the survival of western civilisation. It’s not as though we’ve lost it completely. We still have got this civilisation — it’s all we’ve got, and it’s not as though we’re going to be able to replace it with any other. I think that’s really what underlies this story of The Disappeared. A lot of things have disappeared.’</p>
<p>Having been made something of a pariah for recognising these truths early, does he feel any sense of vindication? He laughs slightly. ‘I don’t feel as though I need it. It’s the way the world is. If you say something in advance — if you describe a problem as it arises, people always turn on you because they don’t want to hear about it. But when it’s too late to do anything, they will then turn around and say that you were right. That’s human nature.’</p>
<p>Despite being fêted and honoured across eastern Europe for his work with dissidents behind the Iron Curtain, and despite his worldwide renown as a philosopher, Scruton is still without honour in his own land. Does this upset him? ‘We live in a time when honours and praise go only to people on the left, essentially because they seem harmless. And what makes them seem harmless is precisely that they’re uttering all the things that have caused so much harm.’ Only one honour really got to him. ‘Nothing upset me more than the award of Companion of Honour to Eric Hobsbawm in reward for a lifetime of unswerving loyalty to the Soviet Union.’</p>
<p>But Scruton is not a regret-filled man. He seems content, even happy, in his ‘Scrutopia’. As we wrap up his wife is bringing their son home with some schoolfriends. The horses and cows need checking, and the chickens need to go down for the night. ‘Touching creatures,’ he notes as they follow him to their home, clucking and chirruping.</p>
<p>— Roger Scruton is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p> | false | 1 | article first appeared print edition spectator magazine dated 4 april 2015 extent britain philosophers expect address issues relevance rest us may pursue hermeneutic byway perhaps urgent profound issues time roger scruton always exception regard many others spent adult life thinking writing nature love nation state belonging alienation beauty home england even closest readers may gulp relevance latest subject matter new novel disappeared set north england centres recent rapegang cases gripping disturbing narrative dealing abduction abuse also love escape type redemption went see last week world away subjects farm in160wiltshire ive thinking things quite time says settle book pianofilled study problem integration muslim community cities aware landmines territory thirty years ago inadvertently stepped one publishing piece bradford headmaster ray honeyford multiculturalism schools looked back experience 1984 salisbury reviewand ray honeyford case huge difficulty teachers political class transferred teachers whole obligation integrate new immigrant communities people find classrooms nobody speak english customs cant relate problems honeyford discipline outright antagonism bradford course read oxford grooming cases vision story would bring things together dreadful situation teacher modern city also situation young girls vulnerable families worked various problems arisen secularisation put together story things readers columns works philosophy may wonder chose tackle medium novel ive always taken view works art things enjoy convey truths world vividly greater effect ordinary philosophical prose dont deal ideas show emotional reality think society gone terribly wrong people confronting great issues loss christian faith inability confront islam loss sense sacredness sexual relation exposure particular young women external predation moral decay things real book principal teacher someone also attracted girl victim raises another big question question paedophilia huge hysteria country last remaining redoubt innocence childhood also thing everybody reason assaulting assaulting well innocence purity objects sexual desire healthy society desire maintained also maintaining wall protects innocence wall crumbled sort public hysteria paedophilia last remaining crime sexual area putting things together enabled story novel connect emotionally intellectually desire communicate connect runs throughout scrutons work seems grown years started family discovered great love hunting fairly late life remaining sun english spring day filters across study also everpresent sadness something like permanent bruisedness honeyford affair helped destroy scrutons career universities knows people address issues truth hard dont need reminding heavy censorship matters immigration integration immigrant communities particular integration muslim communities police forces northern cities heavily intimidated macpherson report accusing police forces country institutional racism incredible injustice means going lean backwards get involved whats going local immigrant communities fear thats clearly happened rotherham also people dont want write theyve also seen penalties hearing stories teachers 30 years youre schoolteacher trying survive circumstances knowing youre assembled forces selfcensorship likely necessary youre philosopher selfemployed end career pointless engage selfcensorship great say true people shout scream usual things said people realise selfcensorship counterproductive actually worsened problem prevented people dealing prevented immigrant communities dealing things got better havent hasnt discussion least opened speaking couple days trevor phillips made another noted intervention attacking antiracists shut debate years prompts classically scrutonian response things changed always battle lost speak freely really mean ask trepidation big battle maintain proper educational system continuous old curriculum passing adapting changes big battle lost think past 20 years certainly time new labour didnt much work people first raised question integrating new communities spirit hope one would able maintain core side actually want destroy core certainly multicultural activists labour party universities wanted destroy old white anglosaxon education system saw produce something completely different conception completely different thing would course always easier destroy create think thats weve seen people start signs rebirth impressed visiting katharine birbalsinghs free school day 110 faces black except little handful romanians real discipline taught old curriculum teachers really trying integrate children saw culture destined battle continuity yes survival western civilisation though weve lost completely still got civilisation weve got though going able replace think thats really underlies story disappeared lot things disappeared made something pariah recognising truths early feel sense vindication laughs slightly dont feel though need way world say something advance describe problem arises people always turn dont want hear late anything turn around say right thats human nature despite fêted honoured across eastern europe work dissidents behind iron curtain despite worldwide renown philosopher scruton still without honour land upset live time honours praise go people left essentially seem harmless makes seem harmless precisely theyre uttering things caused much harm one honour really got nothing upset award companion honour eric hobsbawm reward lifetime unswerving loyalty soviet union scruton regretfilled man seems content even happy scrutopia wrap wife bringing son home schoolfriends horses cows need checking chickens need go night touching creatures notes follow home clucking chirruping roger scruton senior fellow ethics public policy center | 771 |
<p>Sept. 5 (UPI) — President <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Donald_Trump/" type="external">Donald Trump</a> on Tuesday said a wind-down of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program allows Congress the “opportunity to advance responsible <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Immigration_Reform/" type="external">immigration reform</a>.”</p>
<p>The president said that though he does “not favor punishing children … for the actions of their parents,” he disagrees with former President <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Barack_Obama/" type="external">Barack Obama</a> for using his executive powers in 2012 to create the DACA program.</p>
<p>“The legislative branch, not the executive branch, writes these laws — this is the bedrock of our constitutional system, which I took a solemn oath to preserve, protect and defend,” Trump said Tuesday after Attorney General <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jeff_Sessions/" type="external">Jeff Sessions</a> announced the elimination of DACA.</p>
<p>Sessions made the announcement at the direction of Trump, rescinding the program, which gave legal protections to roughly 800,000 people.</p>
<p>Sessions, who took no questions from reporters, did not give a timeframe but the Trump administration also announced a plan to continue renewing permits for anyone whose status expires in the next six months.</p>
<p>Homeland Security Acting Secretary Elaine Duke said “new initial requests or associated applications filed after today will be acted on.”</p>
<p>Those whose status expires by March 5 have one month to apply for a new two-year permit, and those applications will be processed.</p>
<p>Trump said the gradual wind-down of DACA will allow Congress to create legislation reforming the immigration system.</p>
<p>“Congress now has the opportunity to advance responsible immigration reform that puts American jobs and American security first,” the president said. “We are facing the symptom of a larger problem, illegal immigration, along with the many other chronic immigration problems Washington has left unsolved.</p>
<p>Sessions has cracked down on undocumented immigration since taking the helm of the Justice Department.</p>
<p>At the time he created DACA, Obama said it was a temporary move. On Tuesday, he issued a statement saying “it made no sense to expel talented, driven, patriotic young people from the only country they know solely because of the actions of their parents.” He said Congress was never able to provide him with legislation reforming the U.S. immigration system, which is why he issued the executive order creating DACA.</p>
<p>“We did so based on the well-established legal principle of prosecutorial discretion, deployed by Democratic and Republican presidents alike, because our immigration enforcement agencies have limited resources, and it makes sense to focus those resources on those who come illegally to this country to do us harm,” he said. “Deportations of criminals went up. Some 800,000 young people stepped forward, met rigorous requirements, and went through background checks. And America grew stronger as a result.”</p>
<p>But Sessions, <a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/speech/attorney-general-sessions-delivers-remarks-daca" type="external">in his speech</a>, said the Department of Justice could not “defend this overreach.”</p>
<p>“There is nothing compassionate about the failure to enforce immigration laws. Enforcing the law saves lives, protects communities and taxpayers, and prevents human suffering. Failure to enforce the laws in the past has put our nation at risk of crime, violence and even terrorism. The compassionate thing is to end the lawlessness, [and[ enforce our laws.”</p>
<p>Duke <a href="http://www.npr.org/2017/09/05/546423550/trump-signals-end-to-daca-calls-on-congress-to-act" type="external">said the administration</a>, facing legal challenges to the program, “chose the least disruptive option” in letting the program wind down in six months.</p>
<p>The period is intended to push Congress to pass legislation for DACA, the controversial program that allows undocumented immigrants brought to the United States as children to obtain work permits and study in the country provided they meet certain guidelines, such as graduating from high school and “who do not present a risk to national security or public safety,” as Obama <a href="https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2012/06/15/remarks-president-immigration" type="external">said at the time</a>.</p>
<p>“This is not amnesty, this is not immunity,” Obama said. “This is not a path to citizenship.”</p>
<p>But if Congress fails to pass legislation by the end of six months, nearly 1 million migrants are at risk of being deported from a country they have lived in most of their lives. In their applications, so-called “Dreamers” — those protected by the program — gave personal information to the U.S. government.</p>
<p>In a statement, House Speaker <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Paul_Ryan/" type="external">Paul Ryan</a> said he wants Congress to reach a solution in time.</p>
<p>“It is my hope that the House and Senate, with the president’s leadership, will be able to find consensus on a permanent legislative solution that includes ensuring that those who have done nothing wrong can still contribute as a valued part of this great country,” the Republican said.</p>
<p>Ryan’s statement was similar to comments last week when he urged Trump not to rescind the order.</p>
<p>“Congress writes laws, not the president, and ending this program fulfills a promise that President Trump made to restore the proper role of the executive and legislative branches,” Ryan said. “But now there is more to do, and the president has called on Congress to act. The president’s announcement does not revoke permits immediately, and it is important that those affected have clarity on how this interim period will be carried out. At the heart of this issue are young people who came to this country through no fault of their own, and for many of them it’s the only country they know. Their status is one of many immigration issues, such as border security and interior enforcement, which Congress has failed to adequately address over the years.”</p>
<p>During his campaign, Trump said he would immediately end the program but he had wavered since becoming president. He said he would “deal with DACA with heart” and he supported Dreamers.</p>
<p>Trump has not commented on the issue Tuesday except for a <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/905038986883850240" type="external">tweet on Twitter</a> four hours before Sessions’ the statement: “Congress, get ready to do your job – DACA! “</p>
<p>Congress in the past has failed to approve an immigration policy.</p>
<p>“My hope is that as part of this process we can work on a way to deal with this issue and solve it through legislation, which is the right way to do it and the constitutional way to do it,” Sen. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Marco_Rubio/" type="external">Marco Rubio</a> R-Fla. told <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2017/09/03/politics/daca-on-the-brink/index.html?adkey=bn" type="external">CNN in June</a>. Rubio has supported immigration reform.</p>
<p>Rep. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Steve_King/" type="external">Steve King</a>, R-Iowa, said a six-month timeframe to find new legislation for DACA was too long and it should be ended immediately.</p>
<p><a href="https://twitter.com/SteveKingIA/status/904508306441494529" type="external">On Sunday</a>, he posted on Twitter: “ending DACA now gives chance 2 restore Rule of Law. Delaying so R Leadership can push Amnesty is Republican suicide.”</p>
<p>A group of conservative state attorneys general threatened to sue the Trump administration in federal court unless it begins to dismantle the program by Tuesday.</p>
<p>Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, in a <a href="https://www.upi.com/Texas-attorney-general-leads-threat-of-lawsuit-over-Dreamers-program/9541498825952/" type="external">letter last June</a> to Sessions and co-signed by nine other state attorneys general, urged the administration to phase out DACA.</p>
<p>In 2014, Obama sought to expand the program, but 26 states sued the federal government to block the expansion along with DAPA.</p>
<p>The U.S. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/supreme-court/" type="external">Supreme Court</a> deadlocked on the decision and left a preliminary injunction in place against the expanded version of DACA, but left the original version in place.</p>
<p>Reacting to Sessions’ announcement, Chicago Mayor <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Rahm_Emanuel/" type="external">Rahm Emanuel</a>, a Democrat, said the city would continue to welcome Dreamers and declared it a “Trump-free zone.”</p>
<p>“To all the Dreamers that are here in this room, and in the city of Chicago, you are welcomed in the city of Chicago. This is your home and you have nothing to worry about.</p>
<p>“Chicago, our schools, our neighborhoods, our city, as it relates to what President Trump said, will be a Trump-free zone. You have nothing to worry about,” he added.</p>
<p>To all <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/DREAMers?src=hash" type="external">#DREAMers</a>: You are welcome in the City of Chicago. This is your home. Come to school and pursue your dreams. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/DACA?src=hash" type="external">#DACA</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/ChicagoisOne?src=hash" type="external">#ChicagoisOne</a> <a href="https://t.co/YbnEpxqbuG" type="external">pic.twitter.com/YbnEpxqbuG</a></p>
<p>– Mayor Rahm Emanuel (@ChicagosMayor) <a href="https://twitter.com/ChicagosMayor/status/905099919907803143" type="external">September 5, 2017</a></p> | false | 1 | sept 5 upi president donald trump tuesday said winddown deferred action childhood arrivals program allows congress opportunity advance responsible immigration reform president said though favor punishing children actions parents disagrees former president barack obama using executive powers 2012 create daca program legislative branch executive branch writes laws bedrock constitutional system took solemn oath preserve protect defend trump said tuesday attorney general jeff sessions announced elimination daca sessions made announcement direction trump rescinding program gave legal protections roughly 800000 people sessions took questions reporters give timeframe trump administration also announced plan continue renewing permits anyone whose status expires next six months homeland security acting secretary elaine duke said new initial requests associated applications filed today acted whose status expires march 5 one month apply new twoyear permit applications processed trump said gradual winddown daca allow congress create legislation reforming immigration system congress opportunity advance responsible immigration reform puts american jobs american security first president said facing symptom larger problem illegal immigration along many chronic immigration problems washington left unsolved sessions cracked undocumented immigration since taking helm justice department time created daca obama said temporary move tuesday issued statement saying made sense expel talented driven patriotic young people country know solely actions parents said congress never able provide legislation reforming us immigration system issued executive order creating daca based wellestablished legal principle prosecutorial discretion deployed democratic republican presidents alike immigration enforcement agencies limited resources makes sense focus resources come illegally country us harm said deportations criminals went 800000 young people stepped forward met rigorous requirements went background checks america grew stronger result sessions speech said department justice could defend overreach nothing compassionate failure enforce immigration laws enforcing law saves lives protects communities taxpayers prevents human suffering failure enforce laws past put nation risk crime violence even terrorism compassionate thing end lawlessness enforce laws duke said administration facing legal challenges program chose least disruptive option letting program wind six months period intended push congress pass legislation daca controversial program allows undocumented immigrants brought united states children obtain work permits study country provided meet certain guidelines graduating high school present risk national security public safety obama said time amnesty immunity obama said path citizenship congress fails pass legislation end six months nearly 1 million migrants risk deported country lived lives applications socalled dreamers protected program gave personal information us government statement house speaker paul ryan said wants congress reach solution time hope house senate presidents leadership able find consensus permanent legislative solution includes ensuring done nothing wrong still contribute valued part great country republican said ryans statement similar comments last week urged trump rescind order congress writes laws president ending program fulfills promise president trump made restore proper role executive legislative branches ryan said president called congress act presidents announcement revoke permits immediately important affected clarity interim period carried heart issue young people came country fault many country know status one many immigration issues border security interior enforcement congress failed adequately address years campaign trump said would immediately end program wavered since becoming president said would deal daca heart supported dreamers trump commented issue tuesday except tweet twitter four hours sessions statement congress get ready job daca congress past failed approve immigration policy hope part process work way deal issue solve legislation right way constitutional way sen marco rubio rfla told cnn june rubio supported immigration reform rep steve king riowa said sixmonth timeframe find new legislation daca long ended immediately sunday posted twitter ending daca gives chance 2 restore rule law delaying r leadership push amnesty republican suicide group conservative state attorneys general threatened sue trump administration federal court unless begins dismantle program tuesday texas attorney general ken paxton letter last june sessions cosigned nine state attorneys general urged administration phase daca 2014 obama sought expand program 26 states sued federal government block expansion along dapa us supreme court deadlocked decision left preliminary injunction place expanded version daca left original version place reacting sessions announcement chicago mayor rahm emanuel democrat said city would continue welcome dreamers declared trumpfree zone dreamers room city chicago welcomed city chicago home nothing worry chicago schools neighborhoods city relates president trump said trumpfree zone nothing worry added dreamers welcome city chicago home come school pursue dreams daca chicagoisone pictwittercomybnepxqbug mayor rahm emanuel chicagosmayor september 5 2017 | 708 |
<p>South Carolina has further cemented Donald Trump as the frontrunner for the GOP nomination. It should be obvious by now that he won’t be stopped with wishful thinking. His opponents need to continue to take the fight to him aggressively — on his many reckless and false statements, his faux conservatism, and his appalling nativism and vulgarity.</p>
<p>But the other candidates must also offer a realistic economic plan that would be attractive to Trump’s supporters.</p>
<p>This is not a new problem. Since President Reagan left office, the GOP has been struggling to connect with Americans who are culturally conservative but inclined by their working-class environment to be suspicious of Republican economic philosophy. Without strong support from these voters, the GOP has lost the popular vote in five of the last six presidential elections.</p>
<p>At the same time, it would be foolish for the GOP to abandon its traditional adherence to limited government, fiscal discipline, low taxes, and free markets. Those are the pillars of a dynamic and growing economy, and abandoning them would cost more votes than would be gained.</p>
<p>But belief in a free market is not inconsistent with concern for those who struggle when firms and entire industries come under pressure from global competition. The GOP must acknowledge the economic dislocation that has occurred and offer an agenda to help families who have seen their prospects dim over the past two decades. Here’s a start.</p>
<p>1. Tax Cuts The GOP is the party of tax-cutting, but the focus needs to shift toward relief for families who live paycheck to paycheck. Middle- and lower-income households pay more in federal payroll taxes than in income taxes. For those in the middle quintile of the nation’s income distribution, the average effective income-tax rate was 4.3 percent in 2013, far below the effective rate of 10 percent for payroll taxes. But GOP tax-reform plans focus much more on income-tax rates — and thus on households with substantial income and assets.</p>
<p>Income-tax reform is absolutely essential to improve growth, but it must be coupled with a realistic assessment of current economic conditions. The GOP should supplement income-tax reform with payroll-tax cuts for the working class. One approach would be to exempt some wages from the tax, or to lower the tax rate on those wages. For instance, exempting the first $30,000 of wages from the employee share of the Social Security and Medicare payroll taxes would provide a family with $40,000 in earned income with a $2,300 tax cut annually. The workers would still earn credits toward future Social Security and Medicare benefits, so the lost revenue to the trust funds would need to be addressed in a broader tax-reform plan.</p>
<p>2. Wage Credits Some in the GOP have proposed a new wage credit program as an alternative to increasing the minimum wage. The idea deserves serious consideration. The credit would be a substitute for programs that provide low-income support but discourage work. Recipients would get a pay raise, financed by the federal credit, and work experience, which is the surest way to improve their long-term economic prospects.</p>
<p>3. Health Care Republicans are right to call for repeal of Obamacare, but many working-class families do not get health insurance through their place of work. The GOP must embrace a replacement plan for Obamacare that gives these families a tax credit so they can purchase an affordable plan in the marketplace. And governors should be given the flexibility to give Medicaid beneficiaries access to higher-quality private insurance plans.</p>
<p>4. Relocation and Other Assistance Trump thinks he can undo decades of U.S. commitments under the global trading regime — built largely under bipartisan U.S. leadership. He is wrong, and he is also wrong about the effects of existing rules. Trade increases the purchasing power of most U.S. households. According to President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers, middle-class families get what amounts to a 29 percent pay raise because of their access to goods and services produced around the world. At the same time, global trade agreements have increased U.S. exports substantially and have added $1,300 to the wages of the average middle-class worker.</p>
<p>Still, some industries have contracted, and workers in those industries are faring worse than others.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, millions of low-skilled, native-born Americans are unintentionally encouraged to stay in slow-or-no growth communities affected by trade because of the structure of federal unemployment, disability, and income support programs. These workers should be given relocation assistance — call it the New Homestead Act — financed through a reform of existing programs. They could then move to areas with more plentiful opportunities and thus get back on their feet. The GOP also should support temporary income-replacement programs for those forced to accept lower wages due to trade, and vouchers for training and education for those seeking to switch careers and industries.</p>
<p>5. Immigration Reform Immigration is overblown as an issue in the GOP presidential campaign. In 2011, only 5.2 percent of the total workforce was foreign-born in 31 states, and the unauthorized immigrant population was only 2 percent in 39 states. Studies also indicate that immigration enhances, rather than retards, overall economic growth. Still, there is a high concentration of both legal and illegal immigrants in certain states; nearly one in four workers in California, New York, and New Jersey were foreign-born in 2012. But Trump’s proposal to build a wall on the southern border is not the answer; it would cost at least $20 to $25 billion, and $1 billion in annual maintenance expenses. And his implausible plan to locate and deport the 11 to 12 million people residing illegally in the U.S. would cost tens of billions more, even as it would wreak havoc on families and communities across the country.</p>
<p>The border can be secured at far less expense by employing a combination of tools, including a wall along certain stretches, more fencing, enhanced surveillance of various kinds, more patrols, and stronger sanctions on those caught attempting illegal entry. Deportation should be imposed on recent illegal entrants; a fair process should apply differing sanctions on persons who have been here longer, are self-reliant, have no other criminal record, and have family who are legal residents. Moreover, the GOP should embrace a policy of controlled, economically focused immigration that limits entry in the future based on family connections. The total level of legal immigration should be more limited for a period of years to allow time for assimilation, given the elevated levels of immigration since the mid-1990s.</p>
<p>Trump offers a vague economic nationalism that would risk isolation and decline. The GOP should resist the temptation to embrace this agenda, even if he becomes the nominee. But the GOP must also provide an alternative to Trump’s simplistic and counterproductive pronouncements. Otherwise, voters desperate for hope will remain vulnerable to appeals that play to their fears, not their aspirations.</p>
<p>Henry Olsen is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. James C. Capretta is a senior fellow at EPPC and a visiting fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.</p> | false | 1 | south carolina cemented donald trump frontrunner gop nomination obvious wont stopped wishful thinking opponents need continue take fight aggressively many reckless false statements faux conservatism appalling nativism vulgarity candidates must also offer realistic economic plan would attractive trumps supporters new problem since president reagan left office gop struggling connect americans culturally conservative inclined workingclass environment suspicious republican economic philosophy without strong support voters gop lost popular vote five last six presidential elections time would foolish gop abandon traditional adherence limited government fiscal discipline low taxes free markets pillars dynamic growing economy abandoning would cost votes would gained belief free market inconsistent concern struggle firms entire industries come pressure global competition gop must acknowledge economic dislocation occurred offer agenda help families seen prospects dim past two decades heres start 1 tax cuts gop party taxcutting focus needs shift toward relief families live paycheck paycheck middle lowerincome households pay federal payroll taxes income taxes middle quintile nations income distribution average effective incometax rate 43 percent 2013 far effective rate 10 percent payroll taxes gop taxreform plans focus much incometax rates thus households substantial income assets incometax reform absolutely essential improve growth must coupled realistic assessment current economic conditions gop supplement incometax reform payrolltax cuts working class one approach would exempt wages tax lower tax rate wages instance exempting first 30000 wages employee share social security medicare payroll taxes would provide family 40000 earned income 2300 tax cut annually workers would still earn credits toward future social security medicare benefits lost revenue trust funds would need addressed broader taxreform plan 2 wage credits gop proposed new wage credit program alternative increasing minimum wage idea deserves serious consideration credit would substitute programs provide lowincome support discourage work recipients would get pay raise financed federal credit work experience surest way improve longterm economic prospects 3 health care republicans right call repeal obamacare many workingclass families get health insurance place work gop must embrace replacement plan obamacare gives families tax credit purchase affordable plan marketplace governors given flexibility give medicaid beneficiaries access higherquality private insurance plans 4 relocation assistance trump thinks undo decades us commitments global trading regime built largely bipartisan us leadership wrong also wrong effects existing rules trade increases purchasing power us households according president obamas council economic advisers middleclass families get amounts 29 percent pay raise access goods services produced around world time global trade agreements increased us exports substantially added 1300 wages average middleclass worker still industries contracted workers industries faring worse others unfortunately millions lowskilled nativeborn americans unintentionally encouraged stay sloworno growth communities affected trade structure federal unemployment disability income support programs workers given relocation assistance call new homestead act financed reform existing programs could move areas plentiful opportunities thus get back feet gop also support temporary incomereplacement programs forced accept lower wages due trade vouchers training education seeking switch careers industries 5 immigration reform immigration overblown issue gop presidential campaign 2011 52 percent total workforce foreignborn 31 states unauthorized immigrant population 2 percent 39 states studies also indicate immigration enhances rather retards overall economic growth still high concentration legal illegal immigrants certain states nearly one four workers california new york new jersey foreignborn 2012 trumps proposal build wall southern border answer would cost least 20 25 billion 1 billion annual maintenance expenses implausible plan locate deport 11 12 million people residing illegally us would cost tens billions even would wreak havoc families communities across country border secured far less expense employing combination tools including wall along certain stretches fencing enhanced surveillance various kinds patrols stronger sanctions caught attempting illegal entry deportation imposed recent illegal entrants fair process apply differing sanctions persons longer selfreliant criminal record family legal residents moreover gop embrace policy controlled economically focused immigration limits entry future based family connections total level legal immigration limited period years allow time assimilation given elevated levels immigration since mid1990s trump offers vague economic nationalism would risk isolation decline gop resist temptation embrace agenda even becomes nominee gop must also provide alternative trumps simplistic counterproductive pronouncements otherwise voters desperate hope remain vulnerable appeals play fears aspirations henry olsen senior fellow ethics public policy center james c capretta senior fellow eppc visiting fellow american enterprise institute | 693 |
<p>As the United States continues its battle against Islamic State militants in Iraq and Syria, some analysts believe Iran has turned its attention to captured ISIS fighters, recruiting them unwittingly to join militias that target U.S. interests in the region and to instigate growing sectarian violence as the regime continues to influence Iraq’s military, political and economic affairs.</p>
<p>It is a complex covert operation coordinated by Iran’s intelligence agency through the nation’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, say some U.S. officials who have spoken to Circa. Iran’s use of proxy groups to coordinate or plan attacks against its perceived enemies or co-opt institutions in neighboring states is not new and the regime has used proxies in Lebanon, Iraq and Syria, just to name a few, said one U.S. official, who spoke on background due to the nature of their work.</p>
<p>The official noted that there’s concern that despite efforts to abolish ISIS there isn’t enough being done to quell “Iran’s influence in the predominately Shi’ite Iraq and the use of Sunni fighters allows the regime to utilize all players to its benefit,” the official said.</p>
<p>Information made available to U.S. intelligence suggests that the “Iranian regime is covertly utilizing former ISIS fighters to engage in operations that would destabilize U.S. and western nation efforts.”</p>
<p>Iran’s close ties with the predominantly Shi’ite Iraqi government are complex and for minority Sunni, Kurdish, Christian and Yazidi people it can be precarious. Monday’s referendum by the Kurdish people to seek independence is one example. The referendum for independence was backed by 92 percent of the Kurds and has now provoked not only Iraq but also Iran and Turkey. Iraq’s parliament asked the prime minister Wednesday to send troops to the city of Kirkuk, one of the disputed oil cities.</p>
<p>Bob Kent, the CEO of Knowledge Information Services, which helps businesses and corporations working Iraq, said over the past several years his company has received information, from more than 1,200 contacts in the region, that Iran has been systemically recruiting war-trained ISIS fighters. Kent a former Air Force intelligence officer has spent more than eight years in Iraq since 2008, and has also worked as a contractor for the Department of Defense as a sociocultural researcher.</p>
<p>“One of things that Iran does is because they can't project power overtly is they like to instigate sectarian violence between the Sunni and Shia,” said Kent, who noted that Iran is focused on the geopolitics and religion is used as a tool.</p>
<p>“What we're seeing now is that not only is Iran supporting all of the Shia militias that are in Iraq, Hezbollah plus all the popular mobilization forces that are coming up, they're also supporting what are known as the Sunni militias,” he said. “They're fighting against ISIS and at the same time, after the battle is over, they're recruiting the ISIS fighters and they're going to work for Iran.”</p>
<p>Kent said the information his company incidentally gathers is shared with U.S. officials both in Iraq and in the United States but he believes the warning signs are being ignored.</p>
<p>He noted that there has been “multiple threats to U.S. forces in the region, active targeting of the U.S. Embassy, both with multiple rocket launchers and cyber teams.”</p>
<p>“We passed that along. Like I said, there has been no follow-up,” Kent added.</p>
<p>A State Department official, who spoke on condition that they not be named, told circa, "the U.S. Embassy receives and welcomes threat information from a variety of sources. We don't provide confirmation, analysis or readouts on reports we receive."</p>
<p>Michael O'Hanlon, a foreign policy expert at the Brookings Institution, said “this danger is worth worrying about but to my knowledge it is hypothetical to date.”</p>
<p>O’Hanlon noted “Iran does have influence that they promote through bribery, cajoling, coercion, and even in the past at times assassination of some Iraqi politicians.”</p>
<p>“However, I also think the U.S., aware of this history, jumps to worst-case analysis quite quickly,” he added. “I am dubious to date about any reports of Iranian-trained ISIS-populated anti-U.S. hit squads.”</p>
<p>But in the Middle East, where there are so many nations vying for control, information and intelligence analysis can be murky.</p>
<p>“Iran has allies now in China and Russia,” said Kent. “They're sharing intelligence. They're sharing resources. They're pre-positioning weapons, heavy weapons and missiles inside of Iraq for use against the other GCC countries and countries from the West like the U.S. If we don't address it now, I'm afraid it's going to get worse and this is how, I believe, world wars get started.”</p>
<p>CENTCOM Army Maj. Earl Brown told Circa, “We are concerned about Iranian malign influence in the region, which is a threat to long-term stability.”</p>
<p>But Brown declined to give specifics as to whether the military has information regarding the allegations that the Iranian regime is covertly recruiting from ISIS fighters in the region. Brown said CENTCOM’s “focus remains on working with our Coalition and partner nations to defeat ISIS, and we encourage all of our partners in the region to work towards common solutions that enable regional security.”</p>
<p>Kent said he is concerned that if the U.S. fails to understand or respond to the serious threats posed by Iran, Iraq will once again fall victim to war and deadly sectarian violence.</p>
<p>“I believe it all depends on what U.S. policy is in the next few years,” said Kent. “Iraq will be lost within a year or year and a half to Iran if the U.S. doesn't start to support the moderate people on the ground. It's important to note that even though the majority of people in Iraq are Shia, most of them support... they're pro- Iraqi. There's a definite nationalist Iraqi feeling -- you're seeing Sunni, Shia, Christians, they want the Iranians out.”</p>
<p>Related Stories: <a href="" type="internal">Iran's president threatened to revitalize the country's nuclear program if the US continues with sanctions</a> <a href="" type="internal">ISIS proves it doesn't need territory to be deadly</a> <a href="" type="internal">ISIS in Afghanistan threatened to attack Russia and executed alleged Russian informants</a></p> | false | 1 | united states continues battle islamic state militants iraq syria analysts believe iran turned attention captured isis fighters recruiting unwittingly join militias target us interests region instigate growing sectarian violence regime continues influence iraqs military political economic affairs complex covert operation coordinated irans intelligence agency nations islamic revolutionary guard corps say us officials spoken circa irans use proxy groups coordinate plan attacks perceived enemies coopt institutions neighboring states new regime used proxies lebanon iraq syria name said one us official spoke background due nature work official noted theres concern despite efforts abolish isis isnt enough done quell irans influence predominately shiite iraq use sunni fighters allows regime utilize players benefit official said information made available us intelligence suggests iranian regime covertly utilizing former isis fighters engage operations would destabilize us western nation efforts irans close ties predominantly shiite iraqi government complex minority sunni kurdish christian yazidi people precarious mondays referendum kurdish people seek independence one example referendum independence backed 92 percent kurds provoked iraq also iran turkey iraqs parliament asked prime minister wednesday send troops city kirkuk one disputed oil cities bob kent ceo knowledge information services helps businesses corporations working iraq said past several years company received information 1200 contacts region iran systemically recruiting wartrained isis fighters kent former air force intelligence officer spent eight years iraq since 2008 also worked contractor department defense sociocultural researcher one things iran cant project power overtly like instigate sectarian violence sunni shia said kent noted iran focused geopolitics religion used tool seeing iran supporting shia militias iraq hezbollah plus popular mobilization forces coming theyre also supporting known sunni militias said theyre fighting isis time battle theyre recruiting isis fighters theyre going work iran kent said information company incidentally gathers shared us officials iraq united states believes warning signs ignored noted multiple threats us forces region active targeting us embassy multiple rocket launchers cyber teams passed along like said followup kent added state department official spoke condition named told circa us embassy receives welcomes threat information variety sources dont provide confirmation analysis readouts reports receive michael ohanlon foreign policy expert brookings institution said danger worth worrying knowledge hypothetical date ohanlon noted iran influence promote bribery cajoling coercion even past times assassination iraqi politicians however also think us aware history jumps worstcase analysis quite quickly added dubious date reports iraniantrained isispopulated antius hit squads middle east many nations vying control information intelligence analysis murky iran allies china russia said kent theyre sharing intelligence theyre sharing resources theyre prepositioning weapons heavy weapons missiles inside iraq use gcc countries countries west like us dont address im afraid going get worse believe world wars get started centcom army maj earl brown told circa concerned iranian malign influence region threat longterm stability brown declined give specifics whether military information regarding allegations iranian regime covertly recruiting isis fighters region brown said centcoms focus remains working coalition partner nations defeat isis encourage partners region work towards common solutions enable regional security kent said concerned us fails understand respond serious threats posed iran iraq fall victim war deadly sectarian violence believe depends us policy next years said kent iraq lost within year year half iran us doesnt start support moderate people ground important note even though majority people iraq shia support theyre pro iraqi theres definite nationalist iraqi feeling youre seeing sunni shia christians want iranians related stories irans president threatened revitalize countrys nuclear program us continues sanctions isis proves doesnt need territory deadly isis afghanistan threatened attack russia executed alleged russian informants | 581 |
<p>By Hyunjoo Jin and Adam Jourdan</p>
<p>SEOUL/SHANGHAI(Reuters) – As a diplomatic spat between Beijing and Seoul raged this year, many South Koreans felt decidedly unwelcome in China. South Korean businesses were shunned, K-pop concerts were canceled and tourist trade dried up.</p>
<p>But one group of South Koreans have been very much in demand: the executives and employees of South Korea’s cosmetics companies, who are being lured by Chinese rivals as a battle for China’s huge beauty market heats up.</p>
<p>Chinese make-up brands including Jala, Proya &lt;603605.SS&gt; and Suhu – which have long trailed Korean rivals in terms of quality – are hiring South Korean executives as well as spending up on research and buying overseas firms, industry executives and headhunters say.</p>
<p>The moves seem to be helping.</p>
<p>Chinese brands, which compete with Korea names from top-rated Amorepacific (KS:) to nimble budget makers such as Clio (KQ:), are gaining market share in the mid-range and premium cosmetics sector where South Korea has traditionally had strength in China.</p>
<p>While Chinese companies have been gaining ground for some time, the trend appears to have accelerated this year after Seoul’s decision to install a U.S. anti-missile system against Beijing’s wishes sparked a backlash against Korean companies.</p>
<p>At stake is a bigger chunk of China’s $50.2 billion beauty and personal care market, which research firm Euromonitor projects will grow to $61.9 billion by 2020.</p>
<p>Jason Yu, Shanghai-based General Manager of market research firm Kantar Worldpanel, said mid-tier or “masstige” Korean brands were most exposed to Chinese brands improving their offering. High-end brands from France’s L’Oreal (PA:) and Japan’s Shiseido (T:) tended to attract wealthier buyers.</p>
<p>“In terms of the price position, they will be more in direct competition with the emerging Chinese brands who are moving up the price ladder,” said Yu, adding Chinese firms were “catching up very fast”.</p>
<p>HIRING SPREE</p>
<p>There are signs that recent diplomatic tensions have played into the hands of local Chinese brands in their battle with Korean rivals.</p>
<p>Amorepacific’s sales fell 8 percent in the January to September period from a year earlier, while operating profit skidded 30 percent. Smaller, budget makers were hit harder, with Clio’s operating profit falling nearly 70 percent.</p>
<p>While some Chinese make-up brands use South Korean stars or highlight Korean links, others are playing up Chinese elements such as using traditional medicine ingredients or use slogans about suiting Chinese skin.</p>
<p>Zoe Zhuang, 24, an engineer in Nanjing, said she used to use cushion foundations and eye pencils from South Korea’s Etude brand. She now uses more Chinese to “support local brands”, she said, without referring to the dispute over the THAAD missile system.</p>
<p>“I actually don’t think Chinese makeup is that good yet, there is plenty of room for improvement,” she said.</p>
<p>Chinese cosmetics firms have been trying to close the quality gap by aggressively targeting South Korean executives.</p>
<p>“(Chinese cosmetics brands) are recruiting Koreans in almost all areas, including brand managers, packaging design, store interiors, purchasing and marketing,” Choi Sun-hee, head of South Korean recruiting firm HR Biz Korea, told Reuters.</p>
<p>Some Chinese brands are willing to offer 50 percent higher wages, help with rents and flights home to woo Korean workers, Choi added.</p>
<p>Guangzhou-based Suhu plans to double the number of its South Korean employees to 40, Choi said. It recently hired an executive from Korea’s Nature Republic to oversee the recent launch of its Rojank brand, he added. Suhu declined to comment.</p>
<p>Chinese brand Proya, which owns the Uzero and Cats &amp; Roses brands, hired South Korean Kim Hoi-joon from Clio in 2014 to launch its Hapsode brand, Kim told Reuters.</p>
<p>Another former Amorepacific official said Kim had lured him to Proya last year with a salary hike of about 50 percent. He said he was one of over 10 Korean employees hired by Proya.</p>
<p>Proya declined to comment.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, Jala, one of China’s leading cosmetics firms, hired a Korean executive earlier this year to revamp its mainstay Chando brand, two people familiar with the matter told Reuters.</p>
<p>Jala also hired the former head of Amorepacific’s Etude brand, Kim Dong-young, they added. Kim, reached by phone, confirmed he had been working at Jala for about a year, but declined to comment further.</p>
<p>Jala’s press office was not available for comment.</p>
<p>The approach is not limited to cosmetics. Chinese firms from carmakers to flatscreen producers to smartphone vendors have recently opened up more to hiring foreign talent to help them gain a competitive edge, often taking market share from South Korean rivals as they move up the value chain and their industries mature.</p>
<p>But Korean brands aren’t going down without a fight.</p>
<p>Amorepacific said it was working with experts in seven Chinese cities to study local skin characteristics and develop products for the local market.</p>
<p>“It is not that we are not worried about Chinese competition,” Rho Jee-hye, an Amorepacific senior vice president told Reuters. “As there is Estee Lauder (N:) in the United States, L’Oreal in France and Amorepacific in Korea, an innovative Chinese company could emerge.”</p> | false | 1 | hyunjoo jin adam jourdan seoulshanghaireuters diplomatic spat beijing seoul raged year many south koreans felt decidedly unwelcome china south korean businesses shunned kpop concerts canceled tourist trade dried one group south koreans much demand executives employees south koreas cosmetics companies lured chinese rivals battle chinas huge beauty market heats chinese makeup brands including jala proya lt603605ssgt suhu long trailed korean rivals terms quality hiring south korean executives well spending research buying overseas firms industry executives headhunters say moves seem helping chinese brands compete korea names toprated amorepacific ks nimble budget makers clio kq gaining market share midrange premium cosmetics sector south korea traditionally strength china chinese companies gaining ground time trend appears accelerated year seouls decision install us antimissile system beijings wishes sparked backlash korean companies stake bigger chunk chinas 502 billion beauty personal care market research firm euromonitor projects grow 619 billion 2020 jason yu shanghaibased general manager market research firm kantar worldpanel said midtier masstige korean brands exposed chinese brands improving offering highend brands frances loreal pa japans shiseido tended attract wealthier buyers terms price position direct competition emerging chinese brands moving price ladder said yu adding chinese firms catching fast hiring spree signs recent diplomatic tensions played hands local chinese brands battle korean rivals amorepacifics sales fell 8 percent january september period year earlier operating profit skidded 30 percent smaller budget makers hit harder clios operating profit falling nearly 70 percent chinese makeup brands use south korean stars highlight korean links others playing chinese elements using traditional medicine ingredients use slogans suiting chinese skin zoe zhuang 24 engineer nanjing said used use cushion foundations eye pencils south koreas etude brand uses chinese support local brands said without referring dispute thaad missile system actually dont think chinese makeup good yet plenty room improvement said chinese cosmetics firms trying close quality gap aggressively targeting south korean executives chinese cosmetics brands recruiting koreans almost areas including brand managers packaging design store interiors purchasing marketing choi sunhee head south korean recruiting firm hr biz korea told reuters chinese brands willing offer 50 percent higher wages help rents flights home woo korean workers choi added guangzhoubased suhu plans double number south korean employees 40 choi said recently hired executive koreas nature republic oversee recent launch rojank brand added suhu declined comment chinese brand proya owns uzero cats amp roses brands hired south korean kim hoijoon clio 2014 launch hapsode brand kim told reuters another former amorepacific official said kim lured proya last year salary hike 50 percent said one 10 korean employees hired proya proya declined comment meanwhile jala one chinas leading cosmetics firms hired korean executive earlier year revamp mainstay chando brand two people familiar matter told reuters jala also hired former head amorepacifics etude brand kim dongyoung added kim reached phone confirmed working jala year declined comment jalas press office available comment approach limited cosmetics chinese firms carmakers flatscreen producers smartphone vendors recently opened hiring foreign talent help gain competitive edge often taking market share south korean rivals move value chain industries mature korean brands arent going without fight amorepacific said working experts seven chinese cities study local skin characteristics develop products local market worried chinese competition rho jeehye amorepacific senior vice president told reuters estee lauder n united states loreal france amorepacific korea innovative chinese company could emerge | 549 |
<p>Special Counsel Robert Mueller has reportedly impaneled a grand jury and expanded his team of investigators into alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 election. Meanwhile, bipartisan legislation to protect Mueller from being fired is before the Senate.</p>
<p>Read more</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/usa/398436-trump-russia-relations-congress/" type="external" /></p>
<p>Mueller has reportedly impaneled a grand jury in Washington as part of the ongoing Russia investigation, which also includes looking into possible collusion between President Donald Trump’s campaign team and the Russian government, the <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/special-counsel-mueller-impanels-washington-grand-jury-in-russia-probe-1501788287" type="external">Wall Street Journal</a> reported Thursday, citing two unnamed sources familiar with the matter.</p>
<p>When Mueller was appointed special counsel in May, there was already a grand jury looking into former national security adviser Michael Flynn. If the reports that Mueller is enlisting a new grand jury are true, it would indicate that the investigation is not slowing down but gathering pace.</p>
<p>“This is yet a further sign that there is a long-term, large-scale series of prosecutions being contemplated and being pursued by the special counsel,” Stephen Vladeck, a law professor at the University of Texas, told the Wall Street Journal.</p>
<p>“If there was already a grand jury in Alexandria looking at Flynn, there would be no need to reinvent the wheel for the same guy. This suggests that the investigation is bigger and wider than Flynn, perhaps substantially so.”</p>
<p>Adam Schiff (D-California), the top ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, also said the news that Mueller impaneled a new grand jury “suggests his work is proceeding.”</p>
<p />
<p>If true that Mueller has impaneled a grand jury, suggests his work is proceeding. All the more impt that Congress protect his independence. <a href="https://t.co/40LdzC82Ie" type="external">https://t.co/40LdzC82Ie</a></p>
<p>— Adam Schiff (@RepAdamSchiff) <a href="https://twitter.com/RepAdamSchiff/status/893206999856492545" type="external">August 3, 2017</a></p>
<p />
<p>Mueller’s use of a grand jury could allow his team to issue subpoenas, compel witnesses to testify and seek indictments.</p>
<p>White House special counsel Ty Cobb said he was not aware of Mueller enrolling a new grand jury.</p>
<p>“Grand jury matters are typically secret,” Cobb told the Wall Street Journal. “The White House favors anything that accelerates the conclusion of his work fairly. The White House is committed to fully cooperating with Mr. Mueller.”</p>
<p>Read more</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/usa/397360-trump-russia-collusion-kushner/" type="external" /></p>
<p>John Dowd, Trump’s lead outside lawyer, also said he was not aware of Mueller’s move to impanel a new grand jury, but said the president was most likely not the target of prosecutors.</p>
<p>“With respect to reports of a federal grand jury, I have no reason to believe that President Trump is being investigated,” Dowd said, according to <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/08/03/special-counsel-robert-mueller-impanels-grand-jury-russia-investigation-intensifies-reports-say/537839001/" type="external">USA Today</a>.</p>
<p>On Thursday, <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-sessions-idUSKBN1AJ026?il=0" type="external">Reuters</a> reported that grand jury subpoenas have been issued in connection with the meeting that Donald Trump Jr. had with a Russian lawyer and others in June 2016.</p>
<p>Last month, Trump Jr released emails related to a meeting he and other members of the Trump campaign held with Natalia Veselnitskaya after she promised to provide damaging information on former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton during the 2016 elections.</p>
<p>At the White House <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/08/01/press-briefing-press-secretary-sarah-sanders-812017-4" type="external">press briefing</a> Tuesday, White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders denied that Trump dictated the statement released by his son, instead, she said, he “weighed in, offered suggestion like any father would do.”</p>
<p>“The statement that was issued was true, and there were no inaccuracies in the statement,” Huckabee Sanders said, according to the White House. “The only thing I see misleading is a year’s worth of stories that have been fueling a false narrative about this Russia collusion, and a phony scandal based on anonymous sources.”</p>
<p>Trump has repeatedly denied any collusion between his team and the Russians. He has also called the investigation a “witch hunt” and criticized Mueller and his team for having conflicts of interest.</p>
<p>On Thursday, Senators Thom Tillis (R-North Carolina) and Chris Coons (D-Delaware) introduced bipartisan legislation to protect Mueller from being fired by Trump during the investigation.</p>
<p>The Special Counsel Integrity Act would add a judicial check to the president’s ability to remove a special counsel. Under the legislation, a special counsel could only be removed for “misconduct, dereliction of duty, incapacity, conflict of interest, or other good cause, like a violation of departmental policies.” The Department of Justice would also be required to inform the special counsel in writing as to why they were being removed.</p>
<p>If Trump did fire Mueller, the legislation would allow the special counsel to challenge the dismissal in court. If the panel of three federal judges decides the termination had no good cause, the special counsel would be reinstated.</p>
<p>“It is critical that special counsels have the independence and resources they need to lead investigations,” Tillis said in a <a href="https://www.tillis.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?id=C62D4DFE-612D-466A-93F8-79293F6F45E2" type="external">statement</a>. “A back-end judicial review process to prevent unmerited removals of special counsels not only helps to ensure their investigatory independence, but also reaffirms our nation’s system of check and balances.”</p>
<p>Similar <a href="https://www.scribd.com/document/355454481/Special-Counsel-Independence-Protection-Act" type="external">legislation</a> was also introduced by Senators Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) and Cory Booker (D-New Jersey) Thursday. The Special Counsel Independence Protection Act would ensure that the special counsel could only be dismissed by the Attorney General after a federal court established there was “misconduct, dereliction of duty, incapacity, conflict of interest, or other good cause for removal.”</p>
<p>“Our bill allows judicial review of any decision to terminate a special counsel to make sure it’s done for the reasons cited in the regulation rather than political motivation. I think this will serve the country well,” Graham said in a <a href="https://www.lgraham.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=46DF3E36-CCE5-4985-A75C-583865C7B526" type="external">statement</a>.</p>
<p>After the report that Mueller impaneled a new grand jury, both US stocks and the dollar dropped Thursday.</p>
<p>Mueller’s team also expanded Tuesday, with former Justice Department official Greg Andres becoming the 16th lawyer to join the team.</p>
<p>[embedded content]</p> | false | 1 | special counsel robert mueller reportedly impaneled grand jury expanded team investigators alleged russian meddling 2016 election meanwhile bipartisan legislation protect mueller fired senate read mueller reportedly impaneled grand jury washington part ongoing russia investigation also includes looking possible collusion president donald trumps campaign team russian government wall street journal reported thursday citing two unnamed sources familiar matter mueller appointed special counsel may already grand jury looking former national security adviser michael flynn reports mueller enlisting new grand jury true would indicate investigation slowing gathering pace yet sign longterm largescale series prosecutions contemplated pursued special counsel stephen vladeck law professor university texas told wall street journal already grand jury alexandria looking flynn would need reinvent wheel guy suggests investigation bigger wider flynn perhaps substantially adam schiff dcalifornia top ranking democrat house intelligence committee also said news mueller impaneled new grand jury suggests work proceeding true mueller impaneled grand jury suggests work proceeding impt congress protect independence httpstco40ldzc82ie adam schiff repadamschiff august 3 2017 muellers use grand jury could allow team issue subpoenas compel witnesses testify seek indictments white house special counsel ty cobb said aware mueller enrolling new grand jury grand jury matters typically secret cobb told wall street journal white house favors anything accelerates conclusion work fairly white house committed fully cooperating mr mueller read john dowd trumps lead outside lawyer also said aware muellers move impanel new grand jury said president likely target prosecutors respect reports federal grand jury reason believe president trump investigated dowd said according usa today thursday reuters reported grand jury subpoenas issued connection meeting donald trump jr russian lawyer others june 2016 last month trump jr released emails related meeting members trump campaign held natalia veselnitskaya promised provide damaging information former democratic presidential candidate hillary clinton 2016 elections white house press briefing tuesday white house press secretary sarah huckabee sanders denied trump dictated statement released son instead said weighed offered suggestion like father would statement issued true inaccuracies statement huckabee sanders said according white house thing see misleading years worth stories fueling false narrative russia collusion phony scandal based anonymous sources trump repeatedly denied collusion team russians also called investigation witch hunt criticized mueller team conflicts interest thursday senators thom tillis rnorth carolina chris coons ddelaware introduced bipartisan legislation protect mueller fired trump investigation special counsel integrity act would add judicial check presidents ability remove special counsel legislation special counsel could removed misconduct dereliction duty incapacity conflict interest good cause like violation departmental policies department justice would also required inform special counsel writing removed trump fire mueller legislation would allow special counsel challenge dismissal court panel three federal judges decides termination good cause special counsel would reinstated critical special counsels independence resources need lead investigations tillis said statement backend judicial review process prevent unmerited removals special counsels helps ensure investigatory independence also reaffirms nations system check balances similar legislation also introduced senators lindsey graham rsouth carolina cory booker dnew jersey thursday special counsel independence protection act would ensure special counsel could dismissed attorney general federal court established misconduct dereliction duty incapacity conflict interest good cause removal bill allows judicial review decision terminate special counsel make sure done reasons cited regulation rather political motivation think serve country well graham said statement report mueller impaneled new grand jury us stocks dollar dropped thursday muellers team also expanded tuesday former justice department official greg andres becoming 16th lawyer join team embedded content | 564 |
<p>While not every president’s budget is relevant to policymaking, most budgets do say something about the priorities and governing philosophy of the administration putting it together. The Obama administration’s&#160; <a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/omb/budget/fy2015/assets/tables.pdf" type="external">fiscal year 2015 budget</a>&#160;is no different in this regard. While it is unlikely to lead to any significant legislation this year, it is nonetheless revealing about what this administration considers important.</p>
<p>As many others have noted, and administration officials have all but admitted, the first priority of the 2015 budget is not to pass anything important in 2014 but to retain Democratic control of the Senate in the November mid-term election. The president himself has&#160; <a href="http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2014/02/05/obama-tells-dems-keeping-control-of-the-senate-is-top-priority-for-2014/" type="external">said</a>&#160;previously that this is his top priority for the year. The budget assembled by his administration quite clearly had this objective in mind when setting priorities. Gone are any (even superficial) attempts to appeal to Republican legislators through serious tax and entitlement reforms, and thus to build the foundation for bipartisan support of significant budgetary legislation. Instead, this budget emphasizes higher levels of spending for liberal priorities and new entitlements, such as preschool education, financed with higher levels of taxation.</p>
<p>According to the administration’s own numbers, the ten-year tax increase in the 2015 budget is $1.8 trillion. This tax hike would come on top of the massive tax hikes already enacted in Obamacare ($1 trillion over ten years, according to the <a href="http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/43471-hr6079.pdf" type="external">Congressional Budget Office</a>), and in the 2013 tax deal ($630 billion over ten years, according to the&#160; <a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/omb/communications/misc/cboscore_hr8_20130101.pdf" type="external">White House budget office</a>). Even without a new round of tax increases, President Obama has already pushed federal revenue collection far above the post-World War II norm of about 18 percent of GDP.&#160; <a href="http://cbo.gov/publication/44521" type="external">According to CBO</a>, federal revenue under current law will now reach 20 percent of GDP in the not-too-distant future and continue rising still further due to the bracket creep built into the Obamacare tax hikes. The tax hikes in the 2015 budget would add another one or two percent of GDP to the nation’s annual tax hike when fully implemented.</p>
<p>The 2015 budget also continues the Obama administration’s remarkably persistent efforts to downsize the nation’s military capabilities. The budget proposes to reduce defense spending to 2.3 percent of GDP at the end of the ten year budget window—which would be the&#160; <a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/Historicals" type="external">lowest level of defense spending</a>&#160;in many decades. Medium-term defense funding estimates carry far more significance than other outyear projections in the budget because it often takes many years for national defense policies to be fully implemented. A budget plan that consistently indicates downward pressure in future years will force near-term decisions to cancel weapons systems, downsize force structures, and degrade readiness with curtailment of training. And these decisions will have implications for our military strength immediately – not ten years from now. What is truly remarkable about the Obama budget is that it is pushing forward with a major downsizing of national security capabilities even as world events—see Syria and Ukraine—indicate that this is quite obviously adding substantial new risks to our security interests all around the world.</p>
<p>Beyond tax increases and defense cuts, the other favored mechanism for fiscal consolidation in this, and past, Obama budgets is deeper healthcare price regulation, implemented through Medicare. The 2015 budget proposes $400 billion in ten-year Medicare cuts, focused mainly on the usual assortment of adjustments to the obscure payment regulations governing how providers get paid for taking care of Medicare patients. For instance, the budget proposes to import into a portion of the Medicare drug benefit the price control system governing how Medicaid purchases drugs, supposedly saving $117 billion over a decade. There are also new cuts planned for nursing homes, rehabilitation facilities, durable medical equipment suppliers, and many others.</p>
<p>Some of these cuts might be justified if the goal were to build a better price control regime in a public insurance program. But the lowering of price controls does not constitute real entitlement reform. The federal government has been trying to fix the problems in Medicare through the micromanagement of prices for decades now, and yet Medicare’s problems persist. The root problem in Medicare is the inefficient provision of care. Price controls do not fix that problem. Indeed, instead of leading to more efficient care, price controls can force providers out of the Medicare program altogether. That’s already expected to happen in coming years as the Medicare cuts contained in Obamacare will push payments to hospitals so low that about 15 percent of them will be forced to drop out of the program by decade’s end, according to the government’s own&#160; <a href="http://www.cms.gov/Research-Statistics-Data-and-Systems/Statistics-Trends-and-Reports/ReportsTrustFunds/Downloads/2013TRAlternativeScenario.pdf" type="external">projections</a>. Millions of Medicare enrollees may also be forced out of their Medicare Advantage plans in the coming decade because of the deep Obamacare cuts in that portion of the program. The 2015 budget doubles down on these dubious, Obamacare-like approaches to cost control.</p>
<p>Among the laundry list of Medicare spending reductions contained in the budget is a proposal to increase the planned cuts implemented by the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB). The IPAB is the fifteen member board given authority in Obamacare to hold cost growth down in the Medicare program. In any year in which Medicare spending is expected to exceed the ceiling set in law, IPAB’s recommended cuts will go into effect automatically unless Congress passes alternative savings provisions. This prospect of handing over so much power and authority over to an unelected and unaccountable board of supposed experts has made the IPAB highly controversial—so much so that the administration has yet to submit names to begin filling out the open slots on the board. Yet the budget proposes to lower IPAB’s annual spending growth target in Medicare from GDP plus one percentage point to GDP plus a half of a percentage point every year.</p>
<p>Beyond these three areas—tax hikes, defense cuts, and health care price controls – the Obama budget shows almost no restraint. The portion of the budget that is creating the pressure for cuts and consolidation—entitlement spending—is allowed to skyrocket, even with the Medicare cuts. Total entitlement spending rises from $2.2 trillion in 2014 to nearly $3.9 trillion in 2024, for an average annual growth rate of 5.5 percent. By comparison, the Obama defense budget is essentially held flat for ten years in nominal terms. In real terms (after adjusting for inflation), defense funding in 2024 would be more than $138 billion less than the appropriation request in 2015.</p>
<p>The Obama budget is purposefully a blueprint for unrestrained liberal governance. The president wants to show the electorate what Democrats would do if they had full control of Congress again. That may help with some voters, but it also opens the administration up to substantial criticism. Because a budget predicated on massive tax hikes, deep cuts to defense, and extension of healthcare price controls can easily be described by opponents as a recipe for slower growth, a more dangerous world, and impeded access to care for seniors.</p>
<p>Let the political debates begin.</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 | every presidents budget relevant policymaking budgets say something priorities governing philosophy administration putting together obama administrations160 fiscal year 2015 budget160is different regard unlikely lead significant legislation year nonetheless revealing administration considers important many others noted administration officials admitted first priority 2015 budget pass anything important 2014 retain democratic control senate november midterm election president has160 said160previously top priority year budget assembled administration quite clearly objective mind setting priorities gone even superficial attempts appeal republican legislators serious tax entitlement reforms thus build foundation bipartisan support significant budgetary legislation instead budget emphasizes higher levels spending liberal priorities new entitlements preschool education financed higher levels taxation according administrations numbers tenyear tax increase 2015 budget 18 trillion tax hike would come top massive tax hikes already enacted obamacare 1 trillion ten years according congressional budget office 2013 tax deal 630 billion ten years according the160 white house budget office even without new round tax increases president obama already pushed federal revenue collection far postworld war ii norm 18 percent gdp160 according cbo federal revenue current law reach 20 percent gdp nottoodistant future continue rising still due bracket creep built obamacare tax hikes tax hikes 2015 budget would add another one two percent gdp nations annual tax hike fully implemented 2015 budget also continues obama administrations remarkably persistent efforts downsize nations military capabilities budget proposes reduce defense spending 23 percent gdp end ten year budget windowwhich would the160 lowest level defense spending160in many decades mediumterm defense funding estimates carry far significance outyear projections budget often takes many years national defense policies fully implemented budget plan consistently indicates downward pressure future years force nearterm decisions cancel weapons systems downsize force structures degrade readiness curtailment training decisions implications military strength immediately ten years truly remarkable obama budget pushing forward major downsizing national security capabilities even world eventssee syria ukraineindicate quite obviously adding substantial new risks security interests around world beyond tax increases defense cuts favored mechanism fiscal consolidation past obama budgets deeper healthcare price regulation implemented medicare 2015 budget proposes 400 billion tenyear medicare cuts focused mainly usual assortment adjustments obscure payment regulations governing providers get paid taking care medicare patients instance budget proposes import portion medicare drug benefit price control system governing medicaid purchases drugs supposedly saving 117 billion decade also new cuts planned nursing homes rehabilitation facilities durable medical equipment suppliers many others cuts might justified goal build better price control regime public insurance program lowering price controls constitute real entitlement reform federal government trying fix problems medicare micromanagement prices decades yet medicares problems persist root problem medicare inefficient provision care price controls fix problem indeed instead leading efficient care price controls force providers medicare program altogether thats already expected happen coming years medicare cuts contained obamacare push payments hospitals low 15 percent forced drop program decades end according governments own160 projections millions medicare enrollees may also forced medicare advantage plans coming decade deep obamacare cuts portion program 2015 budget doubles dubious obamacarelike approaches cost control among laundry list medicare spending reductions contained budget proposal increase planned cuts implemented independent payment advisory board ipab ipab fifteen member board given authority obamacare hold cost growth medicare program year medicare spending expected exceed ceiling set law ipabs recommended cuts go effect automatically unless congress passes alternative savings provisions prospect handing much power authority unelected unaccountable board supposed experts made ipab highly controversialso much administration yet submit names begin filling open slots board yet budget proposes lower ipabs annual spending growth target medicare gdp plus one percentage point gdp plus half percentage point every year beyond three areastax hikes defense cuts health care price controls obama budget shows almost restraint portion budget creating pressure cuts consolidationentitlement spendingis allowed skyrocket even medicare cuts total entitlement spending rises 22 trillion 2014 nearly 39 trillion 2024 average annual growth rate 55 percent comparison obama defense budget essentially held flat ten years nominal terms real terms adjusting inflation defense funding 2024 would 138 billion less appropriation request 2015 obama budget purposefully blueprint unrestrained liberal governance president wants show electorate democrats would full control congress may help voters also opens administration substantial criticism budget predicated massive tax hikes deep cuts defense extension healthcare price controls easily described opponents recipe slower growth dangerous world impeded access care seniors let political debates begin james c capretta senior fellow ethics public policy center visiting fellow american enterprise institute | 722 |
<p>Robert Hughes didn’t mince words:</p>
<p>On the morning of February 25, 1970, Mark Rothko’s body was found in his studio in New York. He had done a thorough job of killing himself…. He lay fat and exsanguinated, clad in long underwear and black socks, in the middle of a lake of blood.</p>
<p>Hughes’s riveting description, black socks and all, captures both the final act of the artist’s tortured life, and the finale to the generation of New York’s pioneering abstract expressionist painters. By the time of Rothko’s suicide, Arshile Gorky, David Smith, and Jackson Pollock (the most celebrated of them all) had already shuffled off their own mortal coils. They had met their deaths, as Hughes (1938–2012) reminds us in The Spectacle of Skill, a new anthology of his writings, “by their own hand…or violent accident…or booze, old age, the usual disabilities.” It’s hard to find a more trenchant obit of an -ism than that.</p>
<p>* * *</p>
<p>The chief reason to buy The Spectacle of Skill is for Hughes’s memoir (five chapters from the first part, which appeared as Things I Didn’t Know in 2006, and eleven chapters from the unpublished second part are reprinted here), a rollicking saga of his turbulent life from his Sydney childhood to the suicide of his estranged son, Danton. Fast-paced, unbuttoned, elegant, and engrossingly written, it’s a fascinating account of its maverick author and those who came into (or left) his orbit, including many luminaries of the New York art scene. Aside from the unfinished memoir, this hefty volume features a selection of pieces from Hughes’s oeuvre, including book reviews and columns from Time magazine—the highly readable art criticism that made him famous in America. There are also long passages from his books on Rome, Barcelona, and Goya, and pages from The Fatal Shore (1986), his massively researched, brilliantly told, history of the convict settlement of Australia. Excerpts from the scripts of his TV hits, The Shock of the New (1980) and American Visions: The Epic History of Art in America (1997) are also included.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, readers will find themselves shortchanged. There are no illustrations of works of art, and no explanation of why these selections were published instead of others from Hughes’s work. Nor is there any information as to when and where they appeared originally, knowledge that would help put the selections in the context and chronology of the author’s life. A few simple footnotes or an editorial note in the preface would have sufficed. And, the publication of the entire memoir in a single volume would have been preferable to this retreading of random articles, some of which come from a previous anthology of Hughes’s writings and reviews.</p>
<p>Never mind, though, because everything here is worth reading for the first or the fifth time. The volume is a page-turner from the pen of one of the bravest, most gifted, opinionated, pugnacious, and perceptive art critics of the last 50 years. Hughes wrote with the skill of a great novelist. He had a finely tuned ear for rhythm and cadence and the gift to find just the right metaphor, analogy, or word to describe, explain, and judge what he saw. This skill is especially evident in the book’s essays on John Singer Sargent, James Whistler, and Jackson Pollock.</p>
<p>Much of the best writing on art comes not from academic art historians or theoretical critics, but from the pens of novelists, poets, and visual artists who creatively translate images into words. In their hands, criticism itself becomes fine art. John Ruskin, Charles Baudelaire, and Walter Pater in the 19th century, and Tom Wolfe, John Updike, and Aldous Huxley in the 20th, rose to this height. Hughes belongs in their ranks.</p>
<p>* * *</p>
<p>One of his defining attributes was nationality. Born and raised in Sydney, he came from a fairly well-to-do Australian family. His father was a lawyer with little interest in art. But if there weren’t many pictures on the walls in Hughes’s home, there was a well-stocked library. There he devoured the Romantic poets, Alice in Wonderland, and quantities of Rudyard Kipling, especially Kim and The Jungle Book. These made a lasting impression on his young mind and his future prose style. He also poured over bound volumes of Punch and the illustrations of Arthur Rackham; these were his introduction to the visual arts.</p>
<p>At his Catholic boarding school, where he learned Latin and lost his faith, he was fortunate to study with the headmaster, Father Wallace, who recognized his brilliance and encouraged him, as Hughes said, to read books that “probably would have featured on the [Vatican’s] Index Librorum Prohibitorem.” His mentor, much to the discomfort of the other priests, also introduced him to modernist literature, including the then-risqué writings of Ernest Hemingway, Christopher Isherwood, and James Joyce. Hughes narrowly escaped a lashing after a teacher found an anthology of Joyce that he had been reading.</p>
<p>Hughes went to the University of Sydney, where he wrote for the student newspaper and moved in a libertarian circle that included Germaine Greer and Clive James. After college, he was hired as a cartoonist by a local newspaper and then was abruptly made its art critic when his predecessor was fired for reviewing a show he never visited. Like a number of distinguished writers on art, including Paul Johnson and Kenneth Clark, whom Hughes admired for his art criticism if not for his social class, Hughes escaped the clutches of a Ph.D. and the constraints of jargon-laced scholarly writing and specialized research.</p>
<p>* * *</p>
<p>He grew up with a sense of the cultural inferiority of his Australian homeland. Art history and the practice of art were absent from his university’s curriculum, although Sydney’s Art Gallery of New South Wales has a collection of old masters and a good selection of Australian art (sadly, still not well enough known outside of that country). Hughes called this sense of inadequacy “the Cultural Cringe,” the assumption that what one wrote or painted or carved “is of unknown value until it is judged by people outside your own society.” This sense of “cultural colonialism,” of being an interloper, never left him. It made him feel like an outsider, both in London (where he first relocated) and New York, even at the height of his fame.</p>
<p>The book’s title comes from a quote that sums up Hughes’s criticism:</p>
<p>I am completely an elitist, in the cultural but emphatically not the social sense. I prefer the good to the bad, the articulate to the mumbling, the aesthetically developed to the merely primitive, and full to partial consciousness. I love the spectacle of skill, whether it’s an expert gardener at work, or a good carpenter chopping dovetails…. I don’t think stupid or ill-read people are as good to be with as wise and fully literate ones…. Consequently, most of the human race doesn’t matter much to me, outside the normal and necessary frame of courtesy and the obligation to respect human rights…. I am, after all, a cultural critic, and my main job is to distinguish the good from the second-rate.</p>
<p>This unabashed elitism in an age of egalitarianism and cultural relativity is rare and admirably politically incorrect. Hughes had zero patience with the herds of conformist, fashionable critics and art historians spouting cant about postmodern art and artists. The strength and fearlessness, and occasional eccentricity, of his judgments make The Spectacle of Skill original, iconoclastic, and bracing. Nowhere does he trim or equivocate about art, no matter what its exalted position or reputation might be.</p>
<p>His ideas about art changed dramatically in 1966 when the BBC sent him to cover the Florentine flood. In the Arno city, the cradle of so much European painting and sculpture, he had an epiphany:</p>
<p>After those days and weeks in Florence, I was never again able to join in the chorus of cultural fantasy that one heard so often in the sixties—the idea that there was something inherently repressive about old art, as though the past were a dead weight that new art, young art, had to shake off. Of course culture changes, but the idea that it simply reinvents itself, like a snake shedding its skin, is dreadfully naïve.</p>
<p>Art, as Hughes realized in Florence, doesn’t “foreshadow” subsequent art, but, instead, is its source, “used, imitated, learned from by later artists…it becomes part of the past and assumes the value that we associate with the past.”</p>
<p>* * *</p>
<p>This road to Damascus moment gave Hughes an understanding of just how much Western artists were indebted to their predecessors. Each succeeding generation was just the newest link in the great chain of art stretching back to Greece and Rome. For thousands of years, painters, sculptors, and architects had turned to the past for inspiration and instruction, unlike contemporary artists and critics who shun history and its values and, instead, prize a bogus “originality” above all else.</p>
<p>A Piero della Francesca or a Rembrandt, Hughes wrote, “is radical in a deep way that no Damien Hirst could ever be,” and to even name them “in the same sentence is faintly comical.” In his politics, Hughes was a man of the Left (his views on Ronald Reagan and conservatism are as clichéd as his art criticism is not), but when it came to art, he was a traditionalist in an age of chic conformists. Like Hilton Kramer, he refused to be bamboozled by the flimflam of the New York art market that was awash with money, greed, and strivers.</p>
<p>* * *</p>
<p>Florence was the watershed in Hughes’s criticism. It gave him a wider horizon. It enabled him to write with more perception and understanding about art. It also furnished a valuable new and wider perspective on the pretensions and humbug of many of the reigning artistic superstars of his day. Hughes was to become a devastating critic of their works, and of the dealers and critics who promoted and sold them. But art was not the only thing that he wrote about in Florence or the other cities he chronicled. He was a first-rate travel writer who captured the nuance, texture, color, and flavor of the places he visited. Intensely curious about people, places, and things, his interests ranged far beyond art and architecture to, among scores of other things, politics, history, wildlife, and the local cuisine.</p>
<p>One of the pleasures of The Spectacle of Skill is his amorous description of what he ate in his travels. In Florence he often dined at the venerable Buca Lapi (it’s still open) in the basement of the Palazzo Antinori. There he loved the “thick, Parmesan-clogged minestrone,” “its plump, egg-yellow pumpkin ravioli,” and the famous bistecca alla Fiorentina. In Sant’ Andrea in Percussina, a village just outside the city, he devoured “coarse bread, toasted on an open fire, rubbed with garlic, and then drenched in the local olive oil, green and thick as Castrol, densely perfumed and sprinkled with salt.” (As a graduate student living in Florence, I often ate this delicious country dish accompanied by sausages, beans, and good Chianti in the same tavern once frequented by the exiled Niccolò Machiavelli, who wrote&#160;The Prince in a villa across the street.)</p>
<p>* * *</p>
<p>Hughes’s stay in Florence is recorded in the first part of his memoirs. The second part, published in The Spectacle of Skill, is of greater historical value. It’s a richly anecdotal, gimlet-eyed telling of his life, loves, trials, and tribulations in New York where he settled in the 1970s. It’s also a fascinating story of a city that had recently become one of the international capitals of contemporary art. The memoir describes, among many other things, Hughes’s work for Time, the friendships he forged with artists (including Robert Rauschenberg, whom he called, inexplicably, “the genius of American art since the death of Pollock”), the making of his TV programs, and his life as an urban pioneer in the SoHo district before it became a high rent neighborhood.</p>
<p>In New York, Hughes found much art he liked and a good deal he despised, particularly that shilled by many of the reigning denizens, and false prophets, of the art world. Many of the most amusing passages in the memoir are the barbed, often sidesplitting deflations of these poobahs. About the then-fashionable artist Julian Schnabel, he opines that his “work is to painting what Stallone’s is to acting—a lurching display of oily pectorals—except that Schnabel makes bigger public claims for himself.” Commenting on a painting by the artistic duo Gilbert &amp; George, he fails to see “how anyone can take a pair of primping narcissists like Gilbert &amp; George seriously on any level whatsoever”; their work always struck him “as aesthetically vacuous, intellectually obvious, and complacently banal in design.” He calls Clement Greenberg, the high priest of abstract painting, “a quite limited critic, not interested in the content of works of art or their historical context, only in their formal character” and says “he had little or nothing of interest to say about any art earlier than impressionism.”</p>
<p>Memorializing his friend, the critic David Sylvester, Hughes says that he was a “fearlessly eccentric figure” whose prose was “sharp, aphoristic at times, free of jargon, and often beautifully judged.”</p>
<p>Those words are a fitting epitaph for the author of The Spectacle of Skill.</p>
<p>Bruce Cole is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p> | false | 1 | robert hughes didnt mince words morning february 25 1970 mark rothkos body found studio new york done thorough job killing lay fat exsanguinated clad long underwear black socks middle lake blood hughess riveting description black socks captures final act artists tortured life finale generation new yorks pioneering abstract expressionist painters time rothkos suicide arshile gorky david smith jackson pollock celebrated already shuffled mortal coils met deaths hughes 19382012 reminds us spectacle skill new anthology writings handor violent accidentor booze old age usual disabilities hard find trenchant obit ism chief reason buy spectacle skill hughess memoir five chapters first part appeared things didnt know 2006 eleven chapters unpublished second part reprinted rollicking saga turbulent life sydney childhood suicide estranged son danton fastpaced unbuttoned elegant engrossingly written fascinating account maverick author came left orbit including many luminaries new york art scene aside unfinished memoir hefty volume features selection pieces hughess oeuvre including book reviews columns time magazinethe highly readable art criticism made famous america also long passages books rome barcelona goya pages fatal shore 1986 massively researched brilliantly told history convict settlement australia excerpts scripts tv hits shock new 1980 american visions epic history art america 1997 also included unfortunately readers find shortchanged illustrations works art explanation selections published instead others hughess work information appeared originally knowledge would help put selections context chronology authors life simple footnotes editorial note preface would sufficed publication entire memoir single volume would preferable retreading random articles come previous anthology hughess writings reviews never mind though everything worth reading first fifth time volume pageturner pen one bravest gifted opinionated pugnacious perceptive art critics last 50 years hughes wrote skill great novelist finely tuned ear rhythm cadence gift find right metaphor analogy word describe explain judge saw skill especially evident books essays john singer sargent james whistler jackson pollock much best writing art comes academic art historians theoretical critics pens novelists poets visual artists creatively translate images words hands criticism becomes fine art john ruskin charles baudelaire walter pater 19th century tom wolfe john updike aldous huxley 20th rose height hughes belongs ranks one defining attributes nationality born raised sydney came fairly welltodo australian family father lawyer little interest art werent many pictures walls hughess home wellstocked library devoured romantic poets alice wonderland quantities rudyard kipling especially kim jungle book made lasting impression young mind future prose style also poured bound volumes punch illustrations arthur rackham introduction visual arts catholic boarding school learned latin lost faith fortunate study headmaster father wallace recognized brilliance encouraged hughes said read books probably would featured vaticans index librorum prohibitorem mentor much discomfort priests also introduced modernist literature including thenrisqué writings ernest hemingway christopher isherwood james joyce hughes narrowly escaped lashing teacher found anthology joyce reading hughes went university sydney wrote student newspaper moved libertarian circle included germaine greer clive james college hired cartoonist local newspaper abruptly made art critic predecessor fired reviewing show never visited like number distinguished writers art including paul johnson kenneth clark hughes admired art criticism social class hughes escaped clutches phd constraints jargonlaced scholarly writing specialized research grew sense cultural inferiority australian homeland art history practice art absent universitys curriculum although sydneys art gallery new south wales collection old masters good selection australian art sadly still well enough known outside country hughes called sense inadequacy cultural cringe assumption one wrote painted carved unknown value judged people outside society sense cultural colonialism interloper never left made feel like outsider london first relocated new york even height fame books title comes quote sums hughess criticism completely elitist cultural emphatically social sense prefer good bad articulate mumbling aesthetically developed merely primitive full partial consciousness love spectacle skill whether expert gardener work good carpenter chopping dovetails dont think stupid illread people good wise fully literate ones consequently human race doesnt matter much outside normal necessary frame courtesy obligation respect human rights cultural critic main job distinguish good secondrate unabashed elitism age egalitarianism cultural relativity rare admirably politically incorrect hughes zero patience herds conformist fashionable critics art historians spouting cant postmodern art artists strength fearlessness occasional eccentricity judgments make spectacle skill original iconoclastic bracing nowhere trim equivocate art matter exalted position reputation might ideas art changed dramatically 1966 bbc sent cover florentine flood arno city cradle much european painting sculpture epiphany days weeks florence never able join chorus cultural fantasy one heard often sixtiesthe idea something inherently repressive old art though past dead weight new art young art shake course culture changes idea simply reinvents like snake shedding skin dreadfully naïve art hughes realized florence doesnt foreshadow subsequent art instead source used imitated learned later artistsit becomes part past assumes value associate past road damascus moment gave hughes understanding much western artists indebted predecessors succeeding generation newest link great chain art stretching back greece rome thousands years painters sculptors architects turned past inspiration instruction unlike contemporary artists critics shun history values instead prize bogus originality else piero della francesca rembrandt hughes wrote radical deep way damien hirst could ever even name sentence faintly comical politics hughes man left views ronald reagan conservatism clichéd art criticism came art traditionalist age chic conformists like hilton kramer refused bamboozled flimflam new york art market awash money greed strivers florence watershed hughess criticism gave wider horizon enabled write perception understanding art also furnished valuable new wider perspective pretensions humbug many reigning artistic superstars day hughes become devastating critic works dealers critics promoted sold art thing wrote florence cities chronicled firstrate travel writer captured nuance texture color flavor places visited intensely curious people places things interests ranged far beyond art architecture among scores things politics history wildlife local cuisine one pleasures spectacle skill amorous description ate travels florence often dined venerable buca lapi still open basement palazzo antinori loved thick parmesanclogged minestrone plump eggyellow pumpkin ravioli famous bistecca alla fiorentina sant andrea percussina village outside city devoured coarse bread toasted open fire rubbed garlic drenched local olive oil green thick castrol densely perfumed sprinkled salt graduate student living florence often ate delicious country dish accompanied sausages beans good chianti tavern frequented exiled niccolò machiavelli wrote160the prince villa across street hughess stay florence recorded first part memoirs second part published spectacle skill greater historical value richly anecdotal gimleteyed telling life loves trials tribulations new york settled 1970s also fascinating story city recently become one international capitals contemporary art memoir describes among many things hughess work time friendships forged artists including robert rauschenberg called inexplicably genius american art since death pollock making tv programs life urban pioneer soho district became high rent neighborhood new york hughes found much art liked good deal despised particularly shilled many reigning denizens false prophets art world many amusing passages memoir barbed often sidesplitting deflations poobahs thenfashionable artist julian schnabel opines work painting stallones actinga lurching display oily pectoralsexcept schnabel makes bigger public claims commenting painting artistic duo gilbert amp george fails see anyone take pair primping narcissists like gilbert amp george seriously level whatsoever work always struck aesthetically vacuous intellectually obvious complacently banal design calls clement greenberg high priest abstract painting quite limited critic interested content works art historical context formal character says little nothing interest say art earlier impressionism memorializing friend critic david sylvester hughes says fearlessly eccentric figure whose prose sharp aphoristic times free jargon often beautifully judged words fitting epitaph author spectacle skill bruce cole senior fellow ethics public policy center | 1,220 |
<p>World leaders are united in their condemnation of the terrorist attack in Barcelona which claimed the lives of 13 people. Nationals from at least 18 countries fell victim to the van plowing massacre in the busy Las Ramblas district of the city which also injured over 110 people.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/399932-barcelona-van-attack-spain/" type="external">LIVE UPDATES: Van smashes into pedestrians in central Barcelona</a></p>
<p>President Vladimir Putin was one of the first world leaders who publicly condemned the La Ramblas van attack that left 13 dead.</p>
<p>“We strongly condemn this cruel and cynical crime perpetrated against ordinary citizens,” Putin said in a statement while offering his condolences to Spaniards and the King of Spain, Felipe VI. He&#160; <a href="http://kremlin.ru/events/president/news/55357" type="external">underlined</a>&#160;that Barcelona’s terror attack&#160;“reaffirms once again the need to truly unite the efforts of the entire international community in the fight against terrorist forces.”</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/399954-barcelona-van-attack-eyewitness/" type="external">‘Van was going fast, stopped, then plowed into more people’ – Barcelona attack eyewitness to RT</a></p>
<p>Putin’s message to the Spanish people followed reaction by Russia’s foreign ministry.</p>
<p>Решительно осуждаем теракт в <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Barcelona?src=hash" type="external">#Barcelona</a>. Уверены, этому злу нет оправдания. Передаём слова сочувствия народу Испании. Скорбим вместе с вами</p>
<p>— МИД России (@MID_RF) <a href="https://twitter.com/MID_RF/status/898242957677146113" type="external">August 17, 2017</a></p>
<p>“We strongly condemn the terrorist attack in Barcelona, and we are sure that there is no justification for this evil,” the ministry said on Twitter.</p>
<p>“We convey the words of sympathy to the people of Spain. We mourn together with you.”</p>
<p>Reaction from US President Donald Trump has meanwhile sparked some criticism. While initially condemning the terrorist attack in Barcelona and offering to “do whatever is necessary to help,” Trump in his next tweet, advised his followers to, “study what General Pershing of the United States did to terrorists when caught. There was no more Radical Islamic Terror for 35 years!”</p>
<p>The United States condemns the terror attack in Barcelona, Spain, and will do whatever is necessary to help. Be tough &amp; strong, we love you!</p>
<p>— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/898243270169563136" type="external">August 17, 2017</a></p>
<p>While Trump did not clarify what he meant, the US general Pershing Trump was referring to, fought in the Moro uprising in the Philippines and allegedly shot prisoners with bullets “dipped in pig’s blood.” Many <a href="https://twitter.com/ikebarinholtz/status/898278141331873792?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&amp;ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.rt.com%2Fpreview%2FNews%2F599648edfc7e93e8128b4568%2F" type="external">critics</a> pointed out though that the claim is false.</p>
<p>Following Islamic State’s (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) claim of responsibility for the Barcelona massacre, Brett McGurk, the special presidential envoy for the US-led coalition to defeat the terror group pledged the “unwavering resolve of our entire coalition to destroy ISIS.”</p>
<p>Vice President Mike Pence, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and UN Envoy Nikki Haley all condemned the attack.</p>
<p>We send thoughts &amp; prayers to lift up those affected by today’s terror attack. We stand w/ Spain now and always in our fight against terror. <a href="https://t.co/Mnvth9mekh" type="external">pic.twitter.com/Mnvth9mekh</a></p>
<p>— Nikki Haley (@nikkihaley) <a href="https://twitter.com/nikkihaley/status/898262091399745537" type="external">August 17, 2017</a></p>
<p>“Terrorists around the world should know the US and our allies are resolved to find you and bring you to justice,” Tillerson was quoted as saying by State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert‏ in her tweet.</p>
<p>Sec Tillerson: Terrorists around the world should know the US and our allies are resolved to find you and bring you to justice. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Barcelona?src=hash" type="external">#Barcelona</a></p>
<p>— Heather Nauert (@statedeptspox) <a href="https://twitter.com/statedeptspox/status/898264574356590592" type="external">August 17, 2017</a></p>
<p>Sec Tillerson: We stand ready to assist law enforcement, national security authorities in <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Spain?src=hash" type="external">#Spain</a>. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Barcelona?src=hash" type="external">#Barcelona</a></p>
<p>— Heather Nauert (@statedeptspox) <a href="https://twitter.com/statedeptspox/status/898264538562174976" type="external">August 17, 2017</a></p>
<p>Former US President Barack Obama also could not stay silent and condemned the attack on Twitter.</p>
<p>Michelle and I are thinking of the victims and their families in Barcelona. Americans will always stand with our Spanish friends. Un abrazo.</p>
<p>— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) <a href="https://twitter.com/BarackObama/status/898261944095789056" type="external">August 17, 2017</a></p>
<p>In the UK, Prime Minister Theresa May said that London stands with Spain against terror.&#160;</p>
<p>“I am sickened by the senseless loss of life in Barcelona today,” she <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/barcelona-attack-pm-statement" type="external">said</a>. “The Foreign Office is working to establish if any British nationals were involved in this appalling incident and we are in close contact with the authorities in Spain who have our full support.”</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/400008-alcanar-explosion-barcelona-attack/" type="external">READ MORE: House explosion in Alcanar, Catalonia may be linked to Barcelona terrorist attack – police</a></p>
<p>May’s message was echoed by Boris Johnson, the British foreign secretary.</p>
<p>Concerned and saddened by <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Barcelona?src=hash" type="external">#Barcelona</a> attack. Our thoughts are with those affected. Doing all we can to identify whether Brits need help.</p>
<p>— Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) <a href="https://twitter.com/BorisJohnson/status/898244660942057473" type="external">August 17, 2017</a></p>
<p>London Mayor Sadiq Khan, whose city has endured numerous terrorist attacks, tweeted that the UK capital “stands with Barcelona against the evil of terrorism.”</p>
<p>My thoughts are with the victims of this barbaric terrorist attack in the great city of Barcelona and with their brave emergency services.</p>
<p>— Sadiq Khan (@SadiqKhan) <a href="https://twitter.com/SadiqKhan/status/898232657821278209" type="external">August 17, 2017</a></p>
<p>“My thoughts are with the victims of this barbaric terrorist attack in the great city of Barcelona and with their brave emergency services,” he tweeted.</p>
<p>Berlin has also expressed condolences to families of the victims.</p>
<p>“We are thinking with profound sadness of the victims of the revolting attack in Barcelona – with solidarity and friendship alongside the Spanish people,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel said.</p>
<p>French President Emmanuel Macron called the incident a “tragic attack.”</p>
<p>“All my thoughts and the solidarity of France are with the victims of this tragic attack in #Barcelona,” Macron tweeted. “We remain united and determined.”</p>
<p>Toutes mes pensées et la solidarité de la France pour les victimes de la tragique attaque à <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Barcelone?src=hash" type="external">#Barcelone</a>. Nous restons unis et déterminés.</p>
<p>— Emmanuel Macron (@EmmanuelMacron) <a href="https://twitter.com/EmmanuelMacron/status/898241788057661440" type="external">August 17, 2017</a></p>
<p>Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo meanwhile said the world famous Eiffel Tower would go dark at 00:45 Paris time in solidarity with the Barcelona victims.</p>
<p>“Parisians are at your side,” Hidalgo tweeted. “Barcelona and Paris are cities that share love and tolerance. Our values are much stronger than this heinous and cowardly act of terrorism.”</p>
<p>The Holy See meanwhile noted that Pope Francis is praying for the victims. The Pontiff was “greatly worried” about Thursday’s attack and is following developments closely, Vatican spokesman Greg Burke said, according to AP.</p>
<p>“The Pope prays for the victims of this attack and wishes to express his closeness to all the Spanish people, especially the wounded and families of the victims,” the Vatican statement said.</p>
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<p>On Thursday a van crashed into a crowd in Barcelona killing 13 people and injuring over 110 others, according to Catalonia authorities. Police say they are treating the incident as a “terrorist attack.”</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/399969-europe-ramming-vehicle-attack-barcelona/" type="external">READ MORE: 4 terror attacks in Europe when vehicles were rammed into pedestrians (VIDEOS)</a></p>
<p>Spanish authorities have so far detained two suspects. One is a Spanish national from Melilla, a Spanish autonomous city located on the north coast of Africa, on the Moroccan border. The other person arrested in the incident is Moroccan. None of the two are believed to be the driver of the van. The investigation continues.</p> | false | 1 | world leaders united condemnation terrorist attack barcelona claimed lives 13 people nationals least 18 countries fell victim van plowing massacre busy las ramblas district city also injured 110 people live updates van smashes pedestrians central barcelona president vladimir putin one first world leaders publicly condemned la ramblas van attack left 13 dead strongly condemn cruel cynical crime perpetrated ordinary citizens putin said statement offering condolences spaniards king spain felipe vi he160 underlined160that barcelonas terror attack160reaffirms need truly unite efforts entire international community fight terrorist forces van going fast stopped plowed people barcelona attack eyewitness rt putins message spanish people followed reaction russias foreign ministry Решительно осуждаем теракт в barcelona Уверены этому злу нет оправдания Передаём слова сочувствия народу Испании Скорбим вместе с вами МИД России mid_rf august 17 2017 strongly condemn terrorist attack barcelona sure justification evil ministry said twitter convey words sympathy people spain mourn together reaction us president donald trump meanwhile sparked criticism initially condemning terrorist attack barcelona offering whatever necessary help trump next tweet advised followers study general pershing united states terrorists caught radical islamic terror 35 years united states condemns terror attack barcelona spain whatever necessary help tough amp strong love donald j trump realdonaldtrump august 17 2017 trump clarify meant us general pershing trump referring fought moro uprising philippines allegedly shot prisoners bullets dipped pigs blood many critics pointed though claim false following islamic states formerly isisisil claim responsibility barcelona massacre brett mcgurk special presidential envoy usled coalition defeat terror group pledged unwavering resolve entire coalition destroy isis vice president mike pence secretary state rex tillerson un envoy nikki haley condemned attack send thoughts amp prayers lift affected todays terror attack stand w spain always fight terror pictwittercommnvth9mekh nikki haley nikkihaley august 17 2017 terrorists around world know us allies resolved find bring justice tillerson quoted saying state department spokeswoman heather nauert tweet sec tillerson terrorists around world know us allies resolved find bring justice barcelona heather nauert statedeptspox august 17 2017 sec tillerson stand ready assist law enforcement national security authorities spain barcelona heather nauert statedeptspox august 17 2017 former us president barack obama also could stay silent condemned attack twitter michelle thinking victims families barcelona americans always stand spanish friends un abrazo barack obama barackobama august 17 2017 uk prime minister theresa may said london stands spain terror160 sickened senseless loss life barcelona today said foreign office working establish british nationals involved appalling incident close contact authorities spain full support read house explosion alcanar catalonia may linked barcelona terrorist attack police mays message echoed boris johnson british foreign secretary concerned saddened barcelona attack thoughts affected identify whether brits need help boris johnson borisjohnson august 17 2017 london mayor sadiq khan whose city endured numerous terrorist attacks tweeted uk capital stands barcelona evil terrorism thoughts victims barbaric terrorist attack great city barcelona brave emergency services sadiq khan sadiqkhan august 17 2017 thoughts victims barbaric terrorist attack great city barcelona brave emergency services tweeted berlin also expressed condolences families victims thinking profound sadness victims revolting attack barcelona solidarity friendship alongside spanish people german chancellor angela merkel said french president emmanuel macron called incident tragic attack thoughts solidarity france victims tragic attack barcelona macron tweeted remain united determined toutes mes pensées et la solidarité de la france pour les victimes de la tragique attaque à barcelone nous restons unis et déterminés emmanuel macron emmanuelmacron august 17 2017 paris mayor anne hidalgo meanwhile said world famous eiffel tower would go dark 0045 paris time solidarity barcelona victims parisians side hidalgo tweeted barcelona paris cities share love tolerance values much stronger heinous cowardly act terrorism holy see meanwhile noted pope francis praying victims pontiff greatly worried thursdays attack following developments closely vatican spokesman greg burke said according ap pope prays victims attack wishes express closeness spanish people especially wounded families victims vatican statement said embedded content thursday van crashed crowd barcelona killing 13 people injuring 110 others according catalonia authorities police say treating incident terrorist attack read 4 terror attacks europe vehicles rammed pedestrians videos spanish authorities far detained two suspects one spanish national melilla spanish autonomous city located north coast africa moroccan border person arrested incident moroccan none two believed driver van investigation continues | 697 |
<p>Talking exclusively to RT Sport, UFC lightweight Mairbek Taisumov told us about his plans after solving his US visa issues. The fighter also discussed Conor McGregor, fighting against Khabib Nurmagomedov, the number of the languages he speaks, and more.</p>
<p>Taisumov re-emerged on the radars of fight fans at the beginning of September, after a break of more than a year, at UFC Fight Night 115 in Rotterdam, the Netherlands.</p>
<p>Continuing his winning streak, he spectacularly knocked out Brazilian <a href="http://www.sherdog.com/fighter/Felipe-Silva-128357" type="external">Felipe Silva</a> in the first round, when landing his first punch of the fight.</p>
<p>With that victory, which earned him the&#160;KO of the night bonus, the 29-year-old Chechnya native took his knockout streak to five in a row.</p>
<p>Despite those impressive stats, Taisumov is still relatively unknown among UFC fans.</p>
<p>That’s mainly because all of his UFC fights have happened in Europe as a result of issues with receiving a US visa in recent years. However, he did visit the States before signing with the UFC, to fight under the <a href="http://www.sherdog.com/events/M1-Challenge-26-Garner-vs-Bennett-2-16616" type="external">M-1 Global banner in 2011</a>.</p>
<p>Following his latest victory, Taisumov, who permanently lives in Austria, came to Russia to visit the Chechen capital of Grozny, as well as Russia’s capital, Moscow.</p>
<p>During his Moscow stay, Taisumov was a special guest of the media day for the upcoming event of Chechen-based promotion Absolute Championship Berkut (ACB) – ACB 71, which takes place on Saturday in the Russian capital.</p>
<p>RT Sport went to the event to talk to Taisumov about his winning streak, affiliation with Berkut Fight Club, future plans, and more.</p>
<p>[embedded content]</p>
<p>RT: We know that you started out in sport as a soccer player. How did you make your way from soccer to mixed martial arts?</p>
<p>Mairbek Taisumov: I was playing soccer since I was a kid. In Austria I played for the Austria 13 (team). My school friend asked me to come to a Brazilian Jiu-jitsu seminar. I went there and saw all the moves, the chokes. You know, triangle choke, all that stuff. And I just liked it. I started to train Brazilian Jiu-jitsu. But I could wrestle because I also come from wrestling, because in Chechnya everybody wrestles since being kids. In Chechnya wrestling is like a national sport. Everybody trains wrestling. I knew how to wrestle, but Brazilian Jiu-jitsu was new for me because of the chokes, triangle (choke), arm bars. I liked it, and then I saw mixed martial arts and I moved to mixed martial arts.</p>
<p>RT: How old were you when you moved to Austria?</p>
<p>MT: I come from Chechen Republic, I am Chechen. But when I was like 13 years old I moved to Austria. My parents decided to move to Austria, because they worked there. It was difficult, because I left my friends, I left my school, I left my soccer team. It was difficult, I couldn’t speak German, you know? But now I feel like Austria is my second home.</p>
<p>RT: Given that you’ve lived in Austria for so long, you probably speak German quite well. How many languages do you speak in total?</p>
<p>MT: I speak German, I speak Chechen, I speak Russian and a little bit of English. I like it when I can speak to people because in mixed martial arts we travel around the world and it’s nice when you come somewhere and you can speak to the people around you.</p>
<p>RT: Many people describe you as a hard worker, they say you train twice a day even when you don’t have any fights scheduled. Is it something you enjoy yourself or just take it as a part of your job?</p>
<p>MT: Some guys see the training as their job, you know. They just have to do this. I am enjoying the training. I love it. Even on the holidays I go to the gym, I go for a run. I am enjoying this. This is not work, this not what I have to do. I just love it.</p>
<p>RT: You have a 5 KO streak in the UFC, but you’re still not very well known by most of UFC fans. Mostly because all your UFC fights happened in Europe, since you’ve had issues getting a US visa. Is there any progress in solving those issues?</p>
<p>MT: I’m motivated to do five more knockouts. But this visa (situation) is the problem. I’ve been in America before. I had a working visa, I fought there, I paid taxes, everything was fine. But now they don’t let me in, I don’t know what happened. But my lawyers are working on it. I hope that soon I’ll have my visa and I’ll smash these (UFC) Top-10 guys.</p>
<p>RT: Your fight moniker is Beckan, what does this name mean? And how did you get it?</p>
<p>MT: I was playing soccer and my shirt was number 7, like David Beckham. And they just called me Beckan. This is where my nickname came from. All my friends call me Beckan still.</p>
<p>RT: We know that you’re affiliated with Berkut Fight Club from Chechnya. What’s your current relationship with them?</p>
<p>MT: Yeah I train with Berkut for many years. Three years ago I started (officially) representing Berkut. But before that I also trained with them.</p>
<p>RT: Berkut management also runs the ACB promotion, which is making a lot of noise among fight fans. How do you rate them, given that you performed for different organizations throughout your career?</p>
<p>MT: I think in Europe and in Russia the ACB is the biggest organization. These guys are getting better and bigger every day. They’re very professional. We [in Russia] have a couple of other promotions, but I think that the ACB is the best one. I think they’ll make some problems for Bellator very soon. They sign the best names, they sign good prospects. ACB is getting bigger every day. They made this promotion big in just three years. In the next three years I think it will be better than any other promotion.</p>
<p>RT: After your last fight you moved up in the UFC rankings to number 15, but you already said that you feel like you should be rated higher. What position do you think you deserve?</p>
<p>MT: They’ve put me on Top 15 on the official rating of the UFC. But I feel like I’m in the Top 5. You know that I want to fight Eddie Alvarez. But anyone (would work). I called out Michael Chiesa, Nate Diaz, Anthony Pettis. But no one wants to fight me. I’m telling you these guys don’t want to fight me. But when I get the visa I’ll go there and smash these guys.</p>
<p>RT: Would you consider fighting one of the top lightweights, Khabib Nurmagomedov?</p>
<p>MT: I know his father, they know me. We’re like brothers. I don’t think that we’ll fight each other. You can also ask Khabib, I don’t think that he’ll say that he wants to fight me.</p>
<p>RT: And finally, what’s your take on the current lightweight champion, Conor McGregor?</p>
<p>MT: Everybody is talking sh*t about McGregor. But I think he did a good job. He did amazing, he’s the champion. Everybody say that he talks sh*t, he does this, he does that. I cannot say anything about him, because I didn’t do the same that he did. He’s the champion and I’m not. When I reach the same level like him, maybe I’ll say something. But now I don’t want to speak about this guy. He’s the champion, he fought one of the best in boxing, he made a lot of money. These guys can talk (about him), but he did a good job.</p>
<p>by <a href="https://twitter.com/DenisGeykoRT" type="external">Denis Geyko</a> for RT Sport</p> | false | 1 | talking exclusively rt sport ufc lightweight mairbek taisumov told us plans solving us visa issues fighter also discussed conor mcgregor fighting khabib nurmagomedov number languages speaks taisumov reemerged radars fight fans beginning september break year ufc fight night 115 rotterdam netherlands continuing winning streak spectacularly knocked brazilian felipe silva first round landing first punch fight victory earned the160ko night bonus 29yearold chechnya native took knockout streak five row despite impressive stats taisumov still relatively unknown among ufc fans thats mainly ufc fights happened europe result issues receiving us visa recent years however visit states signing ufc fight m1 global banner 2011 following latest victory taisumov permanently lives austria came russia visit chechen capital grozny well russias capital moscow moscow stay taisumov special guest media day upcoming event chechenbased promotion absolute championship berkut acb acb 71 takes place saturday russian capital rt sport went event talk taisumov winning streak affiliation berkut fight club future plans embedded content rt know started sport soccer player make way soccer mixed martial arts mairbek taisumov playing soccer since kid austria played austria 13 team school friend asked come brazilian jiujitsu seminar went saw moves chokes know triangle choke stuff liked started train brazilian jiujitsu could wrestle also come wrestling chechnya everybody wrestles since kids chechnya wrestling like national sport everybody trains wrestling knew wrestle brazilian jiujitsu new chokes triangle choke arm bars liked saw mixed martial arts moved mixed martial arts rt old moved austria mt come chechen republic chechen like 13 years old moved austria parents decided move austria worked difficult left friends left school left soccer team difficult couldnt speak german know feel like austria second home rt given youve lived austria long probably speak german quite well many languages speak total mt speak german speak chechen speak russian little bit english like speak people mixed martial arts travel around world nice come somewhere speak people around rt many people describe hard worker say train twice day even dont fights scheduled something enjoy take part job mt guys see training job know enjoying training love even holidays go gym go run enjoying work love rt 5 ko streak ufc youre still well known ufc fans mostly ufc fights happened europe since youve issues getting us visa progress solving issues mt im motivated five knockouts visa situation problem ive america working visa fought paid taxes everything fine dont let dont know happened lawyers working hope soon ill visa ill smash ufc top10 guys rt fight moniker beckan name mean get mt playing soccer shirt number 7 like david beckham called beckan nickname came friends call beckan still rt know youre affiliated berkut fight club chechnya whats current relationship mt yeah train berkut many years three years ago started officially representing berkut also trained rt berkut management also runs acb promotion making lot noise among fight fans rate given performed different organizations throughout career mt think europe russia acb biggest organization guys getting better bigger every day theyre professional russia couple promotions think acb best one think theyll make problems bellator soon sign best names sign good prospects acb getting bigger every day made promotion big three years next three years think better promotion rt last fight moved ufc rankings number 15 already said feel like rated higher position think deserve mt theyve put top 15 official rating ufc feel like im top 5 know want fight eddie alvarez anyone would work called michael chiesa nate diaz anthony pettis one wants fight im telling guys dont want fight get visa ill go smash guys rt would consider fighting one top lightweights khabib nurmagomedov mt know father know like brothers dont think well fight also ask khabib dont think hell say wants fight rt finally whats take current lightweight champion conor mcgregor mt everybody talking sht mcgregor think good job amazing hes champion everybody say talks sht say anything didnt hes champion im reach level like maybe ill say something dont want speak guy hes champion fought one best boxing made lot money guys talk good job denis geyko rt sport | 675 |
<p>Mike Novogratz is reinventing himself as the king of bitcoin.</p>
<p>The swaggering macro manager who flamed out at Fortress Investment Group LLC is starting a $500 million hedge fund to invest in cryptocurrencies, initial coin offerings and related companies. Novogratz will put up $150 million of his own money and plans to raise $350 million more by January, mainly from family offices, wealthy individuals and fellow hedge fund managers, said a person familiar with his plans.</p>
<p>At that size, the Galaxy Digital Assets Fund would be the biggest of its kind and signal a growing acceptance of cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin and ether as legitimate investments. For Novogratz, 52, the fund marks a comeback to professional money management after humbling losses at Fortress and almost two years of self-imposed exile from Wall Street.</p>
<p>Novogratz, in an interview with Bloomberg Television, declined to confirm or deny that he’s raising a fund, citing regulatory constraints. He did talk at length about his recent experience with digital assets and why he’s eager to trade them.</p>
<p>“This is going to be the largest bubble of our lifetimes,” Novogratz said. “Prices are going to get way ahead of where they should be. You can make a whole lot of money on the way up, and we plan on it.”</p>
<p>‘Trading Junkie’</p>
<p>Just this month, bitcoin hit a record of almost $5,000 then plunged 30 percent in two weeks as buyers weighed the impact of a Chinese ban on initial coin offerings and domestic trading in virtual currencies.</p>
<p>“I sold at $5,000 or $4,980,” he said. “Then three weeks later I’m trying to buy it in the low $3,000s. If you’re good at that and you’re a trading junkie, it’s a lot of fun.”</p>
<p>The fortunes being made and lost are just one reason Novogratz likens the cryptocurrency market to the Wild West. Digital assets like bitcoin need more regulation, and in the meantime some initial coin offerings, or ICOs, will prove to be fraudulent “get-rich-quick schemes,” he said.</p>
<p>While the technology community has embraced the libertarian ideal of a decentralized, open-source payment system in which a fixed money supply is determined by computer code, financiers are taking a more cautious approach. Only two other hedge funds have raised tens of millions of dollars to invest in digital assets, Polychain Capital and MetaStable Capital.</p>
<p>Click <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-06-27/novogratz-says-cryptocurrencies-face-monster-regulatory-risks" type="external">here</a> to read about cyberattacks and digital currency</p>
<p>Novogratz’s fund will have a broader mandate, including market-making, arbitrage, stakes in internet coin offerings and venture capital-style investments in digital-asset development, said the person familiar with his plans, who asked not to be named because they’re still private. He also brought on as partners two traders with years of experience in hedge fund investing and compliance: Richard Tavoso, the former head of global arbitrage at RBC Capital Markets; and David Namdar, who worked at Millennium Partners, Marto Capital and UBS AG, the person said.</p>
<p>Bitcoin ‘Fraud’</p>
<p>Most large institutions have steered clear of the cryptocurrency market out of skepticism about its legitimacy or concerns that the mostly unregulated instruments are too volatile. JPMorgan Chase &amp; Co. Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon captured the prevailing view on Wall Street when earlier this month he called bitcoin a “fraud” and said he would fire anyone at his bank for trading it.</p>
<p>Where others see volatility and liability, Novogratz, a former Goldman Sachs Group Inc. partner, smells opportunity.</p>
<p>“In a lot of ways, this is a market like any other market,” Novogratz said. “You see the psychology of fear and greed in the charts the same way you’d see it in charts of the Indonesian rupiah or dollar-yen or Treasuries. They’re exaggerated because of less liquidity and because you can’t get short.”</p>
<p>Novogratz developed his taste for risk as a varsity wrestler at Princeton University and later as a National Guard helicopter pilot. He dabbled in bitcoin while still managing billions of dollars in a macro fund at Fortress, but didn’t score his first big win until after leaving the New York-based firm two years ago.</p>
<p>It started with a late-2015 visit to a friend’s startup in Brooklyn.</p>
<p>“I expected to see Joe, a dog and one assistant. Instead I saw 30 dynamic young people crammed in a Bushwick warehouse, coding, talking on the phone, making plans for this revolution,” Novogratz said. “Macro guys are instinctive. My instinct was, ‘I want to buy a chunk of this company.”’</p>
<p>$250 Million Haul</p>
<p>He decided instead to invest in ether, the cryptocurrency token used on the Ethereum network. Novogratz bought about $500,000 at less than a dollar per ether and left on a vacation to India. By the time he returned a few weeks later, the price had risen more than fivefold. He bought more.</p>
<p>Over the course of 2016 and into 2017, as ether surged to almost $400 and bitcoin topped $2,500, Novogratz sold enough to make about $250 million, the biggest haul of any single trade in his career. He said he paid tax on the profits, bought a Gulfstream G550 jet and donated an equal amount to a philanthropic project for criminal justice reform.</p>
<p>Novogratz was hooked. Today, he hosts a weekly “crypto meet-up” for as many as 90 people over drinks at his office in Manhattan’s SoHo district and waxes effusive about his adopted industry.</p>
<p>“Remember, bubbles happen around things that fundamentally change the way we live,” he said. “The railroad bubble. Railroads really fundamentally changed the way we lived. The internet bubble changed the way we live. When I look forward five, 10 years, the possibilities really get your animal spirits going.”</p>
<p>Novogratz, known to his friends as “Novo,” estimates that he now has about 20 percent of his net worth in digital assets. In addition to cryptocurrencies, his family office has invested in bitcoin mining, trading platforms, initial coin offerings, pre-ICO sales and blockchain technology. He said Gemini, the exchange run by Cameron and Tyler Winkelvoss, is “one of our go-to places” in part because it has a New York State license to trade bitcoin and ether.</p>
<p>With a $500 million hedge fund, Novogratz will be able to capture trading opportunities that require more scale, as well as wield influence with developers, entrepreneurs and regulators. Of course, he’ll also make money on other people’s money: The person familiar with his fund, who has seen early versions of marketing documents, said it will charge investors a 2 percent management fee and 20 percent of profits, with a two-year lockup.</p>
<p>Plus, he doesn’t like the idea of fading away.</p>
<p>“Everyone would love to leave Wall Street gracefully and very few do,” Novogratz said. “You get kicked in the knees or kicked in the midsection, you learn from your mistakes, you kind of rebuild and you start your new adventure.”</p>
<p>One thing hasn’t changed: Novo’s love of the risky bet.</p> | false | 1 | mike novogratz reinventing king bitcoin swaggering macro manager flamed fortress investment group llc starting 500 million hedge fund invest cryptocurrencies initial coin offerings related companies novogratz put 150 million money plans raise 350 million january mainly family offices wealthy individuals fellow hedge fund managers said person familiar plans size galaxy digital assets fund would biggest kind signal growing acceptance cryptocurrencies bitcoin ether legitimate investments novogratz 52 fund marks comeback professional money management humbling losses fortress almost two years selfimposed exile wall street novogratz interview bloomberg television declined confirm deny hes raising fund citing regulatory constraints talk length recent experience digital assets hes eager trade going largest bubble lifetimes novogratz said prices going get way ahead make whole lot money way plan trading junkie month bitcoin hit record almost 5000 plunged 30 percent two weeks buyers weighed impact chinese ban initial coin offerings domestic trading virtual currencies sold 5000 4980 said three weeks later im trying buy low 3000s youre good youre trading junkie lot fun fortunes made lost one reason novogratz likens cryptocurrency market wild west digital assets like bitcoin need regulation meantime initial coin offerings icos prove fraudulent getrichquick schemes said technology community embraced libertarian ideal decentralized opensource payment system fixed money supply determined computer code financiers taking cautious approach two hedge funds raised tens millions dollars invest digital assets polychain capital metastable capital click read cyberattacks digital currency novogratzs fund broader mandate including marketmaking arbitrage stakes internet coin offerings venture capitalstyle investments digitalasset development said person familiar plans asked named theyre still private also brought partners two traders years experience hedge fund investing compliance richard tavoso former head global arbitrage rbc capital markets david namdar worked millennium partners marto capital ubs ag person said bitcoin fraud large institutions steered clear cryptocurrency market skepticism legitimacy concerns mostly unregulated instruments volatile jpmorgan chase amp co chief executive officer jamie dimon captured prevailing view wall street earlier month called bitcoin fraud said would fire anyone bank trading others see volatility liability novogratz former goldman sachs group inc partner smells opportunity lot ways market like market novogratz said see psychology fear greed charts way youd see charts indonesian rupiah dollaryen treasuries theyre exaggerated less liquidity cant get short novogratz developed taste risk varsity wrestler princeton university later national guard helicopter pilot dabbled bitcoin still managing billions dollars macro fund fortress didnt score first big win leaving new yorkbased firm two years ago started late2015 visit friends startup brooklyn expected see joe dog one assistant instead saw 30 dynamic young people crammed bushwick warehouse coding talking phone making plans revolution novogratz said macro guys instinctive instinct want buy chunk company 250 million haul decided instead invest ether cryptocurrency token used ethereum network novogratz bought 500000 less dollar per ether left vacation india time returned weeks later price risen fivefold bought course 2016 2017 ether surged almost 400 bitcoin topped 2500 novogratz sold enough make 250 million biggest haul single trade career said paid tax profits bought gulfstream g550 jet donated equal amount philanthropic project criminal justice reform novogratz hooked today hosts weekly crypto meetup many 90 people drinks office manhattans soho district waxes effusive adopted industry remember bubbles happen around things fundamentally change way live said railroad bubble railroads really fundamentally changed way lived internet bubble changed way live look forward five 10 years possibilities really get animal spirits going novogratz known friends novo estimates 20 percent net worth digital assets addition cryptocurrencies family office invested bitcoin mining trading platforms initial coin offerings preico sales blockchain technology said gemini exchange run cameron tyler winkelvoss one goto places part new york state license trade bitcoin ether 500 million hedge fund novogratz able capture trading opportunities require scale well wield influence developers entrepreneurs regulators course hell also make money peoples money person familiar fund seen early versions marketing documents said charge investors 2 percent management fee 20 percent profits twoyear lockup plus doesnt like idea fading away everyone would love leave wall street gracefully novogratz said get kicked knees kicked midsection learn mistakes kind rebuild start new adventure one thing hasnt changed novos love risky bet | 681 |
<p>The Susan G. Komen Foundation, an organization dedicated since 1982 to fighting, and one day curing, breast cancer, decided to extricate itself from the culture wars by discontinuing grants to Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest provider of abortions. The grants Komen had been making amounted to $650,000 last year, funding some 19 local Planned Parenthood programs that offered manual breast exams but only referrals for mammograms performed elsewhere.</p>
<p>The reality is that Planned Parenthood—with annual revenues exceeding $1 billion—does little in the way of screening for breast cancer. But the organization is very much in the business of selling abortions-more than 300,000 in 2010, according to Planned Parenthood. At an average cost of $500, according to various sources including Planned Parenthood’s website, that translates to about $164 million of revenue per year.</p>
<p>So how did Planned Parenthood and its loyal allies in politics and the media react to Komen’s efforts to be neutral in the controversy over abortion?</p>
<p>Faced with even the tiniest depletion in the massive river of funds Planned Parenthood receives yearly, the behemoth mobilized its enormous cultural, media, financial and political apparatus to attack the Komen Foundation in the press, on TV and through social media.</p>
<p>The organization’s allies demonized the charity, attempting to depict the nation’s most prominent anti-breast cancer organization as a bedfellow of religious extremists. A Facebook page was set up to “Defund the Komen Foundation.” In short, Planned Parenthood took breast-cancer victims as hostages.</p>
<p>Komen’s leaders had good reason to believe their organization could disintegrate under Planned Parenthood’s assault. On Friday the charity issued a statement “apologizing to the American public for recent decisions that cast doubt upon our commitment to our mission of saving women’s lives.” The statement assured Planned Parenthood’s supporters that, like any other organization, it is eligible to apply for grants in the future.</p>
<p>Among Komen’s reasons for discontinuing grants to Planned Parenthood was its policy of avoiding entanglements with entities under government investigation. Planned Parenthood has been and is under congressional and criminal investigation (by attorneys general, local prosecutors and various regulatory agencies in Arizona, Indiana, Alabama, Kansas and Texas) for allegations including failure to report criminal child sex abuse, misuse of health-care and family-planning funds, and failure to comply with parental-involvement laws regarding abortions.</p>
<p>Planned Parenthood is very far from the uncontroversial organization the Susan G. Komen Foundation aspires to be. According to its most recent annual report, for 2010, Planned Parenthood sells abortions to nine out of every 10 pregnant women who come to its clinics. And it’s known throughout the country as an implacable and aggressive opponent of any meaningful restrictions on deliberate feticide.</p>
<p>Planned Parenthood has spent millions fighting even those legislative initiatives that command extremely wide public support, such as laws requiring parental notification and informed consent for abortions, and those banning late-term abortions when the child developing in the womb is fully viable. Planned Parenthood even opposes a bill recently introduced in Congress to ban abortions for the purpose of sex selection.</p>
<p>It is easy to see why Komen might not wish to be associated with Planned Parenthood. Fighting breast cancer is something all Americans can and do agree on; promoting and performing abortions is something that divides us bitterly.</p>
<p>While Planned Parenthood’s target in the Komen case was new, its tactics are not. In the past two years, we have seen the abortion giant (and the politicians it funds) hold for ransom a diverse array of hostages.</p>
<p>In 2010, President Obama and the Democrats in Congress risked and narrowly averted the rejection of their signature health-care law in order to block the inclusion of provisions (such as the 1970s Hyde Amendment) that prevent federal abortion funding. At the 11th hour, a handful of “pro-life” Democrats capitulated, giving Mr. Obama and Planned Parenthood their victory.</p>
<p>Last year, in April, Mr. Obama risked a government shutdown over language in a resolution that would have defunded Planned Parenthood at the federal level. At the last moment, congressional Republicans gave way and allowed the federal money to keep flowing.</p>
<p>Also in 2011, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services threatened to withhold billions of dollars in Medicaid funds from those states such as Indiana that prohibit state funding of Planned Parenthood and other entities that provide elective abortions. Planned Parenthood strongly opposed Indiana’s attempt to cut off its funding and celebrated the federal government’s intervention. Indiana is currently litigating the matter in federal court.</p>
<p>Most recently, after intense lobbying, the Department of Health and Human Services did the bidding of Planned Parenthood by imposing a mandate on virtually all employers to provide insurance coverage (without cost-sharing) for abortion-inducing drugs, sterilizations and contraceptives. This threatens to force many religiously affiliated charitable institutions out of the business of providing education, health care and social services to the poor.</p>
<p>Breast-cancer victims are only the latest hostages taken by Planned Parenthood. Unless the organization is finally held to account, they will surely not be the last.</p>
<p>Robert P. George, a member of EPPC’s board of directors,is professor of jurisprudence and director of the James Madison Program at Princeton University. EPPC Fellow Carter Snead is professor of law and was recently appointed director of the Center for Ethics and Culture at the University of Notre Dame.</p> | false | 1 | susan g komen foundation organization dedicated since 1982 fighting one day curing breast cancer decided extricate culture wars discontinuing grants planned parenthood nations largest provider abortions grants komen making amounted 650000 last year funding 19 local planned parenthood programs offered manual breast exams referrals mammograms performed elsewhere reality planned parenthoodwith annual revenues exceeding 1 billiondoes little way screening breast cancer organization much business selling abortionsmore 300000 2010 according planned parenthood average cost 500 according various sources including planned parenthoods website translates 164 million revenue per year planned parenthood loyal allies politics media react komens efforts neutral controversy abortion faced even tiniest depletion massive river funds planned parenthood receives yearly behemoth mobilized enormous cultural media financial political apparatus attack komen foundation press tv social media organizations allies demonized charity attempting depict nations prominent antibreast cancer organization bedfellow religious extremists facebook page set defund komen foundation short planned parenthood took breastcancer victims hostages komens leaders good reason believe organization could disintegrate planned parenthoods assault friday charity issued statement apologizing american public recent decisions cast doubt upon commitment mission saving womens lives statement assured planned parenthoods supporters like organization eligible apply grants future among komens reasons discontinuing grants planned parenthood policy avoiding entanglements entities government investigation planned parenthood congressional criminal investigation attorneys general local prosecutors various regulatory agencies arizona indiana alabama kansas texas allegations including failure report criminal child sex abuse misuse healthcare familyplanning funds failure comply parentalinvolvement laws regarding abortions planned parenthood far uncontroversial organization susan g komen foundation aspires according recent annual report 2010 planned parenthood sells abortions nine every 10 pregnant women come clinics known throughout country implacable aggressive opponent meaningful restrictions deliberate feticide planned parenthood spent millions fighting even legislative initiatives command extremely wide public support laws requiring parental notification informed consent abortions banning lateterm abortions child developing womb fully viable planned parenthood even opposes bill recently introduced congress ban abortions purpose sex selection easy see komen might wish associated planned parenthood fighting breast cancer something americans agree promoting performing abortions something divides us bitterly planned parenthoods target komen case new tactics past two years seen abortion giant politicians funds hold ransom diverse array hostages 2010 president obama democrats congress risked narrowly averted rejection signature healthcare law order block inclusion provisions 1970s hyde amendment prevent federal abortion funding 11th hour handful prolife democrats capitulated giving mr obama planned parenthood victory last year april mr obama risked government shutdown language resolution would defunded planned parenthood federal level last moment congressional republicans gave way allowed federal money keep flowing also 2011 centers medicare medicaid services threatened withhold billions dollars medicaid funds states indiana prohibit state funding planned parenthood entities provide elective abortions planned parenthood strongly opposed indianas attempt cut funding celebrated federal governments intervention indiana currently litigating matter federal court recently intense lobbying department health human services bidding planned parenthood imposing mandate virtually employers provide insurance coverage without costsharing abortioninducing drugs sterilizations contraceptives threatens force many religiously affiliated charitable institutions business providing education health care social services poor breastcancer victims latest hostages taken planned parenthood unless organization finally held account surely last robert p george member eppcs board directorsis professor jurisprudence director james madison program princeton university eppc fellow carter snead professor law recently appointed director center ethics culture university notre dame | 541 |
<p>When Clark County commissioners gave the Regional Transportation Commission of Southern Nevada the green light in 2013 to fund transportation improvement projects with a fuel tax increase, the agency aimed to fulfill three promises:</p>
<p>Keep the ensuing jobs local, focus on hiring small businesses and put special emphasis on employing Clark County’s racial minorities.</p>
<p>Consider two goals met. Almost half of the 166 project contracts awarded from 2014 through 2016 went to small businesses, and nearly all of the estimated 5,305 jobs created were given to locals.</p>
<p>But employing minorities is a work in progress, officials say.</p>
<p>While the three-year fuel tax generated more than 2.1 million hours of work over the last three years, only 4 percent of those hours went to African Americans and less than 1 percent went to Asians, according to payroll data compiled by the RTC.</p>
<p>In comparison, one-third of the work hours went to Hispanics. Almost half went to Caucasians.</p>
<p>At a public meeting last month, County Commissioner Lawrence Weekly, who is black, said he was “totally disgusted” to learn how little of the work African Americans have gotten.</p>
<p>“This is not a slice of a pie,” he said. “This is not even a sliver.”</p>
<p>Last year voters extended the fuel tax for another 10 years to fund an estimated 200 more transportation projects.</p>
<p>Investment for opportunity</p>
<p>In 2016, African Americans held about 6.5 percent of construction jobs in Clark County, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. Asians held about 4.6 percent. &lt;img src="http://res.cloudinary.com/stephens-media/image/upload/v1491251297/fuelgraphic.jpg" style="float:right; margin: 1em 0 1em 1em; width:100%; max-width: 300px" alt="(Las Vegas Review-Journal)" /&gt;</p>
<p>Shaundell Newsome, a marketing professional that RTC hired to conduct outreach, said most of Nevada’s nine African American-owned construction firms specialize in building vertical structures — like homes and hotels — and were not equipped to take on major highway construction projects.</p>
<p>“If you don’t have the bonding capacity, the proper insurance, the equipment, the personnel, it’s extremely difficult to get on some of these jobs” Newsome said. “ All of those things have to be there before you can even acquire a bid.”</p>
<p>Urban Chamber of Commerce president Ken Evans said those firms were strapped for cash following the Great Recession and many owners did not have access to enough capital to take on the new projects.</p>
<p>“If you’ve made a fairly sizeable investment in people, equipment and other financial aspects. Those small projects may not pay off fast enough to justify the investment,” Evans said.</p>
<p>Such was the case of THOR Construction, the state’s largest African-American owned construction firm with more than 150 employees.</p>
<p>Founder and chairman Richard Copeland said his firm did not have the capital to be a general contractor on any of the major fuel tax-funded projects, so his staff spent three months getting a license to be a subcontractor for concrete work.</p>
<p>But THOR Construction has not worked on any of the projects, Copeland said. General contractors are encouraged but not required by the fuel tax law to hire minority-owned businesses, and Copeland said contractors tend to stick with the familiar.</p>
<p>“They’re not going to increase their risk by using someone who is an unknown subcontractor to them,” Copeland said.</p>
<p>“Given a chance to perform we should become one of the regular contractors they turn to for pricing and performance, but it just hasn’t happened yet.”</p>
<p>Workforce training</p>
<p>Two training programs were created to get more people accepted into the Laborers’ Union Apprenticeship Program.</p>
<p>“You can’t just go and hire a person off the street,” RTC spokeswoman Angela Castro said. “It’s skilled work.”</p>
<p>Build Nevada, graduated eight people in September who then entered into construction trade programs.</p>
<p>DO IT 4 U! graduated 10 people in late 2016. Three of them are waiting for slots to open in the apprenticeship program and are guaranteed jobs with Las Vegas Paving Corporation after they complete 80 apprenticeship hours.</p>
<p>Evans said he sees progress being made, and he is focused on sustaining that progress for better long-term results.</p>
<p>“Objectively, we know there is definitely room for improvement,” he said. “It would be nice if African Americans, for example, were represented in terms of employment or in terms of contractor business opportunities commensurate with their percentage in the overall population.”</p>
<p>In Clark County, African Americans account for about 12 percent of the population and Asians account for about 10 percent, according to 2015 census data.</p>
<p>Asian Chamber of Commerce President Sonny Vinuya said his organization is trying to reach further into the Asian community to find workers.</p>
<p>“Looking at our member base, we just don’t have a lot of Asians in that (construction) industry,” he said. “We really have more on the medical side, business owners, such as (certified public accountants).”</p>
<p>Small gains</p>
<p>Some progress has been made.</p>
<p>Last year, about 4 percent of hours worked on fuel tax-funded projects went to African Americans. In 2014, their share was 3.6 percent.</p>
<p>“In the world of all the commitments that we’ve made, that may seem very low. But in fact that individual number is improving,” RTC board chairman and county commissioner Larry Brown said. “It’s up … which is a very strong message.”</p>
<p>The share of hours that went to Asian workers, however, decreased from about 1.1 percent in 2014 to less than half that in 2016.</p>
<p>Weekly said the Hispanic community’s success in getting construction work could be an example for other minority groups.</p>
<p>“Maybe instead of reinventing the wheel we need to see what others are doing to see the success they did and try to recreate that to better increase our numbers,” he said.</p>
<p>Contact Michael Scott Davidson at [email protected] or 702-477-3861. Follow <a href="http://www.twitter.com/davidsonlvrj" type="external">@davidsonlvrj</a> on Twitter.</p>
<p>ABOUT THE TAX</p>
<p>The road improvement projects that took place during the last three years were funded with a 10-cent fuel tax hike per gallon that took effect in 2014.</p>
<p>Through 2016 the tax raised about $411 million and funded 166 projects, according to the Regional Transportation Commission of Southern Nevada.</p>
<p>In November, Clark County voters approved a decade-long incremental fuel tax hike. By 2026 drivers will pay about 36.32 cents more per gallon, according to RTC projections.</p>
<p>The tax is expected to raise roughly $3 billion to pay for nearly 200 local road construction, maintenance and repair projects.</p>
<p />
<p>SUCCESS STORY</p>
<p>For Müller Construction, a minority-owned general contracting firm that formed in 2013, the fuel tax projects have been a golden opportunity.</p>
<p>The company’s first project was building a fuel tax-funded bus shelter, and it has built more than 150 bus shelters for RTC since. Today, the company has construction contracts with UNLV, McCarran International Airport and Clark County, said J.D. Calhoun as vice president of marketing and sales.</p>
<p>Calhoun estimated about 70 percent of Müller Construction’s subcontracts go to minority or women-owned businesses. The company had more than $2 million in projects awarded to it in the first quarter of 2017.</p>
<p>“Being given the opportunity to prove we can do the business was a real springboard for the company to get other projects,” Calhoun said. “That’s what’s needed for small businesses, an opportunity.”</p>
<p />
<p /> | false | 1 | clark county commissioners gave regional transportation commission southern nevada green light 2013 fund transportation improvement projects fuel tax increase agency aimed fulfill three promises keep ensuing jobs local focus hiring small businesses put special emphasis employing clark countys racial minorities consider two goals met almost half 166 project contracts awarded 2014 2016 went small businesses nearly estimated 5305 jobs created given locals employing minorities work progress officials say threeyear fuel tax generated 21 million hours work last three years 4 percent hours went african americans less 1 percent went asians according payroll data compiled rtc comparison onethird work hours went hispanics almost half went caucasians public meeting last month county commissioner lawrence weekly black said totally disgusted learn little work african americans gotten slice pie said even sliver last year voters extended fuel tax another 10 years fund estimated 200 transportation projects investment opportunity 2016 african americans held 65 percent construction jobs clark county according us census bureau data asians held 46 percent ltimg srchttprescloudinarycomstephensmediaimageuploadv1491251297fuelgraphicjpg stylefloatright margin 1em 0 1em 1em width100 maxwidth 300px altlas vegas reviewjournal gt shaundell newsome marketing professional rtc hired conduct outreach said nevadas nine african americanowned construction firms specialize building vertical structures like homes hotels equipped take major highway construction projects dont bonding capacity proper insurance equipment personnel extremely difficult get jobs newsome said things even acquire bid urban chamber commerce president ken evans said firms strapped cash following great recession many owners access enough capital take new projects youve made fairly sizeable investment people equipment financial aspects small projects may pay fast enough justify investment evans said case thor construction states largest africanamerican owned construction firm 150 employees founder chairman richard copeland said firm capital general contractor major fuel taxfunded projects staff spent three months getting license subcontractor concrete work thor construction worked projects copeland said general contractors encouraged required fuel tax law hire minorityowned businesses copeland said contractors tend stick familiar theyre going increase risk using someone unknown subcontractor copeland said given chance perform become one regular contractors turn pricing performance hasnt happened yet workforce training two training programs created get people accepted laborers union apprenticeship program cant go hire person street rtc spokeswoman angela castro said skilled work build nevada graduated eight people september entered construction trade programs 4 u graduated 10 people late 2016 three waiting slots open apprenticeship program guaranteed jobs las vegas paving corporation complete 80 apprenticeship hours evans said sees progress made focused sustaining progress better longterm results objectively know definitely room improvement said would nice african americans example represented terms employment terms contractor business opportunities commensurate percentage overall population clark county african americans account 12 percent population asians account 10 percent according 2015 census data asian chamber commerce president sonny vinuya said organization trying reach asian community find workers looking member base dont lot asians construction industry said really medical side business owners certified public accountants small gains progress made last year 4 percent hours worked fuel taxfunded projects went african americans 2014 share 36 percent world commitments weve made may seem low fact individual number improving rtc board chairman county commissioner larry brown said strong message share hours went asian workers however decreased 11 percent 2014 less half 2016 weekly said hispanic communitys success getting construction work could example minority groups maybe instead reinventing wheel need see others see success try recreate better increase numbers said contact michael scott davidson sdavidsonreviewjournalcom 7024773861 follow davidsonlvrj twitter tax road improvement projects took place last three years funded 10cent fuel tax hike per gallon took effect 2014 2016 tax raised 411 million funded 166 projects according regional transportation commission southern nevada november clark county voters approved decadelong incremental fuel tax hike 2026 drivers pay 3632 cents per gallon according rtc projections tax expected raise roughly 3 billion pay nearly 200 local road construction maintenance repair projects success story müller construction minorityowned general contracting firm formed 2013 fuel tax projects golden opportunity companys first project building fuel taxfunded bus shelter built 150 bus shelters rtc since today company construction contracts unlv mccarran international airport clark county said jd calhoun vice president marketing sales calhoun estimated 70 percent müller constructions subcontracts go minority womenowned businesses company 2 million projects awarded first quarter 2017 given opportunity prove business real springboard company get projects calhoun said thats whats needed small businesses opportunity | 719 |
<p />
<p>Prefatory Note: This is a modified version of a post published online, July 15, 2014, at the recently established very informative website, Middle East Eye; as&#160;the casualty totals continue to mount while the world looks on in stupefied inaction, the attacks go on; at the very least, from a humanitarian perspective, there should be a global outcry demanding that children, mothers, and those sick and&#160;disabled be allowed to leave the Gaza Strip until current hostilities end. Yet this is a gap in international humanitarian law, refugee law, and the moral sensibilities of the combatant states.</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; As the hideous Israeli assault on Gaza, named Operation Protective Edge, by the IDF enters its second week, overdue international appeals for a ceasefire fall on deaf ears.</p>
<p>The short lived July 15th ceasefire arranged by Sisi’s Egypt had many accompanying signs of bad faith from its inception, including the failure to allow Hamas to participate in the process, insultingly conveying the proposed terms of the ceasefire through public media. The vague terms depicted, alongside the failure to take any account of Hamas’ previously announced conditions, suggest that this initiative was not a serious effort to end the violence, but rather a clever ploy to regain moral credibility for Israel thereby facilitating the continuation and even intensification of its violent military campaign that was never defensive in conception or execution.</p>
<p>Rather than being a real effort to end the violence, such a ‘ceasefire’ seems best understood as a sophisticated for form of escalation produced by a descent into the lower depths of Israeli hasbara. Such an Israeli tactic was facilitated by the active complicity of the Egyptian government that shares with Israel an undisguised wish to destroy Hamas.</p>
<p>Cairo regards Hamas as an offshoot of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, an organization that has been criminalized and viciously repressed, and has collaborated with Tel Aviv ever since Sisi took over control of the Egyptian government.</p>
<p>Throughout Protective Edge, Bibi Netanyahu has been telling the world that no outside pressure will alter Israel’s resolve to reach its military and political goals to disable Hamas for the indefinite future. The main official justification for such aggression is to make sure this time that Israelis will never again have to seek shelter from Hamas rockets, an elusive result that Netanyahu acknowledges could require a prolonged military campaign combining ground forces with a continuing air and naval assault.</p>
<p>Others claim on Israel’s behalf that this attack on Hamas is a just response to its involvement in the kidnapping incident a month ago in which three Israeli settler teenagers were seized by two Palestinians, and soon afterwards brutally executed. Such a rationale would still be a hyperbolic form of collective punishment directed at the entire civilian population of Gaza, even if there had been a Hamas connection to the earlier crime, an involvement alleged from the very first moment, and yet up to now not substantiated by evidence even in the face of Hamas’ denial of any involvement.</p>
<p>The internationally respected human rights and international law specialist resident in Gaza, Raji Sourani, has written that the scale and ferocity of Protective Edge is an application of what he labels the ‘Gaza Doctrine,’ a deliberate reliance on disproportionate force in any encounter in Gaza. The Gaza Doctrine is a renewal of what was originally known as the ‘Dahiya Doctrine’ after the destruction of the Dahiya residential neighborhood in south Beirut, where many of Hezbollah’s faithful&#160;were living, during the 2006 Lebanon War.</p>
<p>The inability of Hamas to mount any sort of defense for the people of Gaza or even to provide protection via shelters and the like, epitomizes the criminal nature of Protective Edge, and more generally, of totally one-sided warfare.</p>
<p>Leaving aside the debate on causes and justifications, the civilian population of Gaza, estimated to be about 1.8 million with women and children comprising 75% of the total, are trapped in an overcrowded war zone with no shelters and no apparent exit from terrifying danger.</p>
<p>Even if families are lucky enough to avoid direct physical injury, the experience of screaming jet fighters attacking through the night, targeting, attack, and surveillance drones flying overhead 24 hours a day, sustained naval artillery barrages, not to mention the threats and warnings of an imminent ground invasion combine to create a nonstop horror show. It has been convincingly confirmed by mental health specialists that these realities result in a trauma inducing phenomenon on a massive scale with prospects of lasting and irreversible psychological damage, especially to children.</p>
<p>With these elements in mind, the idea of fulfilling the basic objective of international humanitarian law to protect civilians caught in a war zone is being violated by Israel, although not altogether. Israeli officials claim that leaflets dropped on some intended targets, otherwise forbidden, that give residents a few minutes to vacate their homes before their living space is reduced to rubble, exhibits a humane intent and satisfies the requirements of international humanitarian law. Such a self-sanitizing gesture fails to discharge the obligations of an Occupying Power under international humanitarian law.</p>
<p>In a further escalation of the attacks, perhaps the prelude to a ground invasion, residents of northern Gaza are being told to flee the area, and tens of thousands have apparently done so. Hamas apparently urged these same people not to leave their homes dismissing Israeli threats as intimidating propaganda. Cynically interpreted, Hamas appears to be informing Israel that if they go ahead and invade, there will be responsible for causing many Palestinian civilian casualties, and the shock caused by such carnage will help eventually swing the international balance of opinion strongly in their favor.</p>
<p>The entrapment of the Gazan population within closed borders is part of a deliberate Israeli pattern of prolonged collective punishment that has for the past several years been imposed on Gaza. This amounts to a grave breach of Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, and as such qualifies as a potential Crime Against Humanity.</p>
<p>The morbid clarity of criminal intent is further disclosed by Israel’s willingness to allow 800 or so Gazans who have dual citizenship and hold a foreign passport to leave Gaza by entering Israel at the Erez Crossing, including 150 with American passports. No other Palestinian residents of Gaza have the option of leaving even if disabled, sick, elderly, or young.</p>
<p>The civilian population of Gaza is denied the option of seeking refugee status by fleeing Gaza during this time of intense warfare, and there is no space available within Gaza that might allow Palestinian civilians to become internally displaced until Protective Edge completes its dirty work.</p>
<p>In countries such as Iraq and Syria, we grieve appropriately for the millions becoming refugees or ‘internally displaced,’ compelled by the dangers of the raging conflict to seek refuge somewhere in the country that is removed from the immediate dangers of inhabiting the war zone. We can sense the extremity of the humanitarian tragedy in Gaza by realizing that these people whose lives are being acutely jeopardized, have no place to hide from the brutalities of war.</p>
<p>There is no doubt that the whole of the Gaza Strip is a war zone. Gazans who have endured many mortal threats and a siege since 2007, currently find themselves in situations of extreme hazard, and yet have no possibility of seeking temporary safety as refugees by crossing an international border. The idea of internal refuge is almost inapplicable given the ferocious nature of Protective Edge that has spared not one corner of the tiny and overcrowded Gaza Strip.</p>
<p>To be sure, in response to Israeli warnings to abandon their homes tens of thousands of Palestinians are fleeing south from north Gaza. At present writing, an estimated 17 thousand Palestinians have obtained refuge in the 20 UN-run schools situated throughout Gaza. UNRWA is doing its heroic best to handle these desperate people but its buildings have limited space and lack the facilities to handle properly this kind humanitarian emergency—insufficient bathrooms, no beds, and not enough space to meet the demands.</p>
<p>This is not the first time that this exit challenge has been posed in Gaza. Back in 2008-09 and 2012, Israeli launched major military operations in Gaza, and the issue of the entrapped civilian population was brought to the attention of the UN and the international community, a challenge met as now with scandalous silence: the encirclement of Gaza by Israeli controlled crossings and fences, even worse than in the past due to an Egyptian political leadership that makes no secret of its hostility to Hamas. The overall humanitarian crisis is catastrophic in the risk it poses to the totally vulnerable Gazan social reality.</p>
<p>For some perspective, it is useful to recall that just prior to the Kosovo War in 1999, up to a million Kosovars crossed into Macedonia to escape anticipated NATO air strikes and because of a credible fear of an imminent ethnic cleansing campaign carried out by Serbian forces then controlling the country. As soon as the war was over and Serbia abandoned Kosovo, these refugees returned, having safely navigated the dangers of the war.</p>
<p>In Libya, too, the international community meaningfully responded in 2011 to the urgent crisis of an entrapped civilian population. In the Libyan crisis, Security Council members talked piously about relying on the emergent norm of international law known as the Responsibility to Protect, or R2P, that validated intruding on Libyan sovereignty by way of a No Fly Zone that was established to protect the civilian population of Benghazi facing the vengeance of Qaddafi’s forces.</p>
<p>This 2011 intervention has been much criticized because the humanitarian justification on which authorization for the undertaking was transformed immediately into a controversial regime-changing intervention that raised many objections. What is most relevant here is that the UN and the member governments of the Security Council acknowledged their responsibility to do something to protect a civilian population unable to remove itself from a combat zone. It should not be forgotten in comparing Libya with Gaza that humanitarian appeals seem much more effective when the country in question is perceived to have strategic value, especially large oil deposits.</p>
<p>The UN , aside from the admirable field efforts of UNRWA noted above, and the international refusal to adopt measures protective of the people of Gaza is unforgiveable, particularly as Gazans are being subjected to severe forms of violence that are approaching genocidal thresholds. Even so, the UN and its leading member governments turn their heads and look away.</p>
<p>Some do worse by actually endorsing Israel’s aggression. This pattern of behavior exhibits either a sense of helplessness in the face of Israel’s military juggernaut or, even more disturbingly, a silence that can be construed as tacitly blessing this infernal entrapment of innocent and a long victimized people.</p>
<p>International law has little to say. International refugee law avoids issues associated with any right to escape from a war zone and does impose a duty on belligerent parties to provide civilians with an exit and/or a temporary place of sanctuary. International humanitarian law offers little more by way of protection to an entrapped people, despite the seeming relevance of the Fourth Geneva Convention devoted to the Protection of Civilians in Time of War. There is accorded to foreign nationals a right of departure with the onset of war, including even repatriation to an enemy country, but no right of nationals to leave their own country if under attack. And the generalized obligation of an Occupying Power to protect the civilian population is legally subordinated to its security needs, including military necessity, and so is generally of little practical use during an ongoing military operation.</p>
<p>What is evident in relation to the entrapped civilian population of Gaza is that&#160;no legal obligation exists to provide for safe havens either within the country experiencing the warfare or beyond its borders. At minimum, this horrible cauldron of violence and vulnerability reveals serious gaps in international humanitarian law, as well as the absence of self-imposed moral constraints that might limit belligerent violence.</p>
<p>Such unattended vulnerability to atrocity urgently calls for a supplemental international agreement, perhaps taking the form of a treaty protocol to the Geneva Convention conferring an unconditional right of exit on civilians entrapped in a war zone. There is also a need to make any denial of the right of exit a species of war crime within the purview of the International Criminal Court.</p>
<p>It should also be considered whether there should be conferred a right of internal displacement, imposing an obligation upon the Occupying Power, a territorial government, and insurgent actor to establish and respect enclaves set aside for displaced persons and to allow unimpeded civilian departure from war zones so as to take advantage of internal displacement.</p>
<p>There are further complications that need to be addressed including whether the territorial government or Occupying Power can invoke security considerations to deny exit and displacement rights to those it has reason to believe are entitled to respect as civilians.</p>
<p>For the present, it is enough to observe that the civilian population of Gaza finds itself totally entrapped in a terrifying war zone, and that Israel, the UN, and neighboring governments have refused to accept responsibility to offer some form of humane protection.</p>
<p>It is one aspect of the unacceptability of the Israeli military operation from a moral/legal perspective and the related failure of international humanitarian law to lay down suitable rules and procedures that respect the human dignity of civilian innocence so entrapped. Yet, as almost always in such situations, it is the presence or absence of political will on the part of leading geopolitical actors that is the decisive factor in determining whether victimized people will be protected or not.</p>
<p>And so it is with Gaza.</p> | false | 1 | prefatory note modified version post published online july 15 2014 recently established informative website middle east eye as160the casualty totals continue mount world looks stupefied inaction attacks go least humanitarian perspective global outcry demanding children mothers sick and160disabled allowed leave gaza strip current hostilities end yet gap international humanitarian law refugee law moral sensibilities combatant states ltimg classalignleft sizemedium wpimage19651 srchttpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201402richardfalk300x162jpg altrichard falk width300 height162 gt hideous israeli assault gaza named operation protective edge idf enters second week overdue international appeals ceasefire fall deaf ears short lived july 15th ceasefire arranged sisis egypt many accompanying signs bad faith inception including failure allow hamas participate process insultingly conveying proposed terms ceasefire public media vague terms depicted alongside failure take account hamas previously announced conditions suggest initiative serious effort end violence rather clever ploy regain moral credibility israel thereby facilitating continuation even intensification violent military campaign never defensive conception execution rather real effort end violence ceasefire seems best understood sophisticated form escalation produced descent lower depths israeli hasbara israeli tactic facilitated active complicity egyptian government shares israel undisguised wish destroy hamas cairo regards hamas offshoot egyptian muslim brotherhood organization criminalized viciously repressed collaborated tel aviv ever since sisi took control egyptian government throughout protective edge bibi netanyahu telling world outside pressure alter israels resolve reach military political goals disable hamas indefinite future main official justification aggression make sure time israelis never seek shelter hamas rockets elusive result netanyahu acknowledges could require prolonged military campaign combining ground forces continuing air naval assault others claim israels behalf attack hamas response involvement kidnapping incident month ago three israeli settler teenagers seized two palestinians soon afterwards brutally executed rationale would still hyperbolic form collective punishment directed entire civilian population gaza even hamas connection earlier crime involvement alleged first moment yet substantiated evidence even face hamas denial involvement internationally respected human rights international law specialist resident gaza raji sourani written scale ferocity protective edge application labels gaza doctrine deliberate reliance disproportionate force encounter gaza gaza doctrine renewal originally known dahiya doctrine destruction dahiya residential neighborhood south beirut many hezbollahs faithful160were living 2006 lebanon war inability hamas mount sort defense people gaza even provide protection via shelters like epitomizes criminal nature protective edge generally totally onesided warfare leaving aside debate causes justifications civilian population gaza estimated 18 million women children comprising 75 total trapped overcrowded war zone shelters apparent exit terrifying danger even families lucky enough avoid direct physical injury experience screaming jet fighters attacking night targeting attack surveillance drones flying overhead 24 hours day sustained naval artillery barrages mention threats warnings imminent ground invasion combine create nonstop horror show convincingly confirmed mental health specialists realities result trauma inducing phenomenon massive scale prospects lasting irreversible psychological damage especially children elements mind idea fulfilling basic objective international humanitarian law protect civilians caught war zone violated israel although altogether israeli officials claim leaflets dropped intended targets otherwise forbidden give residents minutes vacate homes living space reduced rubble exhibits humane intent satisfies requirements international humanitarian law selfsanitizing gesture fails discharge obligations occupying power international humanitarian law escalation attacks perhaps prelude ground invasion residents northern gaza told flee area tens thousands apparently done hamas apparently urged people leave homes dismissing israeli threats intimidating propaganda cynically interpreted hamas appears informing israel go ahead invade responsible causing many palestinian civilian casualties shock caused carnage help eventually swing international balance opinion strongly favor entrapment gazan population within closed borders part deliberate israeli pattern prolonged collective punishment past several years imposed gaza amounts grave breach article 33 fourth geneva convention qualifies potential crime humanity morbid clarity criminal intent disclosed israels willingness allow 800 gazans dual citizenship hold foreign passport leave gaza entering israel erez crossing including 150 american passports palestinian residents gaza option leaving even disabled sick elderly young civilian population gaza denied option seeking refugee status fleeing gaza time intense warfare space available within gaza might allow palestinian civilians become internally displaced protective edge completes dirty work countries iraq syria grieve appropriately millions becoming refugees internally displaced compelled dangers raging conflict seek refuge somewhere country removed immediate dangers inhabiting war zone sense extremity humanitarian tragedy gaza realizing people whose lives acutely jeopardized place hide brutalities war doubt whole gaza strip war zone gazans endured many mortal threats siege since 2007 currently find situations extreme hazard yet possibility seeking temporary safety refugees crossing international border idea internal refuge almost inapplicable given ferocious nature protective edge spared one corner tiny overcrowded gaza strip sure response israeli warnings abandon homes tens thousands palestinians fleeing south north gaza present writing estimated 17 thousand palestinians obtained refuge 20 unrun schools situated throughout gaza unrwa heroic best handle desperate people buildings limited space lack facilities handle properly kind humanitarian emergencyinsufficient bathrooms beds enough space meet demands first time exit challenge posed gaza back 200809 2012 israeli launched major military operations gaza issue entrapped civilian population brought attention un international community challenge met scandalous silence encirclement gaza israeli controlled crossings fences even worse past due egyptian political leadership makes secret hostility hamas overall humanitarian crisis catastrophic risk poses totally vulnerable gazan social reality perspective useful recall prior kosovo war 1999 million kosovars crossed macedonia escape anticipated nato air strikes credible fear imminent ethnic cleansing campaign carried serbian forces controlling country soon war serbia abandoned kosovo refugees returned safely navigated dangers war libya international community meaningfully responded 2011 urgent crisis entrapped civilian population libyan crisis security council members talked piously relying emergent norm international law known responsibility protect r2p validated intruding libyan sovereignty way fly zone established protect civilian population benghazi facing vengeance qaddafis forces 2011 intervention much criticized humanitarian justification authorization undertaking transformed immediately controversial regimechanging intervention raised many objections relevant un member governments security council acknowledged responsibility something protect civilian population unable remove combat zone forgotten comparing libya gaza humanitarian appeals seem much effective country question perceived strategic value especially large oil deposits un aside admirable field efforts unrwa noted international refusal adopt measures protective people gaza unforgiveable particularly gazans subjected severe forms violence approaching genocidal thresholds even un leading member governments turn heads look away worse actually endorsing israels aggression pattern behavior exhibits either sense helplessness face israels military juggernaut even disturbingly silence construed tacitly blessing infernal entrapment innocent long victimized people international law little say international refugee law avoids issues associated right escape war zone impose duty belligerent parties provide civilians exit andor temporary place sanctuary international humanitarian law offers little way protection entrapped people despite seeming relevance fourth geneva convention devoted protection civilians time war accorded foreign nationals right departure onset war including even repatriation enemy country right nationals leave country attack generalized obligation occupying power protect civilian population legally subordinated security needs including military necessity generally little practical use ongoing military operation evident relation entrapped civilian population gaza that160no legal obligation exists provide safe havens either within country experiencing warfare beyond borders minimum horrible cauldron violence vulnerability reveals serious gaps international humanitarian law well absence selfimposed moral constraints might limit belligerent violence unattended vulnerability atrocity urgently calls supplemental international agreement perhaps taking form treaty protocol geneva convention conferring unconditional right exit civilians entrapped war zone also need make denial right exit species war crime within purview international criminal court also considered whether conferred right internal displacement imposing obligation upon occupying power territorial government insurgent actor establish respect enclaves set aside displaced persons allow unimpeded civilian departure war zones take advantage internal displacement complications need addressed including whether territorial government occupying power invoke security considerations deny exit displacement rights reason believe entitled respect civilians present enough observe civilian population gaza finds totally entrapped terrifying war zone israel un neighboring governments refused accept responsibility offer form humane protection one aspect unacceptability israeli military operation morallegal perspective related failure international humanitarian law lay suitable rules procedures respect human dignity civilian innocence entrapped yet almost always situations presence absence political part leading geopolitical actors decisive factor determining whether victimized people protected gaza | 1,311 |
<p><a href="" type="internal">The Faith Angle Forum</a> is a semi-annual conference which brings together a select group of 20 nationally respected journalists with 3-5 distinguished scholars on areas of religion, politics &amp; public life.</p>
<p>“Same Universe, Different Lenses:&#160;Science, Ethics, and Religion in Dialogue”</p>
<p>South Beach, Florida</p>
<p>Speaker:&#160;Director of the AAAS Dialogue on Science, Ethics, and Religion Program</p>
<p>Moderator:&#160;Michael Cromartie, Vice-President, Ethics and Public Policy Center</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">Click here to listen to an audio recording of this event.</a></p>
<p>Michael Cromartie</p>
<p>MICHAEL CROMARTIE:&#160; Ladies and gentlemen, during our conversation last night at the reception, and during the dinner, and even today, some of you were wondering out loud, who was the person to discover the Comet P/114? And I said, “Well, she happens to be our speaker today.” And so, at some point, Jennifer, I’d love for you to tell us the story of how you discovered a comet now named after you and your colleague.</p>
<p>You have the bio of Dr. Jennifer Wiseman. She’s here speaking in her capacity as a Fellow of the American Scientific Affiliation and the new Director of Dialogue on Science, Ethics, and Religion for the American Association for the Advancement of Science. I’ll let you add.</p>
<p>Dr. Jennifer Wiseman</p>
<p>DR. JENNIFER WISEMAN:&#160; I am an Astronomer with NASA. I do work with the Hubble Space Telescope Program, but I’m here mainly for another hat that I wear, which Michael just mentioned, which is with the American Association for the Advancement of Science, because I believe that my work with that organization is more relevant to this particular group in that I direct a program there called the Dialogue on Science, Ethics, and Religion, or DOSER program. So, we’ll get in to some of that.</p>
<p>But as an Astronomer I can’t resist showing you some things from space, so I’m going to do some of that as well.</p>
<p>I found this morning’s conversation incredibly helpful, insightful, very interesting. This afternoon we are going to kind of go in a different direction, talking about how science impacts society, especially a society that’s filled with faith-based communities and people of religious faith, where our values are often shaped through lenses of religion and philosophy, and even how we look at nature.</p>
<p>So, I like to use slides because astronomy shows such beautiful visual images, and also I use them kind of as notes for myself. So, I don’t really want you necessarily fixated on the slides, but it’s helpful to kind of give us a guiding light through the things I want to say.</p>
<p>I think the title of my presentation pretty much summarizes what I want to say, that we have the same universe that we live in, but we’re looking at it with different lenses — all of us do, depending on what we’re thinking about or how we’re considering nature around us. And so, this brings in our society science, ethics, and religion together in dialogue. Sometimes that’s constructive, sometimes it’s not, and you all have a major important role to play about the health of that dialogue in our society.</p>
<p>I’m amazed by this comment by a philosopher, Kant — I believe it’s written on his tombstone — where he says two things continue to fill his mind with ever increasing wonder and awe the more often and intensely he reflected upon them. And those two things that he singled out were the starry heavens above him and the moral law within him.</p>
<p>And I think those are still the two realms of things that we as human beings continue to grapple with: the amazement and the majesty and the intrigue that we see in the universe around us, not only on the large scale, but also on the small scale, as science is telling us more and more about our genetic make-up, and about even subatomic realms of physics, and then of course on the large scale of cosmology. All of this makes us wonder about our origins and where we fit into the universe, and yet we also wonder, who are we? How do we fit it in? How should we live? Why do we have a sense of justice? Why do we feel that there are things that we need forgiveness for? As we discussed this morning, why is there a sense that there are wrongs that need to be righted? Where does that sense come from? And, in fact, it is that perception that everyone has some innate sense of justice that drew even C.S. Lewis, who was mentioned this morning, into his own faith in God. So these are the two kinds of things that I think still we are grappling with in society today.</p>
<p>So, being an Astronomer as I am, I’m going to spend maybe the next ten minutes or so just kind of giving you a little update on the universe, and then we’ll return to that a little bit later as warranted.</p>
<p>We study the heavens with lots of different kinds of tools. We use telescopes. Telescopes can be on the ground, in deserts or in mountaintops, or they can be in space, such as this one. This is an orbiting satellite known to all of us as the Hubble Space Telescope. It’s about the size of a school bus. It is whizzing around the earth every 90 minutes or so and it’s still sending back marvelous data and images to us, even after being in operation for 23 years.</p>
<p>So, what we’re learning — and we are continually awed by — is that the universe we live in is beautiful, and the universe that we live in is active. It is not stagnant. The stars and planets and galaxies are not just sitting there. There is a lot going on out there. We’ve learned that by using different kinds of tools we can see the universe with different eyes. So this region will be recognized by many of you as the Orion region of the sky. You can see Orion’s belt and a sword here. And the bright star, Rigel, down here, and red giant star Betelgeuse up here. This is an unstable star that may explode in a supernova possibly any day now, in the next 100,000 years or so, so kind of get your concerns in perspective.</p>
<p>Credit: NASA,ESA, M. Robberto (Space Telescope Science Institute/ESA) and the Hubble Space Telescope Orion Treasury Project Team</p>
<p>This is a picture taken with a telescope, a good one, on the ground, but if you look at these kind of fuzzy regions — somebody mentioned a nebulous question this morning, and nebulosity is something that we like in astronomy. Anything that’s fuzzy we call nebulous. So this little nebulous thing down here — you can’t see the detail with this kind of telescope, but if you zoom in with the Hubble Space Telescope, you see something like this. It’s much expanded and you see beautiful colors. And to astronomers, that’s not only a sign of beauty, it’s also a sign of great activity. It means that new stars are still forming because when a new star coalesces out of condensing gas — for the large stars the light is powerful enough coming out of the star to actually ionize the surrounding gas, meaning these photons of light go out into the surrounding gas, separate the protons from the electrons in the surrounding atoms, and then when these atoms sort of recover from that shock and they come back together, they release colored light such as we see here.</p>
<p>So this is called the Orion Nebula and it is a very active region of ongoing star formation, not only this colored region, which shows the result of recently formed stars, but if you look at this region with radio telescopes and infrared telescopes, you can see behind this into the darker regions where protostars are forming and heating up surrounding gas, but they haven’t yet turned on. Very active.</p>
<p>These clouds of gas, and stars within them and between them, fill up our galaxy. This is a galaxy — not our own. It’s beautiful, I think, and it looks what we think our galaxy looks like in terms of its spiral structure, but we can’t get outside of our Milky Way to take a picture back of it, so we can only learn about our own galaxy from looking around from the inside. But here’s a similar galaxy that I think is quite beautiful, and there’s so many stars in the core here that it kind of blends together in this bulge of light. So, in a typical spiral like this you would have hundreds of billions of stars embedded in here.</p>
<p>Credit: NASA, ESA, The Hubble Heritage Team, (STScI/AURA) and A. Riess (STScI)</p>
<p>Our sun, we think, is about two thirds of the way out in our own Milky Way galaxy, and one of several hundred billion stars. We are also learning that there are planets around many of those stars, which I will discuss later. And then looking in the background of this picture you can see other galaxies, and in fact, we now know that there are hundreds of billions of galaxies in our visible universe. So if you can do the multiplication of hundreds of billions of galaxies times hundreds of billions of stars in most galaxies you see that there is an enormous number of stars in our universe.</p>
<p>And galaxies can interact with one another. These are two different galaxies — actually three; there’s one here — that are starting to be pulled together by each other’s gravitational pull, and that starts to distort the spiral structure of these galaxies. In this case we thought it was quite pretty, so we released this as an image to celebrate an anniversary of the Hubble Space Telescope, with this galaxy looking like a rose flower and this looking like the rose stem.</p>
<p>Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)</p>
<p>Okay. So, how are we learning such things? Well, it’s through the advancement of technology and, of course, the curiosity to explore. I like to show this little chart which shows you over the last 400 years of time, graphically, how our technology has allowed an improvement in the sensitivity of what we can see in the sky over what we could just see with our bare eyes. And so this scale here is logarithmic, so every little tic mark above the one below it is ten times more sensitive than the one below it. So these are enormous increases as we go up the scale here, starting with Galileo’s little telescope where he looked at Jupiter and noticed that there were these little moving blips of light around Jupiter. Every night they were in a different position; he realized that these were moons orbiting Jupiter. That, of course, had huge ramifications of human understanding of where we are in the cosmos and how things work.</p>
<p>And then, as eye pieces grew and telescopes enlarged, we were able to see distant star clusters, even other galaxies, faint galaxies, as we were able to record things with photography. Eventually, we began the idea of electronically recording images from the sky. You could receive light for hours or days on end, to see very faint things, and that’s how we really came to understand the magnitude — the enormous size and depth of our universe.</p>
<p>We went to space with the Hubble Space Telescope. That brought us two orders of magnitude more sensitivity just by getting above the blurring effects of our atmosphere. And then with servicing of Hubble — that SM-4 stands for Servicing Mission Four — we went off the chart here because every time astronauts have gone up to this telescope they’ve put in new instruments and new things that have enhanced its capabilities. So we really are at the very peak of this particular observatory’s capabilities, thanks to the advancement of technology.</p>
<p>So here’s an example of technology, I think, being used and advanced for the good of humanity — and we can all think of ways in which technology has served humanity and served the world, and also ways wherein technology has been used for things that have been harmful. And so, again, you need a values system to decide what technologies are going to develop and how you’re going to use them.</p>
<p>So, there’s our telescope. There’s our astronauts that went up a few years ago for the last time to service the telescope because we don’t have a space shuttle anymore. The astronauts did a marvelous job in 2009 of putting in new instruments and doing repairs. And so, we get back to this image you saw in my beginning slide of a star cluster which is really just a test image for the newest camera on Hubble, but through this image you can see how amazing stars can be, that the beauty here is something that is worth just kind of staring at and taking in. Each star here is at about the same distance because these stars are in all one single cluster, and so they are not — they’re gravitationally sort of held near to one another. So the brighter stars here really are intrinsically brighter. They’re not just closer, they’re brighter. And you can see red stars and blue stars and white stars, all kinds of stars.</p>
<p>And again, it helps to see things in context, so this is the Hubble image, which astronomers like because of the precision of the telescope, the fine resolution, you can differentiate star from star. It doesn’t just all mesh together, and so you can do quantitative studies of the stellar properties. But it also helps to see where these things are in context — this globular cluster of stars — so this is an image of a much broader field of view taken with a telescope on the ground, and then from here we can zoom in, in this Centaurus constellation, to this one cluster, this globular cluster, and then we will transition over from this image into that taken by the Hubble Space Telescope, which gets a much smaller field of view but higher precision. Some people like to see that twice, and some people don’t. You want to see it again? All right. Let’s see that again. I don’t like that violent constellation, but there we go.</p>
<p>Globular clusters are distributed around what we call the halo of our galaxy, and they tend to hold some of the oldest stars in our galaxy. Okay. So that’s the context.</p>
<p>We also have things happening on the other end of a star’s life. I talked about stars being born. Well, along with stars being born, there are planets being born. This is an image of an artist’s conception of a very real planetary system discovered with the Kepler space telescope, another observatory in space, and this system has six planets that are in tight orbits — if it were our own solar system they would be within the orbit of Mercury, so they’re zipping around very close to their parent star.</p>
<p>We have to do an artist’s conception because most of these planets we’re discovering right now outside of our solar system we’re finding indirectly, either because they transit in front of their parent star during their orbit, as these do — and you can measure the total amount of starlight that dips every time a planet orbits in front — or, they cause the star to wobble, as both the star and planets tug on each other during the orbital period. So you can actually detect the star wobbling and measure what kind of mass must be tugging on it. Hundreds of planets have been confirmed this way. Thousands of candidates have been found for planetary systems outside our own.</p>
<p>Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble SM4 ERO Team</p>
<p>On the other end of a star’s life we have this marvelous ejection of material from stars. This is what’s called the Butterfly Nebula, and we have material here being ejected from this very mature star at hundreds of kilometers every second. It’s quite beautiful, actually. We call it the Butterfly Nebula for that reason. But it’s also indicative of how stars eject what they’ve produced through their whole life.&#160; Stars are little factories that during their process of shining, they’re actually fusing hydrogen into heavier elements, and then as they run out of inner fuel, they eject all of that into the interstellar medium. It can fill galaxies and eventually you can get stars forming out of that gas with heavier nutrients. We’ll talk about that later.</p>
<p>And then finally, for this little astro-intro, I want to show you what we’re doing with galaxies as a whole, what we’re learning. In fact, we find that it seems that most galaxies, if not all, have something very dense in their inner core. We call it a black hole. It’s where so much mass has fallen into this gravitational well, if you call it, that it has coalesced into a very, very, dense region we call a black hole.</p>
<p>And as material falls into a black hole, it can do odd things. Here’s an example. This is a galaxy down here in this core, and there are lots of galaxies in the background here. This is a Hubble Space Telescope image, but these weird looking lobes were imaged with a radio telescope that can pick up this kind of emission. These are jets being shot out far beyond the confines of the galaxy from material that has fallen in toward the inner black hole and then has been caught up in magnetic fields, ejected out of the galaxy, and is interacting with the intergalactic medium in quite a spectacular way. These jets are moving almost at the speed of light, so this is really energetic.</p>
<p>Credit: NASA, ESA, S. Baum and C. O’Dea (RIT), R. Perley and W. Cotton (NRAO/AUI/NSF), and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)</p>
<p>We do believe now that our own galaxy has a relatively quiet black hole in the core of it. We can tell because of the motions of stars in the core of our galaxy, but we don’t see any evidence of this kind of hyperactivity with jets going on in our own galaxy right now.</p>
<p>We do, however, see evidence that galaxies like our own have gone through mergers, so here’s an example of two galaxies that are being drawn together. Again, they will be disrupted as they get closer and closer. There won’t be a lot of collisions between stars, but the disruption from tidal forces will end up like this pair, causing so much turbulence that you lose the original structure, and the turbulence spawns a whole bunch of new active star formation. So, all these little bright nebulae are spots where new stars are vibrantly and vigorously forming.</p>
<p>Our own galaxy is on a head-on collision course with Andromeda, our neighbor sister big spiral galaxy, and we just found that out for real — for sure — by modeling done based on Hubble Space Telescope observations and other observations a few months ago. So, again, our night sky might look quite different a few billion years from now, but you don’t need to be too concerned because individual star systems don’t seem to be disrupted, at least not in the models. So we’re in a very active galaxy — in a very, very active universe.</p>
<p>Credit: NASA, ESA, S. Beckwith (STScI) and the HUDF Team</p>
<p>The universe is enormous in both space and time. I show this again as a sample galaxy. It turns out that galaxies fill the universe. This is the ultra-deep field of the Hubble Space Telescope. Each one of these little blobs of light is not a star, but is a whole galaxy with hundreds of billions of stars. And then this is just a little pencil beam area of the sky, so just imagine this extrapolated over the whole sky and you get a mental image of how enormous the universe is. Here’s a spiral galaxy somewhat like our own. There’s also a third dimension here, so some of these galaxies are very far away and some of them are closer to us.</p>
<p>And so, astronomers are very interested in these distances. That’s the hardest thing in astronomy, to find the distances to other galaxies, or to anything in space, but there are ways of doing it. And, of course, distance means time in astronomy, because if things are far away it takes a long time for the light to get to us, so you’re seeing things as they actually were in the past when they emitted that light.</p>
<p>So, in this case, when you look at certain galaxies, you’re seeing them as they were in the far distant past, especially the more reddened ones, because as the universe is expanding, which we discovered some decades back, light gets sort of stretched as it travels through this stretching space to get to us, and so it becomes more red in its wavelength or its color. So many of the most distant galaxies appear the reddest to us. Here’s an example blown up for you of this very reddened galaxy. Turns out this is one of the most distant things we’ve ever seen. It’s shining to us from the first few hundred million years after the Big Bang burst beginning of the universe. That sounds like a long time, but we think the universe had an energetic beginning about 13.8 billion years ago. This is shining to us from within that first .8 of the 13.8 billion year history of the universe, so this is a very young infant galaxy. It hasn’t done a lot of these mergers yet. It hasn’t grown into the big spiral structure. We’re seeing it as it was, and maybe as our own galaxy was, a long time ago.</p>
<p>And, in fact, there’s this strong correlation between the improvement in telescope sensitivity and how far back in time you can see, because here you see telescopes getting better and better over time. As they get better and better, they get more sensitive, so you can see more faint objects. Well, many of the faint objects are the ones that are farthest away, which means you’re looking at them from far back in time. And so this sort of graphic shows you that as things get better and better, we can see farther out, which, in terms of galaxies, means seeing farther back in time.</p>
<p>Credit: NASA</p>
<p>The time scale down here is going from the present, over here, to toward the beginning of our universe, which would be over here off the right side of the chart. And so we’re starting to see this age when the first galaxies began to form and come together, and then it took a long time, billions of years, for these galaxies to merge, to grow, for stars to form vigorously within them, and to go through cycles where stars build up heavier and heavier elements within these galaxies to the point where galaxies today, like our own, have stars that are enriched with heavier elements and even planetary systems around them.</p>
<p>Things change over time and we can see that in astronomy. It’s one of the few sciences that has the advantage of being sort of like a time machine. We can look at a galaxy back here in time and compare it to a galaxy here in time, and see how they’re different, and that’s a really exciting privilege with astronomy. We can see that things have changed and indeed evolved over time in our universe.</p>
<p>And again, stars themselves play a very active role in creating the habitat that we need for life — the conditions. This is an old star that exploded about a thousand years ago. The remnants, or the debris, of this star is called the Crab Nebula, but Chinese sky watchers recorded this star brightening back about a thousand years ago and we’ve been watching the debris ever since.</p>
<p>We can also analyze the debris and see that it’s full of these heavier elements that we need for life — carbon, nitrogen, oxygen. These are things that are produced in stars and in their explosions that get incorporated into subsequent generations of stars, enabling the formation of dust disks, and even planetary systems around stars — not the first generation of stars, but several generations on. So our own sun is not a first generation star. It’s taken several generations of stars to get those heavier elements that we needed for our sun and our solar system.</p>
<p>So, it appears that our universe, with seemingly perfect underlying physical laws that govern it, shows a progression over time toward the production of stars and heavier elements, planets, and eventually life.</p>
<p>Now, is that a sign of purpose? I’ve just taken a leap out of the science and into the philosophy, into the interpretation. What do we do with this? All right? Here we start our conversation about how science, philosophy, religion and even ethics, start to converse with one another, using astronomy as an example.</p>
<p>Freeman Dyson, the physicist, said it wouldn’t surprise him “if it should turn out that the origin and destiny of the energy in the universe [could not] be completely understood in isolation from the phenomena of life and consciousness” and that the “design of the inanimate Universe may not be as detached from the potentialities of life and intelligence as scientists of the 20th century” — when he was writing – “have tended to suppose.”</p>
<p>So, is this progression of the universe toward life as we know it — at least on one planet — is that a sign that the universe was destined for this? Or is it just an accident? This is an interpretation question. You can’t measure that with science.</p>
<p>So, then, what about this perspective of faith? Can you prove or disprove God through science and nature? And at this point it’s kind of good to point out what should be the obvious — but I think it’s not obvious to a lot of people as we re-ask these questions over and over again — that science, as we know it today — the practice of science — is limited to questions of how and when and why, in terms of physical cause and effect of how nature works, basically, while religious faith is equipped better to address questions like Why — with a capital “W.” Is there a purpose? Is there a God? And how should we live?&#160; These kinds of things science is not really equipped to address, and religious tenets in faiths and texts are really not well equipped, usually, to address questions of how the natural world physically operates.</p>
<p>Now, of course there’s a lot of conversation now as to whether these realms are so separate or not. Can you explain religious thinking through scientific analysis? And so forth. So the conversation continues.</p>
<p>For many people in the scientific community, and in religious communities, the common ground that different groups can take regards ethics. How do we use science? How do we use technology? Whether or not you’re a religious believer, many people do care about how we are using science and technology and how it impacts humanity and the other creatures on this planet. So that can be a common ground where people of any or no religious faith can come together, regarding issues of science and technology.</p>
<p>So how do we relate science and religion? That’s a very big, difficult question. There are many books and many libraries. Many theologians, scientists, philosophers have been writing about this much more than I’ve ever read. I’m a scientist, not a theologian and not a philosopher. But there are some basic models that you’ll see out in the public sphere that are being assumed or adopted when talking about the interface of science and religion. This is not meant to be a comprehensive description, but rather just a helpful introduction here.</p>
<p>Credit: AAAS</p>
<p>One model is this contrast model, which basically would state that there’s no conflict between science and religion since they’re responding to different questions. Somewhat what I just said: Science is answering questions about the physical mechanics of nature and religion is asking more questions of meaning and value and purpose kind of thing. The Stephen Jay Gould sort of “non-overlapping, magisterial” idea. So you’ll see that discussed, as I just did.</p>
<p>There’s a contact model which is a little more interactive. This is a more positive approach, which doesn’t say that science and religion can just stay out of each other’s hair; it basically says there’s more to it, that it can be a positive approach which looks for dialogue and interaction, such as, for example, ways in which science can help shape religious understanding, such as understanding better what’s meant by the cosmos and the size and scale of the universe and the intricacies of life kind of thing.</p>
<p>And public service and religion — and how science can also shape public service by people being better informed as to what kinds of public service are most helpful using the science and technology knowledge we’re gaining, and how religion can often motivate scientific pursuits. Many of the great scientists throughout history and even today were motivated to do their research based on their religious convictions and their sense of worship, or of appreciation of the creation.</p>
<p>And then, of course, there’s the conflict model, which is also widely discussed, which basically says that science and religious belief are inherently incompatible. I read a lot of comments out in the blogosphere and so forth about how many people perceive that science is based on testable information, whereas religious belief is based only on basically groundless faith — that these are two very different approaches to understanding things, and they’re incompatible — or even worse, that religious belief has maybe been an impediment to scientific advancement. And so, there are those voices out there, as well.</p>
<p>And so, you’ll see as you read and write — I’m sure you’ve run across it, and maybe even in your own writing — you’ll see assumptions from these different perspectives coming through.</p>
<p>For example, here are some perspectives. Again, I go back to the lauded physicist, Freeman Dyson, who said, “Why are we here? Does the universe have a purpose? Whence comes our knowledge of good and evil? These mysteries, and a hundred others like them, are beyond the reach of science. They lie on the other side of the border within, the jurisdiction of religion.” So he’s sort of speaking, at least in this quote, from that contrast point of view. These realms or approaches are asking different kinds of questions, and so they are separate.</p>
<p>Francis Collins, who wrote this bestselling book, The Language of God — geneticist — I believe he’s more of the ilk of the contact model, that there’s something positive to be gained by having more contact and dialogue between science and religion. He said, “We cannot discover, through science alone, the answers to the questions ‘Why is there life anyway?’ and ‘Why am I here?’”</p>
<p>And then Richard Dawkins, who’s well known for advocating more of a conflict model — here he says what I think many people also believe — where he says:</p>
<p>I think that when you consider the beauty of the world, and you wonder how it came to be what it is, you’re naturally overwhelmed with a feeling of awe, a feeling of admiration, and you almost feel a desire to worship something. I feel this, I recognize that other scientists such as Carl Sagan feel this. Einstein felt it. We, all of us, share a kind of religious reverence for the beauties of the universe, for the complexity of life. For the sheer magnitude of the cosmos, the sheer magnitude of geological time. And it’s tempting to translate that feeling of awe and worship into a desire to worship some particular thing, a person, an agent. You want to attribute it to a maker, to a creator.</p>
<p>And here’s the punch line for him — “What science has now achieved is an emancipation from that impulse to attribute these things to a creator.</p>
<p>So, for him, science has basically emancipated us from earlier models that humans have made up, basically, to explain the inexplicable.</p>
<p>Now, of course, others would not interpret it the same way, so I just wanted to give you some examples of different perspectives. And, of course, these are all from western perspectives of science and religion, being very different ways of thinking of things than that in many Eastern cultures and religions.</p>
<p>Virchand Gandhi said, “In our country religion is not different from philosophy and religion and philosophy don’t differ from science.” So, this whole idea that science is a totally separate sphere of gaining knowledge and truth independent of anything else is a rather recent invention in the West.</p>
<p>Let me mention a little bit about why scientific societies actually care about what our culture thinks about the interaction of science and religion. The American Association for the Advancement of Science, the nation’s largest — the world’s largest — scientific society, has this program, which I direct, called the Dialogue on Science, Ethics, and Religion.</p>
<p>Why would a scientific society do this? This program has been around for probably 17 or 18 years now.&#160; I’ve only been on board with it for three. But the program is established not to try to solve these theological issues or philosophical issues of whether science and religion are compatible or complementary, or irreconcilable, or actually necessary for one another. Rather, it simply brings religious communities and scientists together to have dialogue on issues of common interest and concern. So, this program, the DOSER program, facilitates communication and understanding between scientific and religious communities, building on the AAAS’s longstanding commitment to relate scientific knowledge to the concerns of society at large.</p>
<p>Here’s the issue. Many, many people in society are religious believers, or their views on the world or their values are shaped through lenses inherent to religious faith, through values that are shaped by their religious faith, and if science is always discussed completely apart from that, it’s not serving society, it’s not interacting wholly with society, even if science itself does not address issues of religious faith directly.</p>
<p>The Society publishes Science, which is well-known scientific journal; it represents millions of scientists worldwide, and here’s the mission: To advance science, engineering, and innovation throughout the world for the benefit of all people. Our little motto is “Advancing Science, Serving Society.” Here we have this idea that having a conversation about — or a dialogue between — science and religion is a way of serving society.</p>
<p>This fits into this scientific society’s goals of fostering communication among scientists and the public, producing responsible conduct and use of science, enhancing the workforce so people aren’t wrongfully keeping themselves out of being a part of the scientific workforce due to a misunderstanding of what science is, appreciating or helping the public appreciate science and technology more, and strengthening support for science and the technology enterprise.</p>
<p>…</p>
<p>Well, what are some of those perceptions? For some, the perception is that science itself is actually a kind of religion that conflicts with their own religious beliefs and they resent that being imposed upon them. And so, as I mentioned, there are often challenges in public school systems regarding what’s taught in the classroom.</p>
<p>Here’s a story from the Kansas City Star from just a few weeks ago where an anti-evolution group filed a federal lawsuit to “block Kansas from using new, multi-state science standards in its public schools, arguing that the guidelines promote atheism and violate students’ and parents’ religious freedom.” So that is why many people feel a sense of concern and threat about science — a concern that science carries along with it some baggage beyond just the scientific knowledge, that there’s an implication of materialism or atheism or some other baggage that’s being brought along with the science.</p>
<p>The lawsuit argues that the new standards will cause Kansas Public Schools to promote a “‘non-theistic religious worldview’ by allowing only ‘materialistic’ or ‘atheistic’ explanations to scientific questions, particularly about the origins of life and the universe. The suit further argues that the state would be ‘indoctrinating’ impressionable students in violation of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.” So you see, this is a concern that many people have. What’s coming along with the science?</p>
<p>And then what about scientists? What are they concerned about? Well, here we have Richard Dawkins on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, and Stewart asked him whether the end of human civilization was more likely to come through religious strife or scientific advancement. In other words, Stewart wasn’t so convinced that scientific advancement necessarily meant a wonderful, positive progression for society.</p>
<p>I think, skipping to the bottom here, Dawkins ultimately said that he thought that religious fanatics with access to the most destructive products of science pose the biggest danger to human civilization. But then Stewart countered, arguing that science contained certain risks in and of itself, in the form of extreme or incautious advancement. So, kind of an interesting little exchange there, which is, which carries more risk? Is it religion or science?</p>
<p>And then there are questions of ethics that are coming before us often. These are just examples. For example, the ethics of vaccines. Of course, we’ve heard about the controversies of whether vaccines produce other health problems and whether that’s really true or not. But then there are also conversations about whether we can afford to vaccinate children, and here’s a lash out at that kind of thinking that was also printed in Science Magazine back in September where author John Mekalanos reminds us, let’s not forget these pitiful images of children in these terrible containers. They had breathing machines they had to go through back when we had to suffer polio and all these horrible diseases that immunizations have delivered us from. And so, therefore, “it is more than a little ironic when we’re told that we can’t afford a needed vaccine, despite the fact that it will save lives.”</p>
<p>The ethics: How much can we afford? Can we afford vaccinating all kids everywhere? How do we do it?</p>
<p>The ethics of using technology for increasing human capabilities. We have, of course, as I mentioned earlier, the ability now to restore movement and things in people that have lost it, through technology. That’s terrific, but what about technology that’s designed to make humans superhuman? We’ve thought about artificial intelligence or even human enhancement through drug therapy and so forth, making people better than they would naturally be. Or this whole trans-humanism idea that humanity will supersede our being attached to a body at some point. What should we be doing about that? These are the ethical questions.</p>
<p>I think all of us need to beware of what is sometimes referred to — and I honestly don’t know who coined the term — but “Nothing Buttery.” In other words, when science comes up with an explanation for something it’s tempting to interpret it as though the phenomenon or issue is nothing but what the science describes.</p>
<p>So the question is, is the scientific explanation for a natural phenomenon, including things like our human behavior, is that the whole story? In other words, if we find out that there’s a natural explanation for altruism — why we care for one another — does that mean that there really isn’t such thing as selfless caring? Or, if there’s a natural explanation for why people are drawn to religious faith or religious belief, does that mean that that’s all there is, that there’s no such thing as an external spiritual reality or an external God? There’s some point where the science only tells you the first part but doesn’t say anything about the second part, and that’s often misunderstood.</p>
<p>I’m going to take a few more minutes here, if that’s okay. About ten more minutes here, hopefully.</p>
<p>So, such a question — for example, altruism — and there are many, many articles on altruism, much research on it — so this is just an example quote, but we find even in animal species examples of animals&#160;helping other animals when it’s of no benefit to themselves, like birds helping other birds to raise their young. You can almost see how that would help the group as a whole. Or monkeys giving alarm calls to warn other monkeys of the presence of predators, even though by doing so they’re attracting attention to themselves and their own possibility of being attacked. So what are we to make of that? Is altruism real or is it something that’s basically still part of a selfish motive deep down inside for survival? Those conversations come up at this interface of science, religion, and ethics.</p>
<p>And then Frans de Waal, who is a very highly respected primate behaviorist at Emory, again talks from this vein that human morality grows out of prior animal moralities:</p>
<p>I don’t believe animals are moral in the sense we humans are — with well developed and reasoned sense of right and wrong — rather that human morality incorporates a set of psychological tendencies and capacities such as empathy, reciprocity, a desire for cooperation and harmony, that are older than our species.</p>
<p>Human morality was not formed from scratch, but grew out of our primate psychology. Primate psychology has ancient roots, and I agree that other animals show many of the same tendencies and have an intense sociality.</p>
<p>So, the question here is if we see that other animals have some of these characteristics that we would have previously incorporated only to human morality and a human sense of empathy and cooperation, does that mean that there is no external ultimate right and wrong, or God-directed values, as religious communities would see it? Is it all nothing but — and interestingly so — but an evolutionary process that comes through the survival of species?</p>
<p>That’s the kind of interesting interface where the science itself can be correct, but the question is, is that the whole story? And that’s where religious communities are particularly interested.</p>
<p>I think for writers, such as yourselves, it’s really crucial to dig deeper in some of these stories when you’re talking about this interface between science and religion, because values and world views shape many of the concerns and interests regarding science. For example, authority figures. Who are people actually listening to and trusting in terms of information about science, and do deeply religious people look to different authority figures for questions and answers regarding science than do non-religious people?</p>
<p>That’s something a new AAAS survey is going to get at, but it baffles a lot of scientists that I interact with when we put forth a lot of data on something, and yet the audience doesn’t always just say, “oh, I see.” Scientists will say that the climate is getting warmer, because “here’s the data.” But many people are also getting information from other authority figures, either a religious authority figure saying that God has different plans, or a different science authority that has been filtered through their religious communities.</p>
<p>And scientists are just the same. We’re all this way. We look to authority voices that we trust to help us interpret what we’re hearing if we’re not experts in the subject matter. But if society is divided on which authority figures we’re looking to for matters of science, is that going to cause a problem as our society moves forward?</p>
<p>And then there are concerns about motivations and agendas that people sometimes wonder about, these other groups that they’re not as familiar with. Do scientists sometimes wonder if religious communities are trying to incorporate religion into the science classroom or something like that? And are religious communities concerned that scientists, as we saw before, are sometimes trying to bring secularization or materialism, or even atheism — along with the science as a kind of baggage? So what are the perceptions of motivations on each side?</p>
<p>And there’s also a very interesting sense that people don’t realize that scientists themselves have a very broad range of personal religious and philosophical beliefs. In other words, this perception that scientists are all atheists is not true. Certainly, the spread of beliefs that scientists hold is not exactly the same distribution as the general public, but many, many scientists identify as adherents to traditional religious faiths, or would identify themselves as “spiritual but not religious,” the ever popular new category of belief.</p>
<p>And I refer you to, again, sociologist Elaine Howard Ecklund. She’s written an excellent book based on surveying over a thousand scientists in elite research universities about their personal religious views, and interviewing hundreds of them in depth, and finding a very interesting spread of religious beliefs amongst scientists. Her book is called — she doesn’t like the title– it’s called, Science vs. Religion: What Scientists Really Think — but it’s a helpful book.</p>
<p>So these are the kinds of things — I think writing about science and religion, it’s helpful to dig deeper for these kinds of perception questions that motivate many people’s concerns. And there are tough questions that are often beyond science, as we think about life on planet earth here. What will, for example, the long-term future of the universe hold? Are we significant given the vastness of the universe in space and time? And now we even talk about this possibility that there’s a multi-verse — that there may be other universes with different physical forces and so forth. Does that just compound our sense of insignificance? Or does our significance come from something else, from our ability to look around and to make these observations? Does that actually imply that we have great significance? That’s a philosophical question. It’s been thought about before. Carl Sagan said, “Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe.”</p>
<p>So that’s one perception you can take by looking at science, and especially the universe, and seeing its vastness and our place in space and time. It’s not the only possible response. The biblical psalmist wrote, “Oh Lord, our Sovereign, how majestic is your name in all the earth! When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars that you’ve established, what are human beings that you are mindful of them, mortals, that you care for them?” — so that sense of insignificance is right there, and yet the psalmist goes on to say, “And yet you’ve made us just a little lower than God and crowned us with glory and honor. You’ve given us dominion over the works of your hands. You’ve put all things under our feet.” So basically, in the psalmist’s view, our significance has come from God’s endowment of that significance to us.</p>
<p>There are more tough questions that arise: Why do the same natural processes that are operating in the universe and on the planet — and even sustain healthy conditions for life — also cause pain, death, and grief? Is it just the random coldness of nature or is there something more theological to be addressed about this? I think of plate tectonics, the motion of the earth’s plates that creates earthquakes and causes so much suffering. Plate tectonics also seem to recycle our atmosphere and give us more livable conditions, so are plate tectonics good or bad?</p>
<p>What about what creatures do to each other? Is this okay? Is it neutral? Is there really such a thing as evil? Science can’t really address that.</p>
<p>I think about what’s happening, for example, to other creatures. There are elephant populations in Africa that are being attacked with military-style assault weapons, gunned down, whole families, just for their tusks. And then elephants, who have very strong familial connections, their relatives will come mourn and grieve their dead, and then they get gunned down too as they come to grieve. Is this okay? We know something about the social nature of elephants now. Are we not responsible to treat them with compassion?</p>
<p>All right. I’m going to close out now — almost. I just want to say, on a more positive note, that the universe always holds new discoveries and new surprises, and that human beings seem to recognize the beauty of nature, and for some reason we’re drawn to the beauty of nature, and we’re drawn to explore it, sometimes with varying responses.</p>
<p>But I think that’s why people love science. It’s telling us more and more about nature. Theologian [John] Calvin said that “astronomy is not only pleasant,” but it’s “also useful to be known” and it “cannot be denied that this art unfolds the admirable wisdom of God.” That was his take on it.</p>
<p>It doesn’t have to be your take on it. Physicist [Steven] Weinberg felt that “the more the universe seems comprehensible the more it seems pointless.” So, your response to what you see is not dictated by the science alone.</p>
<p>I’m going to skip through all of this, but if you ask me about it in the Q&amp;A, I’m going to tell you about exoplanets.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE: All of that Lewis stuff.</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Yeah? Well, you’ll have to ask me about it because I think I’ve gone over time.</p>
<p>We’re learning a lot about extra solar planets and it interfaces a lot with religious thought about the significance of humans. So, if somebody asks me about that, I will talk about it.</p>
<p>We’re discovering, also, things through our study of galaxies. This magnified galaxy here is just a normal galaxy. It just is behind this cluster of nearer galaxies, and the dark matter and all the mass in this cluster is so powerful that it bends the light from the background galaxy and magnifies it in this weird, distorted way so that we can actually learn more detail about this weirdly distorted light from the background galaxy than we can from the foreground galaxies. We can learn more information about this distant galaxy than we ever could if it were isolated, simply because of this magnifying effect of nature. That’s pretty cool, and astronomers are using that now to study these very distant galaxies by using nature’s own magnifying lenses in the foreground.</p>
<p>Credit: NASA, ESA, the Hubble SM4 ERO Team, and ST-ECF</p>
<p>We’ve also found out that the universe is not only expanding, but that expansion is accelerating, and Adam Riess here won a Nobel Prize along with two colleagues, Brian Schmidt and Saul Perlmutter, for taking the observations that showed that our universe, which after its birth began to decelerate in its expansion, has now transitioned to a point of accelerating in this expansion. We don’t know what causes that. We call it dark energy. So it’s another mystery, another thing to go forward in studying.</p>
<p>The beauty of the universe inspires everyone. Here’s a young lady from the Maryland School for the Blind, who’s looking at a nebula just like that one, except she’s looking at it through her hands. She’s a visually impaired student and these images have been created by NASA with textile cues, so there are different feels for nebulae and for galaxies, for planets and stars. And so, by feeling these images, you can very much appreciate the beauty, just as many of us do with our eyes. And, in fact, when I spoke to this classroom of students they were every bit as excited about space exploration as anybody who looks at space images with their eyes.</p>
<p>So, how do we think about science and religion here? Alfred North Whitehead said that “when we consider what religion is for mankind, and what science is, it is no exaggeration to say that the future course of history depends upon the decision of this generation as to the relations between them.”</p>
<p>And I like the perspective of Sir John Polkinghorne, who spent his life as a physicist and the president of Queens College, eventually, in Cambridge, and then he decided to become an Anglican priest, and he’s written some very helpful books on the interface between theology and science. And he says that “science and theology are both concerned with the search for truth. In consequence, they complement each other rather than contrast one another. Of course, the two disciplines focus on different dimensions of truth, but they share a common conviction that there is truth to be sought.”</p>
<p>I think that’s a very key point. The reason people get energized about conversations about science and religion is that both scientists and many devout religious believers — and by the way, those are not exclusive categories; many scientists are, themselves, religious believers — but they all believe that there is something called truth, something to be sought, something to be grasped, something to be learned about, as opposed to just total inconsequential relativism. And so, I think, in that sense, it drives a commonality between, in some cases, scientists and religious believers.</p>
<p>I saw that somewhat in my own educational background. My own education was at major research universities and the religious groups of students — the fellowship groups of students there centered on religious faith — were full of science students. Science students made up the majority of the students participating in these religious groups. Why is that? Well, I think it is partly because of this sense of a conviction that there’s truth to be sought in both of these facets of life.</p>
<p>If you want more resources, I could have made a list that’s 20-pages long, but I just wanted to point out a couple of my favorite books — the Collins book, The Language of God. I also like this anthology, The Book of the Cosmos: Imagining the Universe from Heraclitus to Hawking. This is a literary professor, Dennis Danielson, a professor of English at the University of British Columbia, who’s created a marvelous collection of essays and excerpts from scientists and philosophers and religious texts throughout human history about thinking about the cosmos.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.aaas.org/DoSER" type="external">Dialogue on Science, Ethics, and Religion Program of the AAAS</a>, I heartily suggest that you look at our website. We also are Facebook active and we are new on Twitter, but we are growing in that realm, as well.</p>
<p>And then there are different religious communities that have their own organizations and websites that regard the interaction of their religious faith and science. The <a href="http://www.asa3.org" type="external">American Scientific Affiliation</a> is a network of scientists who are interested in the relationship of science and Christian faith. Very good resources on their site.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.scienceandjudaism.org/" type="external">Institute for Science and Judaism</a>, and a new organization called <a href="http://sinaiandsynapses.org/" type="external">Sinai and Synapses</a>, are very interested in the interface of science, Judaism, and religion in general.</p>
<p>And these — I could go on and on — there are organizations regarding Islam and science, and humanism and science, and so forth. There’s a lot out there if you do a little digging for resources.</p>
<p>There’s also beauty to be held and this is an image of the Horsehead Nebula we took in infrared light with the Hubble Space Telescope recently, and so you can see this marvelous ethereal image of one of these interstellar clouds where silently and quietly, but aggressively, new stars are bursting forth in a very beautiful way.</p>
<p>Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)</p>
<p>And then, looking back on our planet earth from servicing Hubble, you can see that little wisp of the atmosphere that shines around the circumference of the earth here as the sun sets behind it, and I like this image because it just kind of reminds us of our own planet, the fragility of the atmosphere, the fragility of life here, and how at least there’s life on this planet.</p>
<p>We should all, regardless of our faith convictions, be good caretakers of this place where we live.</p>
<p>So, with that I will close for the moment, unless someone asks me about exoplanets —</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Okay.&#160; Thank you, Jennifer. Thank you very much.</p>
<p>I already have a list of names of people to get in, but I get the first question.</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; All right.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; What did you think of the movie Gravity?</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; I thought — have you guys seen the movie Gravity?</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Well, some of you have.</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Please go see it. It’s a lot of fun. Just —</p>
<p>WILLIAM SALETAN, Slate:&#160; Don’t spoil it!</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Okay. I won’t spoil it, but it’s a lot of fun. I would suggest if you — many theatres offer it in 3D, or even in IMAX 3D, and I would say this one is worth it to pay the extra and get the 3D and get the IMAX, get whatever.</p>
<p>It’s a lot of fun. Yes, there are some issues with some of it being absolutely physically possible. This is science fiction so just relax, go and enjoy the film.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; So it’s not accurate? Is it accurate?</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Not in every physical respect, no.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Okay.</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; But it’s very cool.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; It’s really cool, yes. Okay. Michael Gerson, you’re first, and then Andy Ferguson and William Saletan. Michael, get the mike — and Dan Harris.</p>
<p>Michael Gerson</p>
<p>MICHAEL GERSON, The Washington Post:&#160; I’m sure you get a lot of half-informed questions on cosmologies, but I’m going to ask mine.</p>
<p>I look at all those beautiful pictures and the ultimate reality that we’re seeing there is not so much progression but decay, increasing entropy eventually, which determines the direction of time, and eventually all those stars will die. And if you wind the process back, which is 13.8 billion years, it means that the beginning had very low levels of entropy.</p>
<p>(Inaudible)</p>
<p>So I’m just wondering how cosmologists explain why the earliest moments of the universe should be the most highly structured and organized. It doesn’t seem obvious to me.</p>
<p>And some, I know, propose the multi-verse as part of an explanation, but it raises the question that doesn’t seem open to verification, even in theory, and so I’m wondering if that’s really science at all? Or whether it’s another form of faith in this space.</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; So, the entropy question comes up a lot. If entropy is increasing, then why would we see increasing complexity? And it kind of all depends on what system you’re looking at when you ask the question.</p>
<p>So, it may be that entropy is increasing with the universe as a whole, but in certain subsystems within that universe you’re getting more and higher complexity, so you’re getting this development of stars, you’re getting development of life, you’re getting these kinds of things.</p>
<p>The ultimate fate of the universe is a very good and somewhat troubling question because basically, as we project forward, if nothing changes, it looks that eventually the universe will expand forever, accelerate out, stars will eventually stop forming because we run out of this interstellar gas from which they can form. You run out of fuel. Stars eventually die out. You eventually have something that you could envision as a very cold and dark place filled with a few black holes and dead stars and nothing more.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; That’s my concern.</p>
<p>(Laughter)</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; And so, that is a kind of a dire prospect. In fact, we already know that we’ve already peaked and the highest rate of star formation was a few billion years back, and so we’re already on the down slope.</p>
<p>As we compare these distant galaxies to our own nearby galaxies, you can see, over the first few billion years of the universe, star formation began to become more and more energetic; but as we compare galaxies at what we call a “red-shift of two,” the time and distance when the star-formation rate peaked, and on to our current epoch, we can see that star formation is now declining a bit.</p>
<p>So we already feel like we’re on the kind of post-peak of the universe in terms of the production of stars.&#160; How should we feel about that?</p>
<p>I don’t know what the question is. I can’t answer your detailed question about entropy in terms of the beginning of the universe because I’m not a cosmologist, so I won’t attempt that, but I will say that —</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; You’re probably a better cosmologist than anybody else in this room.</p>
<p>(Laughter)</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN: &#160;The amazing thing about science is that we often get surprised. So that’s the projection right now, but there may be something that we don’t quite understand that will affect the long term future of the universe. This whole dark energy thing was a complete surprise, so if there are aspects of gravity that we don’t quite understand, then we may not be able to predict the long-term future of the universe. And maybe it doesn’t even matter. If there is this multi-verse, maybe the question is, what’s the long-term future of the multi-verse?</p>
<p>Now, you ask a very good question. Is the multi-verse something scientifically real? Is it testable? And right now, the answer is, no, you can’t test it. It’s a mathematically viable possibility based on string theory, and string theory is just that, it’s a kind of theory that can explain some of the phenomena that we see at least in our own universe, and you can tie those observations back to some aspects of string theory. It allows for this idea that there are other universes with other forces, but we can’t — sort of by definition — we can’t see outside of our own universe in order to test whether that’s actually happened.</p>
<p>It provides a philosophical mode of thinking for some people who are troubled by the fact that our universe does seem to have produced life, and does that imply some sort of specialness that is philosophically uncomfortable. But if you have a whole bunch of other universes and we’re just kind of a random accident, if you will, then that kind of provides a philosophical way out of this conundrum.</p>
<p>But that, again, is not science itself. That’s kind of philosophy, so I’m not — personally, I don’t have an opinion as to whether the multi-verse theory is correct or not, because like you say, you can’t observe it. But it wouldn’t necessarily surprise me. We’ve been amazed so many times by how much grander our universe is than we ever envisioned before. We never knew there were other planetary systems until just recently, and we didn’t know that there were other galaxies until just a few decades ago. So what if there were other universes? Would that threaten the faith view? Well, not if the faith perspective is based on the idea that whatever God or spirituality is responsible for the universe could be equally responsible for a multi-verse, so it just kind of pulls the question back.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Do you have a follow-up, Michael? I can tell.</p>
<p>MR. GERSON:&#160; No, no.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Okay. Andy Ferguson, if you’d pull the mike up, you’re next, and then we’ll —</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; I just want to add one more thing. Religious communities, particularly like Christianity, would say that there’s more to the story than just what looks like the natural projection of the universe. Christian communities believe that Christ will return and make some sort of noticeable change in the universe, so it’s not the whole story, but those are religious beliefs.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Andy?</p>
<p>Andrew Ferguson</p>
<p>ANDREW FERGUSON, The Weekly Standard:&#160; My question is so petty after this one.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE: &#160;Say it again? Your question is so what?</p>
<p>MR. FERGUSON: &#160;Petty, because it doesn’t have anything to do with the future of the universe.</p>
<p>I’m not going to ask about the future of the universe or anything. You had mentioned the surveys by Elaine Ecklund. One thing that I thought, looking at it, was the community of scientists still is an amazingly secular group. It’s something like 35% or something believe in some kind of God, and much less of those believe in sort of a traditional notion of God.</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Compared to the U.S. population.</p>
<p>MR. FERGUSON:&#160; Compared to the 90% of Americans who say they believe in God. How do you account for that? Is it something in the people who are inclined to go into science, that they just have a more secular or unreligious point of view? Or is it something that in the practice of science itself that makes somebody less religious?</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; That’s a very good question. Now, in her book, where she talks more thoroughly about the qualitative interviews she did with scientists, she found out some of that.</p>
<p>Many scientists had been raised in religious families, but their love of science had caused them to ask questions that were not always favorably entertained in their religious congregation or church, or whatnot. And so it made them feel eventually that they had to basically leave their religious faith behind because it wasn’t helping them with their questions about science. So that may be one reason — is that people who are scientifically inclined may not find their religious upbringing to be relevant or helpful.</p>
<p>Then the question then is, does science itself make one deduce that religious faith is irrelevant or illogical or false? I’m not sure. Since I’m not a sociologist, I haven’t done this, I can’t speculate quantitatively on whether that’s the case.</p>
<p>I do know that you find — and I have found — in my line of work I have interacted with a whole lot of scientists and they all have a story, just like all of us do. Everybody in this room has a story as to why they’re at a certain place in their belief or nonbelief in terms of religious faith, and I found many scientists who are people of faith who said that they came to it as adults, as scientists, like Francis Collins — it was a journey that included both their intellect, but also their heart, a sense of maybe repentance or maybe a longing for God, or something like that, along with fitting it in an acceptable way with their intellect such that they became believers. I’ve interacted with many people who have stories along that line.</p>
<p>I’ve also interacted with many people of the other line, who were religious believers and maybe fervently so, but the more they looked at what we’re learning in science, be it biology or behavioral evolution, or even cosmology, they began to doubt many things that they had been taught in their religious heritage and have turned away from it.</p>
<p>And of course, there’s always the question of whether religious belief been good for society or harmful for society as a whole, and that gets bantered around a lot in public dialogue. But I think the real question that nearly everyone grapples with at some point in their life is why is there evil and suffering in the world? Why do innocent people or animals or whatnot — why are they suffering? Why is evil allowed to take place? And you can either answer — some people answer that as a sense of proof that God must not exist, or at least not in any useful or tangible way, or else this God would not have allowed these horrible things to happen. Or others can come to a different conclusion, such as that in Christian heritage with the idea is that God doesn’t generally intervene to stop our freedom of — either the freedom of nature or the freedom of human action and its consequences — but God has joined in the suffering in the incarnation in Jesus Christ, and somehow redeems it and promises a new type of future.</p>
<p>So there’s different ways of dealing with suffering, but depending on how one grapples with this ubiquitous question of why is there injustice, why is there suffering, it can direct how they respond to religious faith and whether they embrace it or reject it.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Well, we won’t be able to address the entire problem of evil in this session, but we may in the future.</p>
<p>I would want to mention quickly, we have had Profession Elaine Ecklund here in the past to talk about her book and her research. And I think we probably have that on our website, the dialogue we had about that. Will Saletan, you’re up next, and then Dan Harris, and Erica, and Greg, and David. But Will, bring the mike up please.</p>
<p>William Saletan</p>
<p>MR. SALETAN:&#160; This is sort of the opposite of Andy’s question. Instead of about the psychology of the scientist, I want to ask about the psychology of the believers.</p>
<p>You had up there — I forget what all the models were of interaction. There was conflict. There was contact. There was non-conflict. I want to ask about an alternative — I guess I’d call it compartmentalization. And just to sort of bring this down to earth — even though it’s not astronomy, it’s biology — I’m from Texas and I grew up among creationists, and when I look at survey data, there are tons of creationists out there, and I’m talking about people who — they don’t believe in human evolution, they don’t believe in the — some of them believe the earth is 6,000 years old, etcetera, etcetera.</p>
<p>My question is, when I grew up with these people I didn’t have the impression that it debilitated them at all — that seemed to me that it was almost cut off from the way that they — it didn’t affect their ability to understand science in general, or to just sort of incorporate daily things.</p>
<p>If someone goes to the doctor and they don’t believe in evolution but the doctor says, “Please don’t use the antibiotics unless you have to because if you do, the microbes will” — if they say, “Okay,” isn’t that sort of functionally enough?</p>
<p>Could science basically say, okay, there’s a bunch of people out there — a lot of the United States — that rejects the theory of human evolution. They apparently do so in defiance of all of this evidence because there’s something they need to hold on to in terms of their moral beliefs, that they believe is built up in rejecting that, but it doesn’t affect the rest of their lives. Can we effectively sidestep it?</p>
<p>So my question to you basically is, do you talk to people who are creationists about exactly what they believe in relation to science and what else they believe, and do you have the impression that this is something that we could sidestep and they could be perfectly functional with respect to understanding and incorporating science in their lives?</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Well, this AAAS survey I talked about is going to get right at that — what is it that people actually are concerned about — because most people are very interested in science, and that goes for people of very conservative fundamentalist religious views. Many of them would love to go to a science museum or love to talk about space exploration and all [of that].</p>
<p>What concerns people is when they perceive, I think, that science is trying to edge out God, or trying to make God irrelevant, and if God is the center of your life, the center of your world view, this can’t fly.</p>
<p>So, your question is, could people who in this sense — in terms of evolutionary science — who have trouble accepting that, can they accept other parts of science and is that okay just to go with that? Is that basically your question? I guess it depends on what it is that they are doing in life. For example, some students who come through with creationist beliefs in high school, and then they come to college and they go to a secular university and they want to study science, they have problems because suddenly they are introduced into science classes where an acceptance of evolutionary science is assumed, and they sometimes feel marginalized or challenged. And so, in that sense I think it doesn’t work very well.</p>
<p>For most people, just daily life, getting along — I don’t think most of us in this room think very much on a day-to-day, moment-to-moment basis about whether we have a common ancestor with other primates. So it’s not something that affects us in our daily life in that sense, but I do think people miss out. My perspective – and here I’m speaking from my personal point of view – is that I’m a religious believer myself and I think we miss out on some of the glorious revelations, if you will, through nature, of the magnitude, the evolution of the universe, and the complexity and intricacies of life, the interrelatedness of life. These are things that don’t necessarily have to conflict, but it can, in fact, augment one’s faith in God if you are a person of faith.</p>
<p>And so, I sort of lament when religious communities set up a kind of conflict, and usually it’s not about the science, it’s about the interpretation of Scripture: How do you interpret this particular biblical passage? Is reading, let’s say the opening versus of Genesis, really telling us the details of the time scale and mechanisms of creation? And if it really isn’t meant and never was meant to convey that kind of knowledge, even if you believe it is the word of God, it can be freeing to find that out so that the religious believer can go on and embrace the science, and so thereby be blessed both by the science and by a deeper understanding of their religious text.</p>
<p>So, do they need to know it? Well, not everybody. But is it helpful? Absolutely. And of course you’ve pointed out this whole idea of people accepting it even when they don’t realize it, in terms of the antibiotics and things. But what many people would say is that it’s microevolution, and microevolution is okay in many of these communities. It’s macroevolution that they have a problem with.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Just quickly before I go to Dan Harris and before Dan pulls the microphone over to himself. Let me just give a quick word of advertisement, if I will, and you can talk to her during the break and the meals — Dr. Deb Haarsma is here, right there.</p>
<p>She’s the new president of the BioLogos Foundation and they sponsor dialogues between the very people that William was talking about, between scientists who are Christians — different views of origins, of the age of the earth, and of biological evolution and all of that — and their whole purpose — founded originally by Dr. Francis Collins — is to have dialogue on these very questions, not just among journalists but among faith communities about those very questions. So I call your attention to the BioLogos website for — that will answer every question you just asked, William. It’s all there.</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Also, I think what we’ve discovered from the AAAS, from the scientists’ point of view, is that there’s a lot of things that we as scientists can’t really do. We can talk about evidences from scientific investigation — evidences for the evolution of life, evidences for the age of the earth, evidences for the evolution of the universe, even genetic evidence, mapping of the human genome. It’s all scientific evidence, but for people whose world view is very much shaped by not only science, but by a profound trust in Scripture, we need people who are leaders in religious communities to step up and start talking about interpreting Scripture in the most respectful way.</p>
<p>It doesn’t mean that you’re compromising, necessarily, but that you are interpreting Scripture in the right way so that as much as possible any unnecessary conflicts between science and religious faith are reduced for people in those communities.</p>
<p>And so, in that sense scientists are not the answer to some of these problems. It is leaders of religious communities that would serve their people well by doing more in depth understanding of what the Scriptures are and are not trying to convey regarding the details of science and natural history.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Could I just say — I’m going to call on Dan Harris, but before I do I want Greg Jones — I want the two theologians among us, Gregory Jones and Tim Dalrymple, to begin preparing remarks on those very questions. When I call on you, you can not only give a question but make a statement.</p>
<p>I know Tim is a trained theologian and has thought a lot about this, and so I’d love to hear the theologians among us address the questions of how theologians ought to look at science, but don’t do it until after Dan and Erica ask their questions.</p>
<p>Dan, you’re up now.</p>
<p>Dan Harris</p>
<p>DAN HARRIS, ABC News:&#160; All right.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; And maybe you’ll answer these questions.</p>
<p>MR. HARRIS: &#160;No, believe me, I will not. I asked this question — I had to moderate a panel with some —</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Move the mike down.</p>
<p>MR. HARRIS:&#160; That’s not usually one of my flaws.</p>
<p>(Laughter)</p>
<p>I had to moderate a panel with some astronomers and I asked this question and I was surprised by the answer — but I was so struck looking at those beautiful pictures you put up of the universe and just the sheer magnitude of stars out there. When confronted with that, these basic facts, I would imagine on a daily basis, does that allow you to put the basic crap of daily life into a greater perspective than the rest of us?</p>
<p>(Laughter)</p>
<p>And here’s my second question, and I apologize if this is stupid, but you talk about the universe expanding — we often hear that the universe is infinite, so can infinity expand?</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Oh, my. If the universe if infinite, how can it expand? What’s it expanding into, right?</p>
<p>MR. HARRIS:&#160; Yeah. Yes.</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; When cosmologists use the word “infinite,” it is very hard to comprehend because the way the words are used, infinity does mean infinite, but originally the size scales, the spatial scales within that infinity, were very, very small. So what’s been happening since the beginning of the universe is that spatial scales have been expanding and so space itself is stretching within an infinity, and you can’t really talk about boundaries in that sense. What you can talk about is boundaries in terms of how far we can see, because we can only see as far back as time has existed, and time as we know it has existed for about 13.8 billion years, so we can only see about 13.8 billion light-years out in the distance because that’s as far as light could have traveled in the history of the universe, to get to us. But there are things in the universe that have expanded beyond that distance. A light-year is a unit of distance, and so there are things that have expanded out beyond our visible horizon that we’ll never be able to see.</p>
<p>So, one way I think of it is that when we talk about the Big Bang, this burst of energy, this energetic beginning of time and space, it isn’t that it happened right there and then everything has been expanding out from that ever since; it basically happened everywhere. The Big Bang happened everywhere at the beginning of time, it’s just that everywhere had very small spatial scales and everywhere is expanding ever since.</p>
<p>And you can see the remnants of the Big Bang everywhere you look, so it’s not that we look off in one direction and see the remnants of the Big Bang over there, it’s that you can see this leftover cosmic microwave background radiation any direction you look because the Big Bang happened everywhere all at the same time and we’re still receiving that background radiation from everywhere.</p>
<p>So I’m sure that cleared it all up for you.</p>
<p>(Laughter)</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; No, that’s my view.</p>
<p>(Laughter)</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; The truth is, I don’t get it all either, but I take little steps every year of understanding a little bit better. How can something be infinite when it wasn’t always there…</p>
<p>So, we do know that space doesn’t appear to be curved. In other words, it doesn’t appear as you’ve probably seen in science fiction or ideas where people have thought “well, maybe if space is a little bit curved on the huge scales, that if you look this direction forever you would eventually see the back of your own head” kind of thing.</p>
<p>Space does not appear to be curved; it appears to be flat in that sense. Sometimes you hear people or scientists say the universe is flat. Well, some of the observations have determined that’s the case — not that it’s flat like a pancake, but that parallel lines should remain parallel forever in that sense.</p>
<p>Now, you asked me another question about if I look at some of these images, does it reduce my sense of being perturbed by the things of daily life. I think what it does is — I feel a great sense of appreciation for the universe that we’re a part of, and I feel a sense of sorrow that so many people do get trapped in just mundane issues that are not of what we would call eternal value. For some, it’s because they have no choice. They are trapped in poverty. They are trapped in a war zone. They are trapped in some situation where survival is all they can think about. So it’s no fault of their own, but that’s a tragedy to me. And when we have such beauty in nature to explore, to learn about, to influence how we think of ourselves — and many people don’t even get the privilege, the luxury, to have those kinds of thoughts.</p>
<p>Also, though, more tragic in some ways are those of us who do have plenty of freedom to go and explore, and don’t. Look at these images. You can go to a website like this one and see all these images that I’ve shown you. You don’t have to be an astronomer to explore the universe. You can just go out for a walk in a park or somewhere to enjoy the wonders of nature, and yet people choose not to, to focus on trivialities of human conflict or material wealth, or distractions of just survival when it’s not even necessary for them, and I think that’s kind of a loss.</p>
<p>When I read some of the headlines that make the news stories on what the latest stars are doing in their personal lives and so forth — movie stars, yes, right —</p>
<p>(Laughter)</p>
<p>I’m like, how many hours do people spend thinking about this kind of stuff when there are things of such greater cosmic importance that we are a part of. But then again, I’m an astronomer so I’m kind of drawn to such things.</p>
<p>MR. HARRIS: &#160;You had me right up until the end there.</p>
<p>(Laughter)&#160;</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; That’s the stuff you cover, isn’t it, Dan? All the time?</p>
<p>MR. HARRIS:&#160; Are we off the record?</p>
<p>(Laughter)</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Let me ask you, then, do you not think it would be — even in the lives of the rich and famous — that it would be inspirational, both for them and for people that look up to them, for them to be thinking about things that are more significant, whether it’s cosmologically significant or significant in terms of serving others? Wouldn’t that have a great influence on a lot of people?</p>
<p>MR. HARRIS:&#160; 100%, I agree. Yes, it would. I was struck, though, when I did ask some astronomers — some of your colleagues — this question, they said, no, it doesn’t actually make them less likely to get upset when somebody cuts them off in line in Starbucks or whatever.</p>
<p>But, yeah, actually my gut is — I find it very powerful to look at those images and consider — what was it billions? Hundreds of billions? Tens of billions of stars — of galaxies, right?</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; These numbers don’t mean a lot to us because we don’t really know what a billion is in our head. We know the number of zeros, but yeah, it looks like there’s 200 billion stars in our own Milky Way galaxy, and then there’s hundreds of billions of galaxies in our observable universe.</p>
<p>MR. HARRIS:&#160; So hundreds of billions of galaxies. That kind of number would, I think, frequent enough — being reminded of that I think would have a salutary effect, for sure.</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Well, you can do that, too, right?</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Well, that’s the purpose of this program, to do that for you, Dan.</p>
<p>MR. HARRIS:&#160; Thank you.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; That’s why we love that you could come.</p>
<p>Erica is up next. I want to tell our mike man that Erica, you’re up next. But I want Greg Jones and Tim Dalrymple — I want to couple the two of you because I really want to hear some theologians give a short way of looking at these things.</p>
<p>So Erica, would you like to go ahead or do you want me to hear from them first and then your question?</p>
<p>Erica Greider</p>
<p>ERICA GRIEDER, Texas Monthly:&#160; No, that’s fine.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; No, you ahead.&#160; Right here, sir.</p>
<p>MS. GRIEDER:&#160; I was wondering about — if we framed the conversation this way, as religion and science, or religion versus science, in the meetings you have or the dialogues you have, do you find that that comes at the expense the sort of other perspectives?</p>
<p>So, something like — I was thinking about that Polkinghorne quote about these two things, religion and science are both positing a knowable truth.</p>
<p>I’m not sure that that’s totally intentioned, but it’s slightly intentioned with something like George Bush’s position on climate change, which was basically that he believed in anthropogenic climate change and thought it was a problem, but not a problem we could effectively, or efficiently, or economically tackle as one country, at the time, during the recession.</p>
<p>So, these kinds of things — economic perspectives, constitutional legal perspectives — do you find that kind of angle on things being disadvantaged in these discussions you guys have?</p>
<p>And secondly, I wanted to follow up on Dan’s question, and maybe there’s no answer to this, but I’ve always wondered, do you know or do you have a sense of what the universe is expanding into? What we are in?</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN: &#160;Okay. So, second question first. The universe is not expanding into anything because that implies that there’s something outside the universe. It’s that the whole universe is infinite but stretching.&#160; Now, that makes no sense to our minds, but that’s —</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; I got it.</p>
<p>(Laughter)</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Okay, so that’s not the way our minds are built to envision things, but it isn’t the case that the universe is this ball of energy that’s expanding into something else. It’s that everything is expanding in its internal spatial scales.</p>
<p>So, how do we envision that? I don’t know. But I’m just mouthing the words to you but it’s not the simplistic explanation that we want– because we so much want to envision what’s going on and it’s very, very — it’s impossible for us to do that.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; So you leave room for mystery.</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Oh, yeah. Yes. The question that you ask is a very good one which I have not touched on much at all today, which is the intersection of science and religion with other things, economics and politics and all of that, and this is, of course, all wound up together when we come to the rubber meets the road issues of policy, and national priorities, and funding, and science policy, and so forth. That can be a very huge mystery to people from these different communities who come together, who can’t understand why the rationale that would drive decisions or priorities from one of these perspectives is not necessarily influencing what actually ends up happening in the larger society.</p>
<p>I think of scientists who’ve gone to work on Capitol Hill, such as myself. I was something called a Congressional Science Fellow for a year and a half and I worked for a committee on Capitol Hill as a staffer there.</p>
<p>But it was just fascinating. I wasn’t the only scientist who was brought in for these fellowship positions, but I was amused just to see how scientists would say that, to make a decision on national policy that involves science or technology, you need the scientific data. Here it is and that’s what you work with. And yet, they were sort of surprised to note that the political ears of leaders on Capitol Hill also had to take into account economic impact, political impact, and all these other kinds of things that would go into a decision about whether you would implement a certain policy.</p>
<p>And this is a really difficult area. This gets into values. It gets into ethics. If the science is telling us one thing but the economics tell us something else, what do you do?</p>
<p>If growing a certain kind of crop — let’s say tobacco — let’s say you grow tobacco and you realize that tobacco is not healthy for people, and you can chart how much cost goes to healthcare because of tobacco-related health problems, you could conclude that it doesn’t make any sense to grow tobacco. But then, if your economics depend on tobacco growth, and if you cut off tobacco growth in certain areas, many people would be forced into poverty because of this — I’m just making this up as a scenario perhaps more relevant to decades past — what are you to do, because you have economic considerations at hand and so forth. You have to consider all these things, and it can be difficult.</p>
<p>I’m trying to think of a modern conundrum. Perhaps genetically modified food is a better example for what we’re thinking about today. Is it better to grow genetically modified food in communities where you could raise a lot more food for a lot more people and alleviate poverty in many spots of the world? However, if these genetically modified organisms are risky for the ecology, or if they change the actual farming culture of those communities in negative ways, should that override and preclude the use of GMOs? &#160;So this is another hot topic where there are different facets coming into the conversation. There’s the science, there’s the economic need, there’s needs of poverty, there’s concerns about ecology, and there’s philosophical problems with these kinds of things.</p>
<p>What wins? Who gets to make the decision? Who makes the choices? What are the impacts? These are things where we need people who are well-versed on all facets of issues to be able to come together with wisdom and make good choices.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Okay. We’re not taking a break, ladies and gentlemen, because we’re riveted by this.&#160; If you need to take a break and run out for any personal business, feel free to do so because we are going to give you three hours of free time today to enjoy South Beach.</p>
<p>We’re pressed for time and I want to go now to Gregory Jones and to Tim Dalrymple on the theological way of viewing these questions. Greg, do you want Tim to go first? Tim, why don’t you pull the mike up.</p>
<p>(Laughter)</p>
<p>While Tim is pulling the mike, Greg, you give the answer — but we all have met Greg Jones, but Tim Dalrymple also went to Princeton Seminary and has a doctorate from Harvard in theology and religious studies. He won’t tell you that, but I will. So, one of you go first. Greg.</p>
<p>Dr. L. Gregory Jones</p>
<p>DR. L. GREGORY JONES, Duke University Divinity School:&#160; &#160;I think that it is the case that theologians seem to engage science a good bit more, but I want to parse out, I think, a couple of different issues which will also lead to a question for you, Jennifer.&#160; Thanks for your presentation.</p>
<p>In particular areas, theologians are working — and there’s a lot of progress — on evolution. Sarah Coakley’s recent Gifford Lectures, I think, are brilliant in engaging particularly Martin Nowak’s mathematical biology. She’s at the University of Cambridge and gave the Gifford Lectures there. You can find them online. They should be published fairly soon. But she actually engages Martin Nowak at Harvard in computational biology and some anthropological work actually around meerkats and their behaviors, and actually argues in a pretty powerful way that the best kind of evolutionary argument not only accounts for moving beyond altruism, but the sacrificial behavior that’s quite similar to the new testament. And so it’s actually a pretty powerful argument within a particular sphere.</p>
<p>And I think what we need to be doing is looking, not so much about religion and science as abstractions — because there’s a particular ideology as to how that has been framed, which I’ll come back to in just a second — but looking at particular issues so that the conversation between theology and physics is a different set of issues than between theology and biology, although synthetic biology raises some really interesting, different kinds of questions that are particularly significant resources for how we think about human sociality and the shaping of community, and so I think there is some significant opportunity.</p>
<p>So, if we look at it in relation to brain science, if we look at it in relation to biology, if we look at it in relation to physics, as well as fields within those, there’s actually a lot of fertile territory.</p>
<p>The trouble, it seems to me, is that we’re trapped in a really pretty sterile set of debates about religion and science, articulated with a peculiar modern history, and that’s where we end up getting stuck. It is as if there’s one set of conversations, which largely goes back in the popular imagination to the Scopes trial, and that’s what frames everything and what leads to people being motivated in very fearful ways, I think, in that debate. And this is where, actually, seminaries are complicit with science departments in that neither one does a very good job of teaching the history of the debate about religion and science. Now, science departments aren’t known for doing a lot of history and philosophy of science because you’re actually doing the practice of the current science.</p>
<p>My question is, to what extent in your dialogue are you actually trying to think about and engage the kind of history of the debates in a way that might lead to a reframing of how the questions of religion and science — as a peculiar topic apart from the substantive advances that are going on in theology and science in particular fields? Are you all trying to look at that, because that’s where I think — I know BioLogos and other organizations that are trying to do this — but I think that trying to get at the history of how we’ve framed the issues could actually perhaps provide some breakthroughs.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Well, Jennifer, before you answer that is I’d like to hear from Tim on this question, and then Jennifer, maybe to Greg’s point you can say yes or no.</p>
<p>DR. JONES:&#160; And just one footnote on that, I actually think theologians — it’s not only the Scriptures and Psalm Eight and things like that, there’s actually a lot of reflection that’s pretty sophisticated and interesting in the history of Jewish, Christian, and Muslim traditions about the cosmos that we assume this all got invented somehow around 1800 or 1900, and there’s a lot of wisdom to be gleaned.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Tim?</p>
<p>Timothy Dalrymple</p>
<p>TIMOTHY DALRYMPLE, Patheos.com:&#160; Yeah, that’s right, and the early Church Fathers had some very sophisticated ways of thinking about the Scriptures. Jewish philosophers, as well, had very sophisticated ways of thinking about Scriptures and how they should be interpreted when they’re talking about natural processes.</p>
<p>But to show what a small world it is, Sarah Coakley, who you mentioned, was my doctoral supervisor, and she was doing a Templeton grant project that led to this, and then working with Deborah at BioLogos around some of these same issues. There’s a — I’d say a tightly knit, but a very effective and high level group of scientists and theologians who are trying to reverse some of this perception.</p>
<p>I take it to be a matter largely of historical accident that there is this perception of a conflict between science and religion, and I’m trying to address Will’s question a little bit — as long as they take their vaccinations, does it really matter that there’s a large group out there that believes in Young Earth creationism?</p>
<p>And I would say that it does for a couple of different reasons. A large part of why this perception arose in the first place — so earlier generations of Christians, I think, in a lot of ways, furnished the intellectual underpinnings for the growth, the explosion, or just the rapid growth of Western science. But there was a period in which a lot of Christians took a stand on bad science, baptized it and said that this is the only way that you could properly understand the natural world and still be a Christian, and because they did so, there arose this perception that from a Christian perception has been enormously damaging, and has given rise — given impetus — in a lot of ways to (very appropriate in a lot of ways) Atheist critics of Christianity.</p>
<p>So, if it’s been that damaging to see those places where people have taken their stand on bad science masquerading as good theology, then I think permitting that, again, is just furthering that God of the gaps kind of approach that is disproven as science marches on, to the great discredit of Christian intellectual quality.</p>
<p>The damage, I think, for young people — I would just agree with Dr. Wiseman that the damage for young people can be really profound, and I saw this a lot in the churches that I’ve worked with over time, where if you do get that perception that you either believe this or else you’re no longer a Christian, and then you go and find all sorts of articulate people who explain with greater amounts of evidence and logic and force, why you should believe otherwise, then it just puts the young people in a very bad situation.</p>
<p>And I think there are broader problems, too, with the perception that science is the enemy that comes across with this kind of — it can lead to withdrawal from the processes of scientific advancement, to bad policy making decisions, and to a kind of Luddite attitude toward technology.</p>
<p>So, I would also recommend just one other book called At the Origins of Modern Atheism, by a Jesuit priest named Michael Buckley, who talks — going even further back into the 1500’s and early 1600’s — a moment when a lot of Christians, including figures like Descartes, kind of gave up, in a lot of ways, the sources of information, the peculiar vision of rationality that Christianity has — set all that aside and tried to answer the skeptics in their own terms and found ultimately that they couldn’t do it. And the failure of that project was taken to be very meaningful, but in a lot of ways I think it was a misbegotten project in the first place. Anyway, very interesting book on this if you want to take a look.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Well, thank you, Tim.</p>
<p>DR. JONES:&#160; Michael, if I could just make a —</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; You have a follow-up to that?</p>
<p>DR. JONES:&#160; — plug for Tim, that he has an essay that came out last week in The New Atlantis on Christian engagement — the history of Christian engagement with technology, that’s a really great piece and a fresh kind of way of cutting through the kind of ways in which Christianity and technology often get put in opposition to each other, which is part of the larger religion and science attitude —</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Yes. That’s called The New Atlantis. It’s published out of our office. I’m so glad for you to do that. But before you answer, Jennifer, let me get to — we’re running out of time and I know people want to go to the beach, so —</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; It’s raining.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Is it raining? Okay, good, we’ll just continue for a few minutes longer. I want to get these other comments on the table and that means David Rennie, and Elizabeth, and Paul, and Fred. So David Rennie, if you pull the microphone up we’ll get some in play. Thank you, Greg and Tim for that.</p>
<p>David Rennie</p>
<p>DAVID RENNIE, The Economist:&#160; I wanted to ask if you think — isn’t science in some respect selling itself short because there’s a kind of asymmetry of reasonableness? You have literal-minded religious people, and perhaps less in a country like Western Christian countries, but there’s plenty of religions which are extremely literal-minded and willing to commit violence against people who are not so literal-minded.</p>
<p>Scientists are, on the whole, more reasonable people, and so you’re also bending over backwards to say that it doesn’t have to be a zero-sum game. But actually, the creationists, when they’re saying scientific education is a challenge to a kind of theist world view, they’re right. It’s just you’re too polite to say they’re right, and you’re too polite to say that an awful lot of religious explanations for the universe, seen from an Atheist perspective, look essentially anthropological. And the reason that you have Muslim scientist organizations is because they were born in Muslim countries to Muslim families, and Jewish scientists were born in Jewish families and that’s their thing, and the thing they agree on is science, and that’s not static and is rather adaptive to new discoveries and their anthropological traditions, which we’re very polite about because we’ve learned to be polite people and rational, enlightened people — they’re losing these arguments.</p>
<p>Aren’t you selling yourself short when you’re saying that there is this dialogue possible? Why not just call it and say the Muslims and the Jews and the Christians can’t agree with each other about the fundamental underlying truths of their — they don’t believe that they’re mutually compatible, so why are we being so reasonable?</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; I think — okay, so I have to unpack that a little bit because certainly there are particular religious beliefs that people hold that are in conflict with scientific understanding of a particular topic. So, let’s say a particular religious belief that would say that life appeared instantly — all forms of life appeared instantly at the same time a few thousand years ago — is in conflict with the many facets of scientific exploration, be it geology or biology, or even astronomy.</p>
<p>So, it certainly is the case that there are topics and issues where a particular religious belief is in conflict with a particular consensus view from the scientific community. No doubt about that, and that can cause great problems, as I’ve mentioned earlier, in what you teach in schools and so forth. But I don’t believe, and neither do these national science organizations, that these conflicts fundamentally have to exist because if — religious communities often — again, the issue for them is often how they interpret their own religious text and so forth, so many Christians, Jews, Muslims, would say that those religious texts that they revere as the word of God, were never intended to convey information about the creation of life or the history of the universe, and so that would be a misuse in their view of their own religious text.</p>
<p>So, in that sense I do believe dialogue is possible and constructive, both within religious communities amongst themselves, and also between communities where we find issues of common interest, such as, what do we do with our technology? What do we do if we are finding things that are of interest in terms of mapping our genetic code, finding that some people are predisposed to certain diseases or certain conditions; and what do we do about that? So, how do we take the knowledge we’re given and do something with it? There’s common ground there. I think that’s the place where there’s the most productive conversation to go on.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; You have a follow-up, I can tell.</p>
<p>MR. RENNIE:&#160; Just very briefly. That ground, though, I’m sure exists, and I’m not trying to be disrespectful of your dialogues, but that common ground is a very small and very rational piece of sort of deist common ground. But does it actually accurately reflect religions as are experienced by the vast majority of religious believers or not? Haven’t you just found a kind of happy, rational place that you can talk to each other, but it doesn’t reflect religion as it’s lived by an awful lot of people?</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; That’s a good question, but I think there is a lot of common ground to talk about. When I say common ground, I don’t mean necessarily common agreement or perceptions, but maybe what I should say is common interest. For example, earth care, environmental stewardship, there can be tremendous common ground in trying to understand what the human impact is on the environment.</p>
<p>For a religious believer it can be the case, and not always — we can all point to religious communities that have a very different take on this — but for some religious communities it can be their sense that they were placed here by God, that the earth is the garden that they were sent to tend, and we’ve not done a good job and it is an act of worship to God and repentance for sin to stop pollution, to stop environmental degradation. And not only that, but it’s an act of service to other people because people are suffering due to environmental degradation, and if you’re supposed to love one another and you don’t do anything to help uplift the environmental condition, you are hurting others.</p>
<p>So, it can be religiously motivated, and yet there can be others who have no such necessarily religious beliefs but have that same common conviction that we are impacting our environment and we need to do something about it, simply for the common good of all living creatures here — kind of a humanistic or inclusive world view that would uplift everyone, that doesn’t necessarily tie itself to religious faith.</p>
<p>So, can people who have perhaps different motivational backgrounds but the same interest and goals and the same interest in understanding what the truth is that science is telling us about the natural world, can people work together from that? I think so.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Okay. On that — we’re about to take a break but we have two more people to get in if we could. But theologians among us would agree that what she just described is common grace. Am I right? Okay, good. May the record show.</p>
<p>Let’s see, Elizabeth, if you’d pull the mike up, and then Fred Barnes, you’ll be the last.</p>
<p>Elizabeth Dias</p>
<p>ELIZABETH DIAS, TIME Magazine:&#160; This is an easy question.</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Yeah?</p>
<p>MS. DIAS:&#160; I’m wondering what seminaries you are working with with your partnership training seminarians and future clergy. I imagine the conversations would be very different at, say Phoenix Seminary, at Denver, Dallas, versus Harvard, Duke, et cetera.</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; We have asked seminaries through something called the Association of Theological Schools, which is an accrediting association of hundreds of seminaries across the country, from a very wide range of theological perspectives, to send us a letter of interest if they are interested in participating as a pilot school in this kind of program, where we don’t deal with the theology, but where we would offer them better contact with science information and they would incorporate it into their program. And we’ve had 28 schools send us passionate letters of interest, that they really see that this is of paramount importance to their programs, and they want to be pilot schools. And those are pretty much equally divided between three — what the Association of Theological School calls Ecclesial families.</p>
<p>So these three families would be mainline Protestant, conservative Protestant, which would include Evangelicals, and Catholic/Orthodox. So these are Christian-based seminaries from a wide range of theological perspectives. But many of the products that we’re hoping that will be produced through the pilot study can then be expanded upon or used in seminaries of other religious traditions, as well.</p>
<p>But which ones specifically? I don’t really want to say that because we haven’t made selections yet — but there’s a very interesting range and a very interesting thirst for this kind of thing.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Fred, you’ll carry us into the break and then we will have break and free time until 6:30 where we will then have a cocktail reception where we had lunch, and we’ll have dinner there also.&#160; Be sure to bring your nametag because it will tell you where you’re sitting. But, Fred, your question?</p>
<p>Fred Barnes</p>
<p>FRED BARNES, The Weekly Standard:&#160; I am interested in the subject of how one can be a scientist and a believer, a Christian believer, as I understand you are. And along that line, how do you as a scientist and a believer deal with matters like the Virgin Birth, the Resurrection, and the existence of the Holy Spirit, things that we’re required or at least asked to believe as Christians.</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; So, the bigger question is how would a religious scientist address the idea of miracles, right?</p>
<p>MR. BARNES:&#160; Well, in the ones I mentioned in particular, but not as a scientist — I meant you.</p>
<p>(Laughter)</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Okay. So, I think —</p>
<p>MR. BARNES:&#160; I asked the same question of Francis Collins when he was here a few years ago. I forget his answer, but —</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; While she’s formulating hers, tell us what his was.</p>
<p>MR. BARNES:&#160; I don’t remember what it was, but I bet it was a good one.</p>
<p>(Laughter)</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Whatever he said, that’s my answer. Well, I will tell you what my perspective of it is personally, but let me tell you just more generally, first. Some people take the perspective, just a priori, that the miraculous does not happen, and so that even some religious people who are science-savvy would say, kind of — like I say, as an a priori — that miracles do not happen, that science basically explains the way things work, and so we understand the working of God through natural processes. And that’s — it’s wonderful — they still believe in God and all that, it’s just that they don’t see the logic of how a god could intervene and tweak the knobs of natural forces and so forth at certain times. It makes no sense in the minds of those particular folks.</p>
<p>And then there are those on the other extreme that say that God is basically in there all the time, basically injecting new information or shaping things, or guiding all these kinds of natural processes.</p>
<p>I tend to think of a miracle as possible, and that miracles actually have happened, but they are just what they sound like. They are a miracle. There’s something that’s outside of the natural working of the forces of nature, and so science is not equipped to address that one way or the other. Science is equipped to address how things normally and naturally work, so as a scientist I study the universe in the way it normally and naturally works and has worked throughout the whole history of time. I don’t look for anything else because my scientific tools are not equipped to measure anything else, but does that mean that nothing outside of the normal natural physical processes that science can address ever happened or ever does happen? Well, science can’t answer that question, so I have to answer that question in some other way, and to me, the answer is yes, because I see both historical and personal evidence for God’s actions, so now here I am talking from my own personal perspective.</p>
<p>But I do see evidence for things, in particular, the resurrection of Jesus Christ. There is to me ample evidence that that event in the course of time changed history and changed lives and people are experiencing the living Christ today. Is that a scientific conclusion? Absolutely not. But is there enough evidence for one to believe it? For me, yes.</p>
<p>What about answered prayer? That’s something that no one can prove to someone else unless it’s something really off the wall, like, I prayed that my amputated arm would grow back and it did. But that doesn’t seem to be the way people experience the answered prayer. People experience prayer when they pray for a change in their lives, to become more forgiving or to become free of a certain bad inclination, or they pray for someone else’s well-being, even for a healing, and that healing may not be a physical healing, it may be a healing of spirit or so forth.</p>
<p>And when you sense God’s answering of that prayer, it’s usually in such a way that you can’t prove to someone else that that’s actually what happened — it’s always explainable by some other way.</p>
<p>And so, do I believe that God is active in our lives? Yes, I do. Do I believe that God regularly changes the forces of nature, or goes in and tweaks things or adds more information into the systems and so forth? No, I don’t. In fact, the biblical record is that God typically works through nature as it is, or works within situations of suffering and enters in and works with people, or helps us through science and technology to help one another. These kinds of things are how I perceive God being most active today. But again, that’s my own personal experience.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Well, that’s what Fred was asking for.</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Okay.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; And thank you, Fred, for that. On the notion of miracles is when we’ll now go into a break and —</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; Let me just add a comment to that. It is kind of interesting to me that the same percentage — scientists have been asked — I think members of the National Academy or something, and you guys will have to look at it because I can’t remember the exact number — but there’s a survey that’s been done, like 40 years ago and then recently — the same question was asked of all the membership of a certain scientific society: Do you pray to God expecting an answer? Something like that. And the same percentage of scientists, and I can’t remember whether it’s 30 percent or something like that, had said yes decades ago and still say it today. So, there is some significant, though probably minority, percentage of scientists who believe that there is some reason to pray, to talk to God, and so why is that? That’s a good question. Polkinghorne, himself, has written some good books about if you believe that the physical forces of the universe are working themselves out without tweaking, then what does prayer do? What is God doing?</p>
<p>That’s a very, very good question and interesting to investigate.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE:&#160; Well, on that note, thank you, Jennifer so much. You all join me in thanking Dr. Wiseman.</p>
<p>(Applause)</p>
<p>DR. WISEMAN:&#160; I have pictures for you on the back table, pictures from the Hubble Space Telescope, and also little brochures about our dialogue programs.</p>
<p>MR. CROMARTIE: &#160;I think the survey you just mentioned was — it’s an essay by Ed Larson and Larry Witham on — it came out about five years ago — on what scientists believe, and then of course there’s a book that we were discussing.</p>
<p>Anyway, ladies and gentlemen, thank you.</p> | false | 1 | faith angle forum semiannual conference brings together select group 20 nationally respected journalists 35 distinguished scholars areas religion politics amp public life universe different lenses160science ethics religion dialogue south beach florida speaker160director aaas dialogue science ethics religion program moderator160michael cromartie vicepresident ethics public policy center click listen audio recording event michael cromartie michael cromartie160 ladies gentlemen conversation last night reception dinner even today wondering loud person discover comet p114 said well happens speaker today point jennifer id love tell us story discovered comet named colleague bio dr jennifer wiseman shes speaking capacity fellow american scientific affiliation new director dialogue science ethics religion american association advancement science ill let add dr jennifer wiseman dr jennifer wiseman160 astronomer nasa work hubble space telescope program im mainly another hat wear michael mentioned american association advancement science believe work organization relevant particular group direct program called dialogue science ethics religion doser program well get astronomer cant resist showing things space im going well found mornings conversation incredibly helpful insightful interesting afternoon going kind go different direction talking science impacts society especially society thats filled faithbased communities people religious faith values often shaped lenses religion philosophy even look nature like use slides astronomy shows beautiful visual images also use kind notes dont really want necessarily fixated slides helpful kind give us guiding light things want say think title presentation pretty much summarizes want say universe live looking different lenses us depending thinking considering nature around us brings society science ethics religion together dialogue sometimes thats constructive sometimes major important role play health dialogue society im amazed comment philosopher kant believe written tombstone says two things continue fill mind ever increasing wonder awe often intensely reflected upon two things singled starry heavens moral law within think still two realms things human beings continue grapple amazement majesty intrigue see universe around us large scale also small scale science telling us genetic makeup even subatomic realms physics course large scale cosmology makes us wonder origins fit universe yet also wonder fit live sense justice feel things need forgiveness discussed morning sense wrongs need righted sense come fact perception everyone innate sense justice drew even cs lewis mentioned morning faith god two kinds things think still grappling society today astronomer im going spend maybe next ten minutes kind giving little update universe well return little bit later warranted study heavens lots different kinds tools use telescopes telescopes ground deserts mountaintops space one orbiting satellite known us hubble space telescope size school bus whizzing around earth every 90 minutes still sending back marvelous data images us even operation 23 years learning continually awed universe live beautiful universe live active stagnant stars planets galaxies sitting lot going weve learned using different kinds tools see universe different eyes region recognized many orion region sky see orions belt sword bright star rigel red giant star betelgeuse unstable star may explode supernova possibly day next 100000 years kind get concerns perspective credit nasaesa robberto space telescope science instituteesa hubble space telescope orion treasury project team picture taken telescope good one ground look kind fuzzy regions somebody mentioned nebulous question morning nebulosity something like astronomy anything thats fuzzy call nebulous little nebulous thing cant see detail kind telescope zoom hubble space telescope see something like much expanded see beautiful colors astronomers thats sign beauty also sign great activity means new stars still forming new star coalesces condensing gas large stars light powerful enough coming star actually ionize surrounding gas meaning photons light go surrounding gas separate protons electrons surrounding atoms atoms sort recover shock come back together release colored light see called orion nebula active region ongoing star formation colored region shows result recently formed stars look region radio telescopes infrared telescopes see behind darker regions protostars forming heating surrounding gas havent yet turned active clouds gas stars within fill galaxy galaxy beautiful think looks think galaxy looks like terms spiral structure cant get outside milky way take picture back learn galaxy looking around inside heres similar galaxy think quite beautiful theres many stars core kind blends together bulge light typical spiral like would hundreds billions stars embedded credit nasa esa hubble heritage team stsciaura riess stsci sun think two thirds way milky way galaxy one several hundred billion stars also learning planets around many stars discuss later looking background picture see galaxies fact know hundreds billions galaxies visible universe multiplication hundreds billions galaxies times hundreds billions stars galaxies see enormous number stars universe galaxies interact one another two different galaxies actually three theres one starting pulled together others gravitational pull starts distort spiral structure galaxies case thought quite pretty released image celebrate anniversary hubble space telescope galaxy looking like rose flower looking like rose stem credit nasa esa hubble heritage team stsciaura okay learning things well advancement technology course curiosity explore like show little chart shows last 400 years time graphically technology allowed improvement sensitivity see sky could see bare eyes scale logarithmic every little tic mark one ten times sensitive one enormous increases go scale starting galileos little telescope looked jupiter noticed little moving blips light around jupiter every night different position realized moons orbiting jupiter course huge ramifications human understanding cosmos things work eye pieces grew telescopes enlarged able see distant star clusters even galaxies faint galaxies able record things photography eventually began idea electronically recording images sky could receive light hours days end see faint things thats really came understand magnitude enormous size depth universe went space hubble space telescope brought us two orders magnitude sensitivity getting blurring effects atmosphere servicing hubble sm4 stands servicing mission four went chart every time astronauts gone telescope theyve put new instruments new things enhanced capabilities really peak particular observatorys capabilities thanks advancement technology heres example technology think used advanced good humanity think ways technology served humanity served world also ways wherein technology used things harmful need values system decide technologies going develop youre going use theres telescope theres astronauts went years ago last time service telescope dont space shuttle anymore astronauts marvelous job 2009 putting new instruments repairs get back image saw beginning slide star cluster really test image newest camera hubble image see amazing stars beauty something worth kind staring taking star distance stars one single cluster theyre gravitationally sort held near one another brighter stars really intrinsically brighter theyre closer theyre brighter see red stars blue stars white stars kinds stars helps see things context hubble image astronomers like precision telescope fine resolution differentiate star star doesnt mesh together quantitative studies stellar properties also helps see things context globular cluster stars image much broader field view taken telescope ground zoom centaurus constellation one cluster globular cluster transition image taken hubble space telescope gets much smaller field view higher precision people like see twice people dont want see right lets see dont like violent constellation go globular clusters distributed around call halo galaxy tend hold oldest stars galaxy okay thats context also things happening end stars life talked stars born well along stars born planets born image artists conception real planetary system discovered kepler space telescope another observatory space system six planets tight orbits solar system would within orbit mercury theyre zipping around close parent star artists conception planets discovering right outside solar system finding indirectly either transit front parent star orbit measure total amount starlight dips every time planet orbits front cause star wobble star planets tug orbital period actually detect star wobbling measure kind mass must tugging hundreds planets confirmed way thousands candidates found planetary systems outside credit nasa esa hubble sm4 ero team end stars life marvelous ejection material stars whats called butterfly nebula material ejected mature star hundreds kilometers every second quite beautiful actually call butterfly nebula reason also indicative stars eject theyve produced whole life160 stars little factories process shining theyre actually fusing hydrogen heavier elements run inner fuel eject interstellar medium fill galaxies eventually get stars forming gas heavier nutrients well talk later finally little astrointro want show galaxies whole learning fact find seems galaxies something dense inner core call black hole much mass fallen gravitational well call coalesced dense region call black hole material falls black hole odd things heres example galaxy core lots galaxies background hubble space telescope image weird looking lobes imaged radio telescope pick kind emission jets shot far beyond confines galaxy material fallen toward inner black hole caught magnetic fields ejected galaxy interacting intergalactic medium quite spectacular way jets moving almost speed light really energetic credit nasa esa baum c odea rit r perley w cotton nraoauinsf hubble heritage team stsciaura believe galaxy relatively quiet black hole core tell motions stars core galaxy dont see evidence kind hyperactivity jets going galaxy right however see evidence galaxies like gone mergers heres example two galaxies drawn together disrupted get closer closer wont lot collisions stars disruption tidal forces end like pair causing much turbulence lose original structure turbulence spawns whole bunch new active star formation little bright nebulae spots new stars vibrantly vigorously forming galaxy headon collision course andromeda neighbor sister big spiral galaxy found real sure modeling done based hubble space telescope observations observations months ago night sky might look quite different billion years dont need concerned individual star systems dont seem disrupted least models active galaxy active universe credit nasa esa beckwith stsci hudf team universe enormous space time show sample galaxy turns galaxies fill universe ultradeep field hubble space telescope one little blobs light star whole galaxy hundreds billions stars little pencil beam area sky imagine extrapolated whole sky get mental image enormous universe heres spiral galaxy somewhat like theres also third dimension galaxies far away closer us astronomers interested distances thats hardest thing astronomy find distances galaxies anything space ways course distance means time astronomy things far away takes long time light get us youre seeing things actually past emitted light case look certain galaxies youre seeing far distant past especially reddened ones universe expanding discovered decades back light gets sort stretched travels stretching space get us becomes red wavelength color many distant galaxies appear reddest us heres example blown reddened galaxy turns one distant things weve ever seen shining us first hundred million years big bang burst beginning universe sounds like long time think universe energetic beginning 138 billion years ago shining us within first 8 138 billion year history universe young infant galaxy hasnt done lot mergers yet hasnt grown big spiral structure seeing maybe galaxy long time ago fact theres strong correlation improvement telescope sensitivity far back time see see telescopes getting better better time get better better get sensitive see faint objects well many faint objects ones farthest away means youre looking far back time sort graphic shows things get better better see farther terms galaxies means seeing farther back time credit nasa time scale going present toward beginning universe would right side chart starting see age first galaxies began form come together took long time billions years galaxies merge grow stars form vigorously within go cycles stars build heavier heavier elements within galaxies point galaxies today like stars enriched heavier elements even planetary systems around things change time see astronomy one sciences advantage sort like time machine look galaxy back time compare galaxy time see theyre different thats really exciting privilege astronomy see things changed indeed evolved time universe stars play active role creating habitat need life conditions old star exploded thousand years ago remnants debris star called crab nebula chinese sky watchers recorded star brightening back thousand years ago weve watching debris ever since also analyze debris see full heavier elements need life carbon nitrogen oxygen things produced stars explosions get incorporated subsequent generations stars enabling formation dust disks even planetary systems around stars first generation stars several generations sun first generation star taken several generations stars get heavier elements needed sun solar system appears universe seemingly perfect underlying physical laws govern shows progression time toward production stars heavier elements planets eventually life sign purpose ive taken leap science philosophy interpretation right start conversation science philosophy religion even ethics start converse one another using astronomy example freeman dyson physicist said wouldnt surprise turn origin destiny energy universe could completely understood isolation phenomena life consciousness design inanimate universe may detached potentialities life intelligence scientists 20th century writing tended suppose progression universe toward life know least one planet sign universe destined accident interpretation question cant measure science perspective faith prove disprove god science nature point kind good point obvious think obvious lot people reask questions science know today practice science limited questions terms physical cause effect nature works basically religious faith equipped better address questions like capital w purpose god live160 kinds things science really equipped address religious tenets faiths texts really well equipped usually address questions natural world physically operates course theres lot conversation whether realms separate explain religious thinking scientific analysis forth conversation continues many people scientific community religious communities common ground different groups take regards ethics use science use technology whether youre religious believer many people care using science technology impacts humanity creatures planet common ground people religious faith come together regarding issues science technology relate science religion thats big difficult question many books many libraries many theologians scientists philosophers writing much ive ever read im scientist theologian philosopher basic models youll see public sphere assumed adopted talking interface science religion meant comprehensive description rather helpful introduction credit aaas one model contrast model basically would state theres conflict science religion since theyre responding different questions somewhat said science answering questions physical mechanics nature religion asking questions meaning value purpose kind thing stephen jay gould sort nonoverlapping magisterial idea youll see discussed theres contact model little interactive positive approach doesnt say science religion stay others hair basically says theres positive approach looks dialogue interaction example ways science help shape religious understanding understanding better whats meant cosmos size scale universe intricacies life kind thing public service religion science also shape public service people better informed kinds public service helpful using science technology knowledge gaining religion often motivate scientific pursuits many great scientists throughout history even today motivated research based religious convictions sense worship appreciation creation course theres conflict model also widely discussed basically says science religious belief inherently incompatible read lot comments blogosphere forth many people perceive science based testable information whereas religious belief based basically groundless faith two different approaches understanding things theyre incompatible even worse religious belief maybe impediment scientific advancement voices well youll see read write im sure youve run across maybe even writing youll see assumptions different perspectives coming example perspectives go back lauded physicist freeman dyson said universe purpose whence comes knowledge good evil mysteries hundred others like beyond reach science lie side border within jurisdiction religion hes sort speaking least quote contrast point view realms approaches asking different kinds questions separate francis collins wrote bestselling book language god geneticist believe hes ilk contact model theres something positive gained contact dialogue science religion said discover science alone answers questions life anyway richard dawkins whos well known advocating conflict model says think many people also believe says think consider beauty world wonder came youre naturally overwhelmed feeling awe feeling admiration almost feel desire worship something feel recognize scientists carl sagan feel einstein felt us share kind religious reverence beauties universe complexity life sheer magnitude cosmos sheer magnitude geological time tempting translate feeling awe worship desire worship particular thing person agent want attribute maker creator heres punch line science achieved emancipation impulse attribute things creator science basically emancipated us earlier models humans made basically explain inexplicable course others would interpret way wanted give examples different perspectives course western perspectives science religion different ways thinking things many eastern cultures religions virchand gandhi said country religion different philosophy religion philosophy dont differ science whole idea science totally separate sphere gaining knowledge truth independent anything else rather recent invention west let mention little bit scientific societies actually care culture thinks interaction science religion american association advancement science nations largest worlds largest scientific society program direct called dialogue science ethics religion would scientific society program around probably 17 18 years now160 ive board three program established try solve theological issues philosophical issues whether science religion compatible complementary irreconcilable actually necessary one another rather simply brings religious communities scientists together dialogue issues common interest concern program doser program facilitates communication understanding scientific religious communities building aaass longstanding commitment relate scientific knowledge concerns society large heres issue many many people society religious believers views world values shaped lenses inherent religious faith values shaped religious faith science always discussed completely apart serving society interacting wholly society even science address issues religious faith directly society publishes science wellknown scientific journal represents millions scientists worldwide heres mission advance science engineering innovation throughout world benefit people little motto advancing science serving society idea conversation dialogue science religion way serving society fits scientific societys goals fostering communication among scientists public producing responsible conduct use science enhancing workforce people arent wrongfully keeping part scientific workforce due misunderstanding science appreciating helping public appreciate science technology strengthening support science technology enterprise well perceptions perception science actually kind religion conflicts religious beliefs resent imposed upon mentioned often challenges public school systems regarding whats taught classroom heres story kansas city star weeks ago antievolution group filed federal lawsuit block kansas using new multistate science standards public schools arguing guidelines promote atheism violate students parents religious freedom many people feel sense concern threat science concern science carries along baggage beyond scientific knowledge theres implication materialism atheism baggage thats brought along science lawsuit argues new standards cause kansas public schools promote nontheistic religious worldview allowing materialistic atheistic explanations scientific questions particularly origins life universe suit argues state would indoctrinating impressionable students violation first amendment us constitution see concern many people whats coming along science scientists concerned well richard dawkins daily show jon stewart stewart asked whether end human civilization likely come religious strife scientific advancement words stewart wasnt convinced scientific advancement necessarily meant wonderful positive progression society think skipping bottom dawkins ultimately said thought religious fanatics access destructive products science pose biggest danger human civilization stewart countered arguing science contained certain risks form extreme incautious advancement kind interesting little exchange carries risk religion science questions ethics coming us often examples example ethics vaccines course weve heard controversies whether vaccines produce health problems whether thats really true also conversations whether afford vaccinate children heres lash kind thinking also printed science magazine back september author john mekalanos reminds us lets forget pitiful images children terrible containers breathing machines go back suffer polio horrible diseases immunizations delivered us therefore little ironic told cant afford needed vaccine despite fact save lives ethics much afford afford vaccinating kids everywhere ethics using technology increasing human capabilities course mentioned earlier ability restore movement things people lost technology thats terrific technology thats designed make humans superhuman weve thought artificial intelligence even human enhancement drug therapy forth making people better would naturally whole transhumanism idea humanity supersede attached body point ethical questions think us need beware sometimes referred honestly dont know coined term nothing buttery words science comes explanation something tempting interpret though phenomenon issue nothing science describes question scientific explanation natural phenomenon including things like human behavior whole story words find theres natural explanation altruism care one another mean really isnt thing selfless caring theres natural explanation people drawn religious faith religious belief mean thats theres thing external spiritual reality external god theres point science tells first part doesnt say anything second part thats often misunderstood im going take minutes thats okay ten minutes hopefully question example altruism many many articles altruism much research example quote find even animal species examples animals160helping animals benefit like birds helping birds raise young almost see would help group whole monkeys giving alarm calls warn monkeys presence predators even though theyre attracting attention possibility attacked make altruism real something thats basically still part selfish motive deep inside survival conversations come interface science religion ethics frans de waal highly respected primate behaviorist emory talks vein human morality grows prior animal moralities dont believe animals moral sense humans well developed reasoned sense right wrong rather human morality incorporates set psychological tendencies capacities empathy reciprocity desire cooperation harmony older species human morality formed scratch grew primate psychology primate psychology ancient roots agree animals show many tendencies intense sociality question see animals characteristics would previously incorporated human morality human sense empathy cooperation mean external ultimate right wrong goddirected values religious communities would see nothing interestingly evolutionary process comes survival species thats kind interesting interface science correct question whole story thats religious communities particularly interested think writers really crucial dig deeper stories youre talking interface science religion values world views shape many concerns interests regarding science example authority figures people actually listening trusting terms information science deeply religious people look different authority figures questions answers regarding science nonreligious people thats something new aaas survey going get baffles lot scientists interact put forth lot data something yet audience doesnt always say oh see scientists say climate getting warmer heres data many people also getting information authority figures either religious authority figure saying god different plans different science authority filtered religious communities scientists way look authority voices trust help us interpret hearing experts subject matter society divided authority figures looking matters science going cause problem society moves forward concerns motivations agendas people sometimes wonder groups theyre familiar scientists sometimes wonder religious communities trying incorporate religion science classroom something like religious communities concerned scientists saw sometimes trying bring secularization materialism even atheism along science kind baggage perceptions motivations side theres also interesting sense people dont realize scientists broad range personal religious philosophical beliefs words perception scientists atheists true certainly spread beliefs scientists hold exactly distribution general public many many scientists identify adherents traditional religious faiths would identify spiritual religious ever popular new category belief refer sociologist elaine howard ecklund shes written excellent book based surveying thousand scientists elite research universities personal religious views interviewing hundreds depth finding interesting spread religious beliefs amongst scientists book called doesnt like title called science vs religion scientists really think helpful book kinds things think writing science religion helpful dig deeper kinds perception questions motivate many peoples concerns tough questions often beyond science think life planet earth example longterm future universe hold significant given vastness universe space time even talk possibility theres multiverse may universes different physical forces forth compound sense insignificance significance come something else ability look around make observations actually imply great significance thats philosophical question thought carl sagan said find live insignificant planet humdrum star lost galaxy tucked away forgotten corner universe thats one perception take looking science especially universe seeing vastness place space time possible response biblical psalmist wrote oh lord sovereign majestic name earth look heavens work fingers moon stars youve established human beings mindful mortals care sense insignificance right yet psalmist goes say yet youve made us little lower god crowned us glory honor youve given us dominion works hands youve put things feet basically psalmists view significance come gods endowment significance us tough questions arise natural processes operating universe planet even sustain healthy conditions life also cause pain death grief random coldness nature something theological addressed think plate tectonics motion earths plates creates earthquakes causes much suffering plate tectonics also seem recycle atmosphere give us livable conditions plate tectonics good bad creatures okay neutral really thing evil science cant really address think whats happening example creatures elephant populations africa attacked militarystyle assault weapons gunned whole families tusks elephants strong familial connections relatives come mourn grieve dead get gunned come grieve okay know something social nature elephants responsible treat compassion right im going close almost want say positive note universe always holds new discoveries new surprises human beings seem recognize beauty nature reason drawn beauty nature drawn explore sometimes varying responses think thats people love science telling us nature theologian john calvin said astronomy pleasant also useful known denied art unfolds admirable wisdom god take doesnt take physicist steven weinberg felt universe seems comprehensible seems pointless response see dictated science alone im going skip ask qampa im going tell exoplanets mr cromartie lewis stuff dr wiseman160 yeah well youll ask think ive gone time learning lot extra solar planets interfaces lot religious thought significance humans somebody asks talk discovering also things study galaxies magnified galaxy normal galaxy behind cluster nearer galaxies dark matter mass cluster powerful bends light background galaxy magnifies weird distorted way actually learn detail weirdly distorted light background galaxy foreground galaxies learn information distant galaxy ever could isolated simply magnifying effect nature thats pretty cool astronomers using study distant galaxies using natures magnifying lenses foreground credit nasa esa hubble sm4 ero team stecf weve also found universe expanding expansion accelerating adam riess nobel prize along two colleagues brian schmidt saul perlmutter taking observations showed universe birth began decelerate expansion transitioned point accelerating expansion dont know causes call dark energy another mystery another thing go forward studying beauty universe inspires everyone heres young lady maryland school blind whos looking nebula like one except shes looking hands shes visually impaired student images created nasa textile cues different feels nebulae galaxies planets stars feeling images much appreciate beauty many us eyes fact spoke classroom students every bit excited space exploration anybody looks space images eyes think science religion alfred north whitehead said consider religion mankind science exaggeration say future course history depends upon decision generation relations like perspective sir john polkinghorne spent life physicist president queens college eventually cambridge decided become anglican priest hes written helpful books interface theology science says science theology concerned search truth consequence complement rather contrast one another course two disciplines focus different dimensions truth share common conviction truth sought think thats key point reason people get energized conversations science religion scientists many devout religious believers way exclusive categories many scientists religious believers believe something called truth something sought something grasped something learned opposed total inconsequential relativism think sense drives commonality cases scientists religious believers saw somewhat educational background education major research universities religious groups students fellowship groups students centered religious faith full science students science students made majority students participating religious groups well think partly sense conviction theres truth sought facets life want resources could made list thats 20pages long wanted point couple favorite books collins book language god also like anthology book cosmos imagining universe heraclitus hawking literary professor dennis danielson professor english university british columbia whos created marvelous collection essays excerpts scientists philosophers religious texts throughout human history thinking cosmos dialogue science ethics religion program aaas heartily suggest look website also facebook active new twitter growing realm well different religious communities organizations websites regard interaction religious faith science american scientific affiliation network scientists interested relationship science christian faith good resources site institute science judaism new organization called sinai synapses interested interface science judaism religion general could go organizations regarding islam science humanism science forth theres lot little digging resources theres also beauty held image horsehead nebula took infrared light hubble space telescope recently see marvelous ethereal image one interstellar clouds silently quietly aggressively new stars bursting forth beautiful way credit nasa esa hubble heritage team stsciaura looking back planet earth servicing hubble see little wisp atmosphere shines around circumference earth sun sets behind like image kind reminds us planet fragility atmosphere fragility life least theres life planet regardless faith convictions good caretakers place live close moment unless someone asks exoplanets mr cromartie160 okay160 thank jennifer thank much already list names people get get first question dr wiseman160 right mr cromartie160 think movie gravity dr wiseman160 thought guys seen movie gravity mr cromartie160 well dr wiseman160 please go see lot fun william saletan slate160 dont spoil dr wiseman160 okay wont spoil lot fun would suggest many theatres offer 3d even imax 3d would say one worth pay extra get 3d get imax get whatever lot fun yes issues absolutely physically possible science fiction relax go enjoy film mr cromartie160 accurate accurate dr wiseman160 every physical respect mr cromartie160 okay dr wiseman160 cool mr cromartie160 really cool yes okay michael gerson youre first andy ferguson william saletan michael get mike dan harris michael gerson michael gerson washington post160 im sure get lot halfinformed questions cosmologies im going ask mine look beautiful pictures ultimate reality seeing much progression decay increasing entropy eventually determines direction time eventually stars die wind process back 138 billion years means beginning low levels entropy inaudible im wondering cosmologists explain earliest moments universe highly structured organized doesnt seem obvious know propose multiverse part explanation raises question doesnt seem open verification even theory im wondering thats really science whether another form faith space dr wiseman160 entropy question comes lot entropy increasing would see increasing complexity kind depends system youre looking ask question may entropy increasing universe whole certain subsystems within universe youre getting higher complexity youre getting development stars youre getting development life youre getting kinds things ultimate fate universe good somewhat troubling question basically project forward nothing changes looks eventually universe expand forever accelerate stars eventually stop forming run interstellar gas form run fuel stars eventually die eventually something could envision cold dark place filled black holes dead stars nothing mr cromartie160 thats concern laughter dr wiseman160 kind dire prospect fact already know weve already peaked highest rate star formation billion years back already slope compare distant galaxies nearby galaxies see first billion years universe star formation began become energetic compare galaxies call redshift two time distance starformation rate peaked current epoch see star formation declining bit already feel like kind postpeak universe terms production stars160 feel dont know question cant answer detailed question entropy terms beginning universe im cosmologist wont attempt say mr cromartie160 youre probably better cosmologist anybody else room laughter dr wiseman 160the amazing thing science often get surprised thats projection right may something dont quite understand affect long term future universe whole dark energy thing complete surprise aspects gravity dont quite understand may able predict longterm future universe maybe doesnt even matter multiverse maybe question whats longterm future multiverse ask good question multiverse something scientifically real testable right answer cant test mathematically viable possibility based string theory string theory kind theory explain phenomena see least universe tie observations back aspects string theory allows idea universes forces cant sort definition cant see outside universe order test whether thats actually happened provides philosophical mode thinking people troubled fact universe seem produced life imply sort specialness philosophically uncomfortable whole bunch universes kind random accident kind provides philosophical way conundrum science thats kind philosophy im personally dont opinion whether multiverse theory correct like say cant observe wouldnt necessarily surprise weve amazed many times much grander universe ever envisioned never knew planetary systems recently didnt know galaxies decades ago universes would threaten faith view well faith perspective based idea whatever god spirituality responsible universe could equally responsible multiverse kind pulls question back mr cromartie160 followup michael tell mr gerson160 mr cromartie160 okay andy ferguson youd pull mike youre next well dr wiseman160 want add one thing religious communities particularly like christianity would say theres story looks like natural projection universe christian communities believe christ return make sort noticeable change universe whole story religious beliefs mr cromartie160 andy andrew ferguson andrew ferguson weekly standard160 question petty one mr cromartie 160say question mr ferguson 160petty doesnt anything future universe im going ask future universe anything mentioned surveys elaine ecklund one thing thought looking community scientists still amazingly secular group something like 35 something believe kind god much less believe sort traditional notion god dr wiseman160 compared us population mr ferguson160 compared 90 americans say believe god account something people inclined go science secular unreligious point view something practice science makes somebody less religious dr wiseman160 thats good question book talks thoroughly qualitative interviews scientists found many scientists raised religious families love science caused ask questions always favorably entertained religious congregation church whatnot made feel eventually basically leave religious faith behind wasnt helping questions science may one reason people scientifically inclined may find religious upbringing relevant helpful question science make one deduce religious faith irrelevant illogical false im sure since im sociologist havent done cant speculate quantitatively whether thats case know find found line work interacted whole lot scientists story like us everybody room story theyre certain place belief nonbelief terms religious faith found many scientists people faith said came adults scientists like francis collins journey included intellect also heart sense maybe repentance maybe longing god something like along fitting acceptable way intellect became believers ive interacted many people stories along line ive also interacted many people line religious believers maybe fervently looked learning science biology behavioral evolution even cosmology began doubt many things taught religious heritage turned away course theres always question whether religious belief good society harmful society whole gets bantered around lot public dialogue think real question nearly everyone grapples point life evil suffering world innocent people animals whatnot suffering evil allowed take place either answer people answer sense proof god must exist least useful tangible way else god would allowed horrible things happen others come different conclusion christian heritage idea god doesnt generally intervene stop freedom either freedom nature freedom human action consequences god joined suffering incarnation jesus christ somehow redeems promises new type future theres different ways dealing suffering depending one grapples ubiquitous question injustice suffering direct respond religious faith whether embrace reject mr cromartie160 well wont able address entire problem evil session may future would want mention quickly profession elaine ecklund past talk book research think probably website dialogue saletan youre next dan harris erica greg david bring mike please william saletan mr saletan160 sort opposite andys question instead psychology scientist want ask psychology believers forget models interaction conflict contact nonconflict want ask alternative guess id call compartmentalization sort bring earth even though astronomy biology im texas grew among creationists look survey data tons creationists im talking people dont believe human evolution dont believe believe earth 6000 years old etcetera etcetera question grew people didnt impression debilitated seemed almost cut way didnt affect ability understand science general sort incorporate daily things someone goes doctor dont believe evolution doctor says please dont use antibiotics unless microbes say okay isnt sort functionally enough could science basically say okay theres bunch people lot united states rejects theory human evolution apparently defiance evidence theres something need hold terms moral beliefs believe built rejecting doesnt affect rest lives effectively sidestep question basically talk people creationists exactly believe relation science else believe impression something could sidestep could perfectly functional respect understanding incorporating science lives dr wiseman160 well aaas survey talked going get right people actually concerned people interested science goes people conservative fundamentalist religious views many would love go science museum love talk space exploration concerns people perceive think science trying edge god trying make god irrelevant god center life center world view cant fly question could people sense terms evolutionary science trouble accepting accept parts science okay go basically question guess depends life example students come creationist beliefs high school come college go secular university want study science problems suddenly introduced science classes acceptance evolutionary science assumed sometimes feel marginalized challenged sense think doesnt work well people daily life getting along dont think us room think much daytoday momenttomoment basis whether common ancestor primates something affects us daily life sense think people miss perspective im speaking personal point view im religious believer think miss glorious revelations nature magnitude evolution universe complexity intricacies life interrelatedness life things dont necessarily conflict fact augment ones faith god person faith sort lament religious communities set kind conflict usually science interpretation scripture interpret particular biblical passage reading lets say opening versus genesis really telling us details time scale mechanisms creation really isnt meant never meant convey kind knowledge even believe word god freeing find religious believer go embrace science thereby blessed science deeper understanding religious text need know well everybody helpful absolutely course youve pointed whole idea people accepting even dont realize terms antibiotics things many people would say microevolution microevolution okay many communities macroevolution problem mr cromartie160 quickly go dan harris dan pulls microphone let give quick word advertisement talk break meals dr deb haarsma right shes new president biologos foundation sponsor dialogues people william talking scientists christians different views origins age earth biological evolution whole purpose founded originally dr francis collins dialogue questions among journalists among faith communities questions call attention biologos website answer every question asked william dr wiseman160 also think weve discovered aaas scientists point view theres lot things scientists cant really talk evidences scientific investigation evidences evolution life evidences age earth evidences evolution universe even genetic evidence mapping human genome scientific evidence people whose world view much shaped science profound trust scripture need people leaders religious communities step start talking interpreting scripture respectful way doesnt mean youre compromising necessarily interpreting scripture right way much possible unnecessary conflicts science religious faith reduced people communities sense scientists answer problems leaders religious communities would serve people well depth understanding scriptures trying convey regarding details science natural history mr cromartie160 could say im going call dan harris want greg jones want two theologians among us gregory jones tim dalrymple begin preparing remarks questions call give question make statement know tim trained theologian thought lot id love hear theologians among us address questions theologians ought look science dont dan erica ask questions dan youre dan harris dan harris abc news160 right mr cromartie160 maybe youll answer questions mr harris 160no believe asked question moderate panel mr cromartie160 move mike mr harris160 thats usually one flaws laughter moderate panel astronomers asked question surprised answer struck looking beautiful pictures put universe sheer magnitude stars confronted basic facts would imagine daily basis allow put basic crap daily life greater perspective rest us laughter heres second question apologize stupid talk universe expanding often hear universe infinite infinity expand dr wiseman160 oh universe infinite expand whats expanding right mr harris160 yeah yes dr wiseman160 cosmologists use word infinite hard comprehend way words used infinity mean infinite originally size scales spatial scales within infinity small whats happening since beginning universe spatial scales expanding space stretching within infinity cant really talk boundaries sense talk boundaries terms far see see far back time existed time know existed 138 billion years see 138 billion lightyears distance thats far light could traveled history universe get us things universe expanded beyond distance lightyear unit distance things expanded beyond visible horizon well never able see one way think talk big bang burst energy energetic beginning time space isnt happened right everything expanding ever since basically happened everywhere big bang happened everywhere beginning time everywhere small spatial scales everywhere expanding ever since see remnants big bang everywhere look look one direction see remnants big bang see leftover cosmic microwave background radiation direction look big bang happened everywhere time still receiving background radiation everywhere im sure cleared laughter mr cromartie160 thats view laughter dr wiseman160 truth dont get either take little steps every year understanding little bit better something infinite wasnt always know space doesnt appear curved words doesnt appear youve probably seen science fiction ideas people thought well maybe space little bit curved huge scales look direction forever would eventually see back head kind thing space appear curved appears flat sense sometimes hear people scientists say universe flat well observations determined thats case flat like pancake parallel lines remain parallel forever sense asked another question look images reduce sense perturbed things daily life think feel great sense appreciation universe part feel sense sorrow many people get trapped mundane issues would call eternal value choice trapped poverty trapped war zone trapped situation survival think fault thats tragedy beauty nature explore learn influence think many people dont even get privilege luxury kinds thoughts also though tragic ways us plenty freedom go explore dont look images go website like one see images ive shown dont astronomer explore universe go walk park somewhere enjoy wonders nature yet people choose focus trivialities human conflict material wealth distractions survival even necessary think thats kind loss read headlines make news stories latest stars personal lives forth movie stars yes right laughter im like many hours people spend thinking kind stuff things greater cosmic importance part im astronomer im kind drawn things mr harris 160you right end laughter160 mr cromartie160 thats stuff cover isnt dan time mr harris160 record laughter dr wiseman160 let ask think would even lives rich famous would inspirational people look thinking things significant whether cosmologically significant significant terms serving others wouldnt great influence lot people mr harris160 100 agree yes would struck though ask astronomers colleagues question said doesnt actually make less likely get upset somebody cuts line starbucks whatever yeah actually gut find powerful look images consider billions hundreds billions tens billions stars galaxies right dr wiseman160 numbers dont mean lot us dont really know billion head know number zeros yeah looks like theres 200 billion stars milky way galaxy theres hundreds billions galaxies observable universe mr harris160 hundreds billions galaxies kind number would think frequent enough reminded think would salutary effect sure dr wiseman160 well right mr cromartie160 well thats purpose program dan mr harris160 thank mr cromartie160 thats love could come erica next want tell mike man erica youre next want greg jones tim dalrymple want couple two really want hear theologians give short way looking things erica would like go ahead want hear first question erica greider erica grieder texas monthly160 thats fine mr cromartie160 ahead160 right sir ms grieder160 wondering framed conversation way religion science religion versus science meetings dialogues find comes expense sort perspectives something like thinking polkinghorne quote two things religion science positing knowable truth im sure thats totally intentioned slightly intentioned something like george bushs position climate change basically believed anthropogenic climate change thought problem problem could effectively efficiently economically tackle one country time recession kinds things economic perspectives constitutional legal perspectives find kind angle things disadvantaged discussions guys secondly wanted follow dans question maybe theres answer ive always wondered know sense universe expanding dr wiseman 160okay second question first universe expanding anything implies theres something outside universe whole universe infinite stretching160 makes sense minds thats mr cromartie160 got laughter dr wiseman160 okay thats way minds built envision things isnt case universe ball energy thats expanding something else everything expanding internal spatial scales envision dont know im mouthing words simplistic explanation want much want envision whats going impossible us mr cromartie160 leave room mystery dr wiseman160 oh yeah yes question ask good one touched much today intersection science religion things economics politics course wound together come rubber meets road issues policy national priorities funding science policy forth huge mystery people different communities come together cant understand rationale would drive decisions priorities one perspectives necessarily influencing actually ends happening larger society think scientists whove gone work capitol hill something called congressional science fellow year half worked committee capitol hill staffer fascinating wasnt scientist brought fellowship positions amused see scientists would say make decision national policy involves science technology need scientific data thats work yet sort surprised note political ears leaders capitol hill also take account economic impact political impact kinds things would go decision whether would implement certain policy really difficult area gets values gets ethics science telling us one thing economics tell us something else growing certain kind crop lets say tobacco lets say grow tobacco realize tobacco healthy people chart much cost goes healthcare tobaccorelated health problems could conclude doesnt make sense grow tobacco economics depend tobacco growth cut tobacco growth certain areas many people would forced poverty im making scenario perhaps relevant decades past economic considerations hand forth consider things difficult im trying think modern conundrum perhaps genetically modified food better example thinking today better grow genetically modified food communities could raise lot food lot people alleviate poverty many spots world however genetically modified organisms risky ecology change actual farming culture communities negative ways override preclude use gmos 160so another hot topic different facets coming conversation theres science theres economic need theres needs poverty theres concerns ecology theres philosophical problems kinds things wins gets make decision makes choices impacts things need people wellversed facets issues able come together wisdom make good choices mr cromartie160 okay taking break ladies gentlemen riveted this160 need take break run personal business feel free going give three hours free time today enjoy south beach pressed time want go gregory jones tim dalrymple theological way viewing questions greg want tim go first tim dont pull mike laughter tim pulling mike greg give answer met greg jones tim dalrymple also went princeton seminary doctorate harvard theology religious studies wont tell one go first greg dr l gregory jones dr l gregory jones duke university divinity school160 160i think case theologians seem engage science good bit want parse think couple different issues also lead question jennifer160 thanks presentation particular areas theologians working theres lot progress evolution sarah coakleys recent gifford lectures think brilliant engaging particularly martin nowaks mathematical biology shes university cambridge gave gifford lectures find online published fairly soon actually engages martin nowak harvard computational biology anthropological work actually around meerkats behaviors actually argues pretty powerful way best kind evolutionary argument accounts moving beyond altruism sacrificial behavior thats quite similar new testament actually pretty powerful argument within particular sphere think need looking much religion science abstractions theres particular ideology framed ill come back second looking particular issues conversation theology physics different set issues theology biology although synthetic biology raises really interesting different kinds questions particularly significant resources think human sociality shaping community think significant opportunity look relation brain science look relation biology look relation physics well fields within theres actually lot fertile territory trouble seems trapped really pretty sterile set debates religion science articulated peculiar modern history thats end getting stuck theres one set conversations largely goes back popular imagination scopes trial thats frames everything leads people motivated fearful ways think debate actually seminaries complicit science departments neither one good job teaching history debate religion science science departments arent known lot history philosophy science youre actually practice current science question extent dialogue actually trying think engage kind history debates way might lead reframing questions religion science peculiar topic apart substantive advances going theology science particular fields trying look thats think know biologos organizations trying think trying get history weve framed issues could actually perhaps provide breakthroughs mr cromartie160 well jennifer answer id like hear tim question jennifer maybe gregs point say yes dr jones160 one footnote actually think theologians scriptures psalm eight things like theres actually lot reflection thats pretty sophisticated interesting history jewish christian muslim traditions cosmos assume got invented somehow around 1800 1900 theres lot wisdom gleaned mr cromartie160 tim timothy dalrymple timothy dalrymple patheoscom160 yeah thats right early church fathers sophisticated ways thinking scriptures jewish philosophers well sophisticated ways thinking scriptures interpreted theyre talking natural processes show small world sarah coakley mentioned doctoral supervisor templeton grant project led working deborah biologos around issues theres id say tightly knit effective high level group scientists theologians trying reverse perception take matter largely historical accident perception conflict science religion im trying address wills question little bit long take vaccinations really matter theres large group believes young earth creationism would say couple different reasons large part perception arose first place earlier generations christians think lot ways furnished intellectual underpinnings growth explosion rapid growth western science period lot christians took stand bad science baptized said way could properly understand natural world still christian arose perception christian perception enormously damaging given rise given impetus lot ways appropriate lot ways atheist critics christianity damaging see places people taken stand bad science masquerading good theology think permitting furthering god gaps kind approach disproven science marches great discredit christian intellectual quality damage think young people would agree dr wiseman damage young people really profound saw lot churches ive worked time get perception either believe else youre longer christian go find sorts articulate people explain greater amounts evidence logic force believe otherwise puts young people bad situation think broader problems perception science enemy comes across kind lead withdrawal processes scientific advancement bad policy making decisions kind luddite attitude toward technology would also recommend one book called origins modern atheism jesuit priest named michael buckley talks going even back 1500s early 1600s moment lot christians including figures like descartes kind gave lot ways sources information peculiar vision rationality christianity set aside tried answer skeptics terms found ultimately couldnt failure project taken meaningful lot ways think misbegotten project first place anyway interesting book want take look mr cromartie160 well thank tim dr jones160 michael could make mr cromartie160 followup dr jones160 plug tim essay came last week new atlantis christian engagement history christian engagement technology thats really great piece fresh kind way cutting kind ways christianity technology often get put opposition part larger religion science attitude mr cromartie160 yes thats called new atlantis published office im glad answer jennifer let get running time know people want go beach dr wiseman160 raining mr cromartie160 raining okay good well continue minutes longer want get comments table means david rennie elizabeth paul fred david rennie pull microphone well get play thank greg tim david rennie david rennie economist160 wanted ask think isnt science respect selling short theres kind asymmetry reasonableness literalminded religious people perhaps less country like western christian countries theres plenty religions extremely literalminded willing commit violence people literalminded scientists whole reasonable people youre also bending backwards say doesnt zerosum game actually creationists theyre saying scientific education challenge kind theist world view theyre right youre polite say theyre right youre polite say awful lot religious explanations universe seen atheist perspective look essentially anthropological reason muslim scientist organizations born muslim countries muslim families jewish scientists born jewish families thats thing thing agree science thats static rather adaptive new discoveries anthropological traditions polite weve learned polite people rational enlightened people theyre losing arguments arent selling short youre saying dialogue possible call say muslims jews christians cant agree fundamental underlying truths dont believe theyre mutually compatible reasonable dr wiseman160 think okay unpack little bit certainly particular religious beliefs people hold conflict scientific understanding particular topic lets say particular religious belief would say life appeared instantly forms life appeared instantly time thousand years ago conflict many facets scientific exploration geology biology even astronomy certainly case topics issues particular religious belief conflict particular consensus view scientific community doubt cause great problems ive mentioned earlier teach schools forth dont believe neither national science organizations conflicts fundamentally exist religious communities often issue often interpret religious text forth many christians jews muslims would say religious texts revere word god never intended convey information creation life history universe would misuse view religious text sense believe dialogue possible constructive within religious communities amongst also communities find issues common interest technology finding things interest terms mapping genetic code finding people predisposed certain diseases certain conditions take knowledge given something theres common ground think thats place theres productive conversation go mr cromartie160 followup tell mr rennie160 briefly ground though im sure exists im trying disrespectful dialogues common ground small rational piece sort deist common ground actually accurately reflect religions experienced vast majority religious believers havent found kind happy rational place talk doesnt reflect religion lived awful lot people dr wiseman160 thats good question think lot common ground talk say common ground dont mean necessarily common agreement perceptions maybe say common interest example earth care environmental stewardship tremendous common ground trying understand human impact environment religious believer case always point religious communities different take religious communities sense placed god earth garden sent tend weve done good job act worship god repentance sin stop pollution stop environmental degradation act service people people suffering due environmental degradation youre supposed love one another dont anything help uplift environmental condition hurting others religiously motivated yet others necessarily religious beliefs common conviction impacting environment need something simply common good living creatures kind humanistic inclusive world view would uplift everyone doesnt necessarily tie religious faith people perhaps different motivational backgrounds interest goals interest understanding truth science telling us natural world people work together think mr cromartie160 okay take break two people get could theologians among us would agree described common grace right okay good may record show lets see elizabeth youd pull mike fred barnes youll last elizabeth dias elizabeth dias time magazine160 easy question dr wiseman160 yeah ms dias160 im wondering seminaries working partnership training seminarians future clergy imagine conversations would different say phoenix seminary denver dallas versus harvard duke et cetera dr wiseman160 asked seminaries something called association theological schools accrediting association hundreds seminaries across country wide range theological perspectives send us letter interest interested participating pilot school kind program dont deal theology would offer better contact science information would incorporate program weve 28 schools send us passionate letters interest really see paramount importance programs want pilot schools pretty much equally divided three association theological school calls ecclesial families three families would mainline protestant conservative protestant would include evangelicals catholicorthodox christianbased seminaries wide range theological perspectives many products hoping produced pilot study expanded upon used seminaries religious traditions well ones specifically dont really want say havent made selections yet theres interesting range interesting thirst kind thing mr cromartie160 fred youll carry us break break free time 630 cocktail reception lunch well dinner also160 sure bring nametag tell youre sitting fred question fred barnes fred barnes weekly standard160 interested subject one scientist believer christian believer understand along line scientist believer deal matters like virgin birth resurrection existence holy spirit things required least asked believe christians dr wiseman160 bigger question would religious scientist address idea miracles right mr barnes160 well ones mentioned particular scientist meant laughter dr wiseman160 okay think mr barnes160 asked question francis collins years ago forget answer mr cromartie160 shes formulating tell us mr barnes160 dont remember bet good one laughter dr wiseman160 whatever said thats answer well tell perspective personally let tell generally first people take perspective priori miraculous happen even religious people sciencesavvy would say kind like say priori miracles happen science basically explains way things work understand working god natural processes thats wonderful still believe god dont see logic god could intervene tweak knobs natural forces forth certain times makes sense minds particular folks extreme say god basically time basically injecting new information shaping things guiding kinds natural processes tend think miracle possible miracles actually happened sound like miracle theres something thats outside natural working forces nature science equipped address one way science equipped address things normally naturally work scientist study universe way normally naturally works worked throughout whole history time dont look anything else scientific tools equipped measure anything else mean nothing outside normal natural physical processes science address ever happened ever happen well science cant answer question answer question way answer yes see historical personal evidence gods actions talking personal perspective see evidence things particular resurrection jesus christ ample evidence event course time changed history changed lives people experiencing living christ today scientific conclusion absolutely enough evidence one believe yes answered prayer thats something one prove someone else unless something really wall like prayed amputated arm would grow back doesnt seem way people experience answered prayer people experience prayer pray change lives become forgiving become free certain bad inclination pray someone elses wellbeing even healing healing may physical healing may healing spirit forth sense gods answering prayer usually way cant prove someone else thats actually happened always explainable way believe god active lives yes believe god regularly changes forces nature goes tweaks things adds information systems forth dont fact biblical record god typically works nature works within situations suffering enters works people helps us science technology help one another kinds things perceive god active today thats personal experience mr cromartie160 well thats fred asking dr wiseman160 okay mr cromartie160 thank fred notion miracles well go break dr wiseman160 let add comment kind interesting percentage scientists asked think members national academy something guys look cant remember exact number theres survey thats done like 40 years ago recently question asked membership certain scientific society pray god expecting answer something like percentage scientists cant remember whether 30 percent something like said yes decades ago still say today significant though probably minority percentage scientists believe reason pray talk god thats good question polkinghorne written good books believe physical forces universe working without tweaking prayer god thats good question interesting investigate mr cromartie160 well note thank jennifer much join thanking dr wiseman applause dr wiseman160 pictures back table pictures hubble space telescope also little brochures dialogue programs mr cromartie 160i think survey mentioned essay ed larson larry witham came five years ago scientists believe course theres book discussing anyway ladies gentlemen thank | 9,382 |
<p>What the emphasis on racism blinds us to is that the justice system is corrupt because justice does not play a role in it.</p>
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<p>On January 23, 2017, I asked, “Are Americans Racists?” I pointed out examples where racist explanations prevail over empirical fact. I did not write that there is no racism in America. I said that racism is not the be-all and end-all explanation of American history and institutions. The point I made is that racist explanations are often inadequate and both work against racial harmony and blind us to more general and more serious problems.</p>
<p>Perhaps the worst of America’s failed institutions is the criminal justice system. The US has the largest prison population in the world, not only as a percentage of the population but also in absolute numbers. “Freedom and democracy” America has an absolute larger number of incarcerated citizens than “authoritarian” China, a country with four times the US population.</p>
<p><a href="https://amzn.to/2jW7yCO" type="external">&lt;img class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-19426" src="https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/tyranny-good-intentions-paul-craig-roberts-194x300.jpg" alt="The Tyranny of Good Intentions by Paul Craig Roberts" width="194" height="300" srcset="https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/tyranny-good-intentions-paul-craig-roberts-194x300.jpg 194w, https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/tyranny-good-intentions-paul-craig-roberts-259x400.jpg 259w, https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/tyranny-good-intentions-paul-craig-roberts-142x220.jpg 142w, https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/tyranny-good-intentions-paul-craig-roberts-118x182.jpg 118w, https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/tyranny-good-intentions-paul-craig-roberts.jpg 324w" sizes="(max-width: 194px) 100vw, 194px" /&gt;</a>Many factors contribute to this result. One is the privatization of prisons, which has turned them into profit-making enterprises ever needful of more labor to exploit, which adds to the pressure for convictions. Another factor is the disregard of the protective features of law in order to more easily pursue demonized offender groups, such as the Mafia, child abusers, drug dealers and users, and “terrorists.” Lawrence M. Stratton and I describe the transformation of law from a shield of the people into a weapon in the hands of the state in our book, <a href="https://amzn.to/2ksVqwd" type="external">The Tyranny of Good Intentions</a>.</p>
<p>This transformation did not occur because of racism. It occurred because chasing after devils and convicting them became more important than justice. Today the criminal justice system is largely indifferent to a defendant’s guilt or innocence. This is a far worst problem than racism. It is&#160;the main reason that there are so many false convictions in the US and so many wrongfully convicted Americans in prison. Indeed, even the guilty are&#160;wrongfully convicted as it is easier to frame them than to convict them on the evidence.</p>
<p>To be clear: The primary reason for wrongful conviction is that the success indicator for police, prosecutor, and judge is conviction, not justice. Crimes are solved by wrongful convictions. High conviction rates boost the careers of prosecutors, and high profile convictions boost their political careers. The key to rapid and numerous convictions is the plea bargain. And plea bargains suit judges as they keep the court docket clear. Today 97% of felony cases are settled with a plea bargain. This means police evidence and a prosecutor’s case are tested only three times out of 100. When the evidence and case are tested in court, the test confronts a vast array of prosecutorial misconduct, such as suborned perjury and the withholding of exculpatory evidence. In America, everything is loaded against Justice.</p>
<p>In a plea bargain police do not have to present evidence, prosecutors do not have to bring a case, and judges do not have to pay attention to the case and be troubled by a growing backlog as trials consume days and weeks.</p>
<p>In a plea bargain the defendant, innocent or guilty, is told that he can plead to this or that offence, which carries a lighter sentence than the crime that allegedly has actually occurred and on which the defendant is arrested, or the defendant can go to trial where he will face more serious charges that carry much harsher penalties. As it has become routine for police to falsify evidence, for prosecutors to suborn perjury and withhold exculpatory evidence, for jurors naively to trust police and prosecutors, and for judges to look the other way, attorneys advise defendants to accept a plea deal. In other words, no one expects a fair trial or for real evidence to play a role in the outcome.</p>
<p>The short of it is that the pursuit of justice is not a feature of the American criminal justice system. Justice does not matter to the police, to the prosecutor, to the jury, to the judge, and often not to the hardened defense attorney who has witnessed so much injustice that he believes justice is a fairy tale.</p>
<p>The only exception to this is the justice introduced from outside the justice system by innocence projects and pro bono attorneys, such as Bryan Stevenson, director of the Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, Alabama.</p>
<p><a href="https://amzn.to/2jWcqYq" type="external">&lt;img class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-36936" src="https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/just-mercy-195x300.jpg" alt="Just Mercy" width="195" height="300" srcset="https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/just-mercy-195x300.jpg 195w, https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/just-mercy-97x150.jpg 97w, https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/just-mercy.jpg 324w" sizes="(max-width: 195px) 100vw, 195px" /&gt;</a>In 2014 Stevenson published <a href="https://amzn.to/2ksU2K4" type="external">Just Mercy</a>, a fascinating collection of case histories of wrongful convictions that he and his colleagues managed to have overturned. A book such as this benefits from a main case, and the one that Stevenson delivers is that of Walter McMillian. It required six years for Stevenson to overturn what must be the most obvious, blatant frameup of a completely innocent man in US history. There were a large number of witnesses who testified that they were with McMillian at a fish fry&#160;during the time that a murder for which McMillian was indicted and convicted took place. The only “evidence” against McMillian was the suborned perjury of a man who retracted his coerced testimony three times, once in the courtroom of Alabama Judge Thomas B. Norton, who simply ignored it.</p>
<p>McMillian is black, and the sheriff, prosecutor, judge, and jury that framed him are white. This fact, together with the fact that the ignored witnesses&#160;whose testimony cleared McMillian were black and McMillian’s sexual affair with a white woman in a small Alabama town, seem to convince Stevenson that McMillian was convicted because of racism.</p>
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<p>McMillian was falsely convicted, (1) because sheriff John Tate was under community criticism for the failure to solve the murder case of a young woman and needed someone to arrest for the crime, (2) because Ralph Meyers gave false testimony against McMillian for confused reasons that did not work out for him, (3) because the local newspaper, as newspapers are wont to do, convicted McMillian in the press, which meant that the jury had to convict or be accused of letting off a murderer, and (4) because the judge, Robert E. Lee Key, not only is unworthy of his name but most certainly did not have the fortitude to run a fair trial when the only possible outcome for his career and reputation in the community was conviction. Neither did his successor, Thomas B. Norton, have fortitude for the same reasons.</p>
<p>I am convinced that all of these representatives of the justice system are racists, but they would have convicted McMillian for the same reasons if he had been white. If the justice system was concerned with justice, he would not have been convicted irrespective or race or gender.</p>
<p>What the emphasis on racism blinds us to is that the justice system is corrupt because justice does not play a role in it. Justice has to be brought into the system from outside by people such as Bryan Stevenson. And for people such as Stevenson to bring justice into the justice system, they must have a high tolerance for death threats and for witnessing justice fail again and again.</p>
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<p>Stevenson describes the convictions of white women by white women. In the aftermath of hurricanes and tornadoes that wrecked coastal Alabama, Marsha Colbey gave premature birth to a stillborn son. She came to the attention of police because her busybody neighbor Debbie Cook had noticed the pregnancy but saw no child.</p>
<p>Colbey’s fate was sealed by the media craze set aflame by Andrea Yates and Susan Smith’s murders of their children. Media sensationalized the baseless suspicion surrounding Colbey and turned her into another “dangerous mother.” Forensic pathologist Kathleen Enstice testified without evidence that Colbey’s son had been born alive and had died by drowning. The state’s own expert witness, Dr. Dennis McNally, and the defense’s expert witness Dr. Werner Spitz testified that Colbey’s age alone placed her pregnancy at high risk for fetal death and that there was no scientific evidence that a crime had occurred.</p>
<p>Irresponsible media had communities and juries on the lookout for “dangerous moms” who should be put in prison, and they found one (along with many others) in Colbey. The trial judge permitted Colbey’s fate to be decided by jurors who stated that they could not honor the presumption of innocence in Colbey’s case. Other jurors said that they always believe the police and prosecutor. This failure of justice enabled Stevenson after years of effort to secure Colbey’s release. Clearly, Colbey’s wrongful conviction had nothing to do with racism. Identity politics would want to say she was convicted by misogynists, but Colbey was the victim of other women.</p>
<p>Justice is so absent in the criminal justice system that Victoria Banks in order to avoid capital punishment was coerced into a plea bargain carrying a 20-year sentence for murdering her child after her pregnancy despite the fact that there was no pregnancy and no child. Stevenson was able to win her release by establishing that she had had a tubal ligation five years prior to her alleged pregnancy, which made it biologically impossible for her to conceive and give birth to a child.</p>
<p>A woman whose tubes were tied, for which conclusive medical evidence existed, five years before she was accused of having just had a child that she murdered is forced into a plea bargain carrying 20 years in order to avoid the electric chair. Perhaps only Alabama could produce something this absurd, but this is a faithful picture of American “justice.”</p>
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<p>This is a faithful picture of justice in America.</p>
<p>The justice system needs victims, and is focused on ruining people’s lives whether they deserve it or not. The more American lives ruined, the greater the success of the justice system.</p>
<p>There is a current case in Alabama of a US Marine honorably discharged who suffers from PTSD. To help out a family friend, who needed a car for work but could not obtain a loan, the Marine sold him a car of his own, which the family friend was to pay off monthly. When payments stopped, the former Marine inquired. Payments were promised, and the family friend offered his cell phone to be held until payments caught up, as an indication of his good faith to pay.</p>
<p>It turned out to be the wrong cell phone, not the debtor’s personal phone but a company-issued one. The company regarded it as a theft by the Marine, and the family friend had to report it to the police. The fact that it was all a misunderstanding has not caused the justice system to drop the case. Instead the prosecutor is demanding a misdemeanor plea. In other words, another person with something on his record who can be a suspect for the next burglary. As everyone in the case is white, injustice is occurring despite the absence of racism.</p>
<p>It is a paradox that child protection laws in the hands of police and prosecutors have become weapons with which to ruin children.</p>
<p>A father whose son is being ruined for life over nothing sent me the story with his permission to publish it as a warning to others about the heartlessness with which the justice system irresponsibly ruins even the immature young. This story again demonstrates that the function of American justice is not justice, but to ruin as many people as possible and as early in life as possible. The gratuitously ruined lives that the justice system achieves is the monument to the success of justice.</p>
<p>I decided not to publish it, not because I disbelieve it, but because the son has not been sentenced, and protestations of innocence in media, as Stevenson says, can prejudice authorities against the defendant, especially in Virginia where this miscarriage of justice took place. I do not want to expose the son to risk in the event that the father is wrong, as I suspect he is, in expecting publicity to elicit compassion and empathy that would moderate an unjust event.</p>
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<p>Let’s call the son Zach. Having just turned 18, he was visiting a young woman his age whose younger sister introduced him via social media to a 13 year old female who shared his interest in dragons and animation. The two never met. As their shared interest developed via the Internet, so did their friendship.</p>
<p>As the natural process that turns a girl into a woman progressed, the cyber relationship developed a romantic aspect. The girl/woman sent Zach five photographs of herself in her underwear.</p>
<p>Later the girl/woman developed emotional problems due to the impending divorce of her parents and was admitted to a mental health facility. At some point she confided her cyber relationship with Zach to a counselor. The “child protection” laws required the counselor to inform the police, who seized Zach’s computer and found chat logs and the five photos.</p>
<p>The consequence was that Zach was charged with 20 felony indictments carrying 350 years in prison. As they always are, the charges were vastly overstated. For example, the five photos sent to Zach of a torso in underwear (apparently the girl’s face was not shown) got Zach charged with distribution of child pornography.</p>
<p>No charges were filed by the parents of the girl. The charges were entirely the idea of the prosecutor’s office, and the 350 years produced a plea bargain to lesser offences. American criminal justice had secured another victim.</p>
<p>In the absurdity that is American law you can be guilty of “indecent liberties with a minor” without ever having seen the girl in person or ever having been close enough to touch. The advent of virtual reality and video screens means that crimes can have happened in virtual reality that did not happen in real reality.</p>
<p>In my days it was almost impossible to be guilty of indecent liberties with a minor, because the age of female sexual consent was 14. But as females sexually matured earlier, the age of sexual consent was irrationally pushed higher. Today the legal age that a male may have sex with a female is 18. In other words, the absurd American legal system pretends that women do not have sex until after they graduate from high school. Who can imagine college dorms full of virginal women?</p>
<p>When America had a livable legal system, law was based on the common ordinary behavior of people. This is known as the Common Law, the foundation of law in England and the United States.</p>
<p>Today the law is so uncommon as to be absurd. Yet absurdity is enforced with vengeance.</p>
<p>The video age means that crimes can be committed by looking at a video screen, and that is what happened to Zach. Neither his attorney nor the judge told Zach and his parents that his coerced plea meant that there was no appeal and that he was registered for life as a sex offender. Zach had committed a “violent sex offense” online! It was the girl who sent the photos, but the offense was Zach’s for having them on his computer.</p>
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<p>This is America, a country totally devoid of justice, a hapless country forced to suffer injustice except for those few cases that heroes such as Bryan Stevenson are able to overturn.</p>
<p>If only Americans in their so-called democracy had the power to make Bryan Stevenson Attorney General for life and give him the power to write and enforce the laws would justice return to America.</p>
<p>God help a country as totally devoid of justice as the United States of America.</p>
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<p>Police, prosecutorial and judicial misconduct seldom bear any cost. Just so you understand how “law’” completely protects the police, prosecutors and judges who routinely violate it, as Stevenson reports, “state and federal courts have persistently insulated prosecutors from accountability for egregious misconduct that results in innocent people being sent to death row.” In 2011 a Republican Supreme Court ruled that a prosecutor cannot be held liable for misconduct in a criminal case, even if he intentionally and illegally withheld evidence of innocence.</p>
<p>In plain words, criminal actions against the innocent are now the legalized policy of the American criminal justice system.</p>
<p>Are the American people moved by these extraordinary injustices and their legalization by the Supreme Court of the United States? Are the Alabamans in the same county who egged on the frame-up of Walter McMillian ashamed of their willing complicity in a gratuitous act of injustice? Absolutely not. They reelected sheriff Tate, and he remains in office today.</p>
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<p>This is the face of justice in America, a hapless country totally devoid of justice where law exists solely for the economic benefit of those whose careers rise with conviction rates, whether of the innocent or the guilty.</p>
<p>Law professors, such as Harvard’s Charles Fried, have shown their indifference to wrongful conviction. Fried came up with the argument that “finality” was more important than justice. Fried was annoyed by appeals. He argued that ending a case had its own importance and that at some point appeals based on fresh evidence had to be cut off even if it meant an innocent person was executed or spent life in prison.</p>
<p>Conservative legislators showed their indifference to wrongful conviction in 1994 when they took over Congress and promptly eliminated federal aid for legal representation of the wrongly convicted on death row. The conservatives were more comfortable with the deaths of innocents than with admitting the willful mistakes made by “law and order.”</p>
<p>The indifference of Americans to injustice has spread outside US borders. The Clinton, George W. Bush, and Obama regimes are responsible for millions of dead and displaced persons in 10 countries—Serbia, Somalia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Yemen, Pakistan, Syria, Ukraine, and Palestine. None of those responsible have expressed any remorse and neither have the American people.</p> | false | 1 | emphasis racism blinds us justice system corrupt justice play role purchases amazoncom via affiliate links help support fpj extra cost january 23 2017 asked americans racists pointed examples racist explanations prevail empirical fact write racism america said racism beall endall explanation american history institutions point made racist explanations often inadequate work racial harmony blind us general serious problems perhaps worst americas failed institutions criminal justice system us largest prison population world percentage population also absolute numbers freedom democracy america absolute larger number incarcerated citizens authoritarian china country four times us population ltimg classalignleft sizemedium wpimage19426 srchttpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201402tyrannygoodintentionspaulcraigroberts194x300jpg altthe tyranny good intentions paul craig roberts width194 height300 srcsethttpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201402tyrannygoodintentionspaulcraigroberts194x300jpg 194w httpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201402tyrannygoodintentionspaulcraigroberts259x400jpg 259w httpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201402tyrannygoodintentionspaulcraigroberts142x220jpg 142w httpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201402tyrannygoodintentionspaulcraigroberts118x182jpg 118w httpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201402tyrannygoodintentionspaulcraigrobertsjpg 324w sizesmaxwidth 194px 100vw 194px gtmany factors contribute result one privatization prisons turned profitmaking enterprises ever needful labor exploit adds pressure convictions another factor disregard protective features law order easily pursue demonized offender groups mafia child abusers drug dealers users terrorists lawrence stratton describe transformation law shield people weapon hands state book tyranny good intentions transformation occur racism occurred chasing devils convicting became important justice today criminal justice system largely indifferent defendants guilt innocence far worst problem racism is160the main reason many false convictions us many wrongfully convicted americans prison indeed even guilty are160wrongfully convicted easier frame convict evidence clear primary reason wrongful conviction success indicator police prosecutor judge conviction justice crimes solved wrongful convictions high conviction rates boost careers prosecutors high profile convictions boost political careers key rapid numerous convictions plea bargain plea bargains suit judges keep court docket clear today 97 felony cases settled plea bargain means police evidence prosecutors case tested three times 100 evidence case tested court test confronts vast array prosecutorial misconduct suborned perjury withholding exculpatory evidence america everything loaded justice plea bargain police present evidence prosecutors bring case judges pay attention case troubled growing backlog trials consume days weeks plea bargain defendant innocent guilty told plead offence carries lighter sentence crime allegedly actually occurred defendant arrested defendant go trial face serious charges carry much harsher penalties become routine police falsify evidence prosecutors suborn perjury withhold exculpatory evidence jurors naively trust police prosecutors judges look way attorneys advise defendants accept plea deal words one expects fair trial real evidence play role outcome short pursuit justice feature american criminal justice system justice matter police prosecutor jury judge often hardened defense attorney witnessed much injustice believes justice fairy tale exception justice introduced outside justice system innocence projects pro bono attorneys bryan stevenson director equal justice initiative montgomery alabama ltimg classalignleft sizemedium wpimage36936 srchttpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201702justmercy195x300jpg altjust mercy width195 height300 srcsethttpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201702justmercy195x300jpg 195w httpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201702justmercy97x150jpg 97w httpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads201702justmercyjpg 324w sizesmaxwidth 195px 100vw 195px gtin 2014 stevenson published mercy fascinating collection case histories wrongful convictions colleagues managed overturned book benefits main case one stevenson delivers walter mcmillian required six years stevenson overturn must obvious blatant frameup completely innocent man us history large number witnesses testified mcmillian fish fry160during time murder mcmillian indicted convicted took place evidence mcmillian suborned perjury man retracted coerced testimony three times courtroom alabama judge thomas b norton simply ignored mcmillian black sheriff prosecutor judge jury framed white fact together fact ignored witnesses160whose testimony cleared mcmillian black mcmillians sexual affair white woman small alabama town seem convince stevenson mcmillian convicted racism mcmillian falsely convicted 1 sheriff john tate community criticism failure solve murder case young woman needed someone arrest crime 2 ralph meyers gave false testimony mcmillian confused reasons work 3 local newspaper newspapers wont convicted mcmillian press meant jury convict accused letting murderer 4 judge robert e lee key unworthy name certainly fortitude run fair trial possible outcome career reputation community conviction neither successor thomas b norton fortitude reasons convinced representatives justice system racists would convicted mcmillian reasons white justice system concerned justice would convicted irrespective race gender emphasis racism blinds us justice system corrupt justice play role justice brought system outside people bryan stevenson people stevenson bring justice justice system must high tolerance death threats witnessing justice fail stevenson describes convictions white women white women aftermath hurricanes tornadoes wrecked coastal alabama marsha colbey gave premature birth stillborn son came attention police busybody neighbor debbie cook noticed pregnancy saw child colbeys fate sealed media craze set aflame andrea yates susan smiths murders children media sensationalized baseless suspicion surrounding colbey turned another dangerous mother forensic pathologist kathleen enstice testified without evidence colbeys son born alive died drowning states expert witness dr dennis mcnally defenses expert witness dr werner spitz testified colbeys age alone placed pregnancy high risk fetal death scientific evidence crime occurred irresponsible media communities juries lookout dangerous moms put prison found one along many others colbey trial judge permitted colbeys fate decided jurors stated could honor presumption innocence colbeys case jurors said always believe police prosecutor failure justice enabled stevenson years effort secure colbeys release clearly colbeys wrongful conviction nothing racism identity politics would want say convicted misogynists colbey victim women justice absent criminal justice system victoria banks order avoid capital punishment coerced plea bargain carrying 20year sentence murdering child pregnancy despite fact pregnancy child stevenson able win release establishing tubal ligation five years prior alleged pregnancy made biologically impossible conceive give birth child woman whose tubes tied conclusive medical evidence existed five years accused child murdered forced plea bargain carrying 20 years order avoid electric chair perhaps alabama could produce something absurd faithful picture american justice faithful picture justice america justice system needs victims focused ruining peoples lives whether deserve american lives ruined greater success justice system current case alabama us marine honorably discharged suffers ptsd help family friend needed car work could obtain loan marine sold car family friend pay monthly payments stopped former marine inquired payments promised family friend offered cell phone held payments caught indication good faith pay turned wrong cell phone debtors personal phone companyissued one company regarded theft marine family friend report police fact misunderstanding caused justice system drop case instead prosecutor demanding misdemeanor plea words another person something record suspect next burglary everyone case white injustice occurring despite absence racism paradox child protection laws hands police prosecutors become weapons ruin children father whose son ruined life nothing sent story permission publish warning others heartlessness justice system irresponsibly ruins even immature young story demonstrates function american justice justice ruin many people possible early life possible gratuitously ruined lives justice system achieves monument success justice decided publish disbelieve son sentenced protestations innocence media stevenson says prejudice authorities defendant especially virginia miscarriage justice took place want expose son risk event father wrong suspect expecting publicity elicit compassion empathy would moderate unjust event lets call son zach turned 18 visiting young woman age whose younger sister introduced via social media 13 year old female shared interest dragons animation two never met shared interest developed via internet friendship natural process turns girl woman progressed cyber relationship developed romantic aspect girlwoman sent zach five photographs underwear later girlwoman developed emotional problems due impending divorce parents admitted mental health facility point confided cyber relationship zach counselor child protection laws required counselor inform police seized zachs computer found chat logs five photos consequence zach charged 20 felony indictments carrying 350 years prison always charges vastly overstated example five photos sent zach torso underwear apparently girls face shown got zach charged distribution child pornography charges filed parents girl charges entirely idea prosecutors office 350 years produced plea bargain lesser offences american criminal justice secured another victim absurdity american law guilty indecent liberties minor without ever seen girl person ever close enough touch advent virtual reality video screens means crimes happened virtual reality happen real reality days almost impossible guilty indecent liberties minor age female sexual consent 14 females sexually matured earlier age sexual consent irrationally pushed higher today legal age male may sex female 18 words absurd american legal system pretends women sex graduate high school imagine college dorms full virginal women america livable legal system law based common ordinary behavior people known common law foundation law england united states today law uncommon absurd yet absurdity enforced vengeance video age means crimes committed looking video screen happened zach neither attorney judge told zach parents coerced plea meant appeal registered life sex offender zach committed violent sex offense online girl sent photos offense zachs computer america country totally devoid justice hapless country forced suffer injustice except cases heroes bryan stevenson able overturn americans socalled democracy power make bryan stevenson attorney general life give power write enforce laws would justice return america god help country totally devoid justice united states america police prosecutorial judicial misconduct seldom bear cost understand law completely protects police prosecutors judges routinely violate stevenson reports state federal courts persistently insulated prosecutors accountability egregious misconduct results innocent people sent death row 2011 republican supreme court ruled prosecutor held liable misconduct criminal case even intentionally illegally withheld evidence innocence plain words criminal actions innocent legalized policy american criminal justice system american people moved extraordinary injustices legalization supreme court united states alabamans county egged frameup walter mcmillian ashamed willing complicity gratuitous act injustice absolutely reelected sheriff tate remains office today face justice america hapless country totally devoid justice law exists solely economic benefit whose careers rise conviction rates whether innocent guilty law professors harvards charles fried shown indifference wrongful conviction fried came argument finality important justice fried annoyed appeals argued ending case importance point appeals based fresh evidence cut even meant innocent person executed spent life prison conservative legislators showed indifference wrongful conviction 1994 took congress promptly eliminated federal aid legal representation wrongly convicted death row conservatives comfortable deaths innocents admitting willful mistakes made law order indifference americans injustice spread outside us borders clinton george w bush obama regimes responsible millions dead displaced persons 10 countriesserbia somalia afghanistan iraq libya yemen pakistan syria ukraine palestine none responsible expressed remorse neither american people | 1,614 |
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<p>I had the feeling that there was one final thing left for me to do regarding my research of informed trading activities in connection to the terror attacks of September 11, 2001 in order to close that chapter of my journalistic work once and for all. And so I went back to the 9/11 stories involving Deutsche Bank Alex Brown. I considered it a journalistic obligation to exercise diligence.</p>
<p>With regard to the research that I’ve done on the topic of “9/11 Insider Trading” there was one thing that I hadn’t gone after sufficiently enough: so far I had not asked the German Bank for a statement on two particular issues. I also noticed that no one else had asked the Deutsche Bank for it – at least I could not find anything that suggested otherwise.</p>
<p>What those two issues were should become evident if I just cite some various e-mails. Moreover, they will give you all relevant links/sources to follow up on the whole story if you want to. I am aware that the format is a bit unusual and a bit hard to follow, but I am confident that you will understand it in the end.</p>
<p>On December 31, 2012, I wrote this e-mail to the press department at the headquarters of Deutsche Bank in Frankfurt, Germany ( <a href="mailto:[email protected]" type="external">[email protected]</a>), which included two relevant excerpts from my research.</p>
<p>Media Request re Deutsche Bank – Alex Brown – 9/11 Informed Trading</p>
<p>Dear Ladies and Gentlemen,</p>
<p>My name is Lars Schall, I am a freelance journalist for finance. Earlier this year I’ve published an article at Asia Times Online, the biggest English news website in Asia, on the topic of alleged informed trading activities prior to the terror attacks of September 11, 2001:</p>
<p><a href="http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/NC21Dj05.html" type="external">http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/NC21Dj05.html</a>.</p>
<p>In this article I’ve mentioned that something strange occurred related to Deutsche Bank’s computer systems in New York City.* The source for this, the investigative journalist Michael C. Ruppert, repeated this story again on record in this video of mine:</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2012/04/09/terror-trading-911/</a>.</p>
<p>Since I have never seen that the Deutsche Bank was officially asked about this, I would like to ask you for a comment on this specific story.</p>
<p>I would also like to ask for a comment from you on the fact that Alex Brown, a subsidiary of Deutsche Bank, traded massive put options purchases on United Airlines Company UAL through the Chicago Board Option Exchange (CBOE).**</p>
<p>Kind regards,</p>
<p>Lars Schall.</p>
<p>* Excerpt:</p>
<p>But let’s get back to the subject of destruction. On September 11, not only human life, aircraft and buildings were destroyed in New York City, but also data on computers and in archives. For example, several federal agencies occupied space in Building 7 of the World Trade Center, including the Securities and Exchange Commission on floors 11 to 13.</p>
<p>Those and other data could have given information about the alleged 9/11 insider trading (though it seems to be very unlikely that no backup existed elsewhere independent of the local computer systems). In fact, some technology companies were commissioned to recover damaged hard disks, which had been recovered from the debris and dust of Ground Zero.</p>
<p>One of these companies was the English company group Convar, more precisely: their data rescue center in the German city Pirmasens. Erik Kirschbaum from the news agency Reuters reported in December 2001 that Convar had at that time successfully restored information from 32 computers, supporting “suspicions that some of the 911 transactions were illegal”.</p>
<p>‘The suspicion is that inside information about the attack was used to send financial transaction commands and authorizations in the belief that amid all the chaos the criminals would have, at the very least, a good head start,’ says Convar director Peter Henschel.” [36] Convar received the costly orders – according to Kirschbaum´s report the companies had to pay between $20,000 and $30,000 per rescued computer – in particular from credit card companies, because: “There was a sharp rise in credit card transactions moving through some computer systems at the WTC shortly before the planes hit the twin towers. This could be a criminal enterprise – in which case, did they get advance warning? Or was it only a coincidence that more than $100 million was rushed through the computers as the disaster unfolded?” [37]</p>
<p>The companies for which Convar was active cooperated with the FBI. If the data were reconstructed they should have been passed on to the FBI, and the FBI, according to its statutory mandate, should have initiated further investigation based on the data to find out who carried out these transactions. Henschel was optimistic at the time that the sources for the transactions would come to light.</p>
<p>Richard Wagner, a Convar employee, told Kirschbaum that “illegal transfers of more than $100 million might have been made immediately before and during the disaster. ‘There is a suspicion that some people had advance knowledge of the approximate time of the plane crashes in order to move out amounts exceeding $100 million,’ he says. ‘They thought that the records of their transactions could not be traced after the main frames were destroyed’.” [38]</p>
<p>Wagner’s observation that there had been “illegal financial transactions shortly before and during the WTC disaster” matches an observation which Ruppert describes in Crossing the Rubicon. Ruppert was contacted by an employee of Deutsche Bank, who survived the WTC disaster by leaving the scene when the second aircraft had hit its target. According to the employee, about five minutes before the attack the entire Deutsche Bank computer system had been taken over by something external that no one in the office recognized and every file was downloaded at lightning speed to an unknown location. The employee, afraid for his life, lost many of his friends on September 11, and he was well aware of the role which the Deutsche Bank subsidiary Alex Brown had played in insider trading. [39]</p>
<p>** I specifically asked financial journalist Max Keiser, who for years had worked on Wall Street as a stock and options trader, about the put option trades. Keiser pointed out in this context that he “had spoken with many brokers in the towers of the World Trade Center around that time. I heard firsthand about the airline put trade from brokers at Cantor Fitzgerald days before.” He then talked with me about an explosive issue, on which Ruppert elaborated in detail in Crossing the Rubicon.</p>
<p>Max Keiser: There are many aspects concerning these option purchases that have not been disclosed yet. I also worked at Alex Brown &amp; Sons (ABS). Deutsche Bank bought Alex Brown &amp; Sons in 1999. When the attacks occurred, ABS was owned by Deutsche Bank. An important person at ABS was Buzzy Krongard. I have met him several times at the offices in Baltimore. Krongard had transferred to become executive director at the CIA. The option purchases, in which ABS was involved, occurred in the offices of ABS in Baltimore. The noise which occurred between Baltimore, New York City and Langley was interesting, as you can imagine, to say the least.</p>
<p>Under consideration here is the fact that Alex Brown, a subsidiary of Deutsche Bank (where many of the alleged 9/11 hijackers handled their banking transactions – for example Mohammed Atta) traded massive put options purchases on United Airlines Company UAL through the Chicago Board Option Exchange (CBOE) – “to the embarrassment of investigators”, as British newspaper The Independent reported. [7]</p>
<p>On September 12, the chairman of the board of Deutsche Bank Alex Brown, Mayo A Shattuck III, suddenly and quietly renounced his post, although he still had a three-year contract with an annual salary of several million US dollars. One could perceive that as somehow strange.</p>
<p>A few weeks later, the press spokesperson of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) at that time, Tom Crispell, declined all comments, when he was contacted for a report for Ruppert’s website From the Wilderness, and had being asked “whether the Treasury Department or FBI [Federal Bureau of Investigation] had questioned CIA executive director and former Deutsche Bank-Alex Brown CEO [chief executive officer], A B ‘Buzzy’ Krongard, about CIA monitoring of financial markets using PROMIS and his former position as overseer of Brown’s ‘private client’ relations.” [8]</p>
<p>Just before he was recruited personally by former CIA chief George Tenet for the CIA, Krongard supervised mainly private client banking at Alex Brown. [9]</p>
<p>In any case, after 9/11 on the first trading day, when the US stock markets were open again, the stock price of UAL declined by 43%. (The four aircraft hijacked on September 11 were American Airlines Flight 11, American Airlines Flight 77 and UAL flights 175 and 93.)</p>
<p />
<p /> | false | 1 | feeling one final thing left regarding research informed trading activities connection terror attacks september 11 2001 order close chapter journalistic work went back 911 stories involving deutsche bank alex brown considered journalistic obligation exercise diligence regard research ive done topic 911 insider trading one thing hadnt gone sufficiently enough far asked german bank statement two particular issues also noticed one else asked deutsche bank least could find anything suggested otherwise two issues become evident cite various emails moreover give relevant linkssources follow whole story want aware format bit unusual bit hard follow confident understand end december 31 2012 wrote email press department headquarters deutsche bank frankfurt germany dbpressedbcom included two relevant excerpts research media request deutsche bank alex brown 911 informed trading dear ladies gentlemen name lars schall freelance journalist finance earlier year ive published article asia times online biggest english news website asia topic alleged informed trading activities prior terror attacks september 11 2001 httpwwwatimescomatimesglobal_economync21dj05html article ive mentioned something strange occurred related deutsche banks computer systems new york city source investigative journalist michael c ruppert repeated story record video mine httpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcom20120409terrortrading911 since never seen deutsche bank officially asked would like ask comment specific story would also like ask comment fact alex brown subsidiary deutsche bank traded massive put options purchases united airlines company ual chicago board option exchange cboe kind regards lars schall excerpt lets get back subject destruction september 11 human life aircraft buildings destroyed new york city also data computers archives example several federal agencies occupied space building 7 world trade center including securities exchange commission floors 11 13 data could given information alleged 911 insider trading though seems unlikely backup existed elsewhere independent local computer systems fact technology companies commissioned recover damaged hard disks recovered debris dust ground zero one companies english company group convar precisely data rescue center german city pirmasens erik kirschbaum news agency reuters reported december 2001 convar time successfully restored information 32 computers supporting suspicions 911 transactions illegal suspicion inside information attack used send financial transaction commands authorizations belief amid chaos criminals would least good head start says convar director peter henschel 36 convar received costly orders according kirschbaums report companies pay 20000 30000 per rescued computer particular credit card companies sharp rise credit card transactions moving computer systems wtc shortly planes hit twin towers could criminal enterprise case get advance warning coincidence 100 million rushed computers disaster unfolded 37 companies convar active cooperated fbi data reconstructed passed fbi fbi according statutory mandate initiated investigation based data find carried transactions henschel optimistic time sources transactions would come light richard wagner convar employee told kirschbaum illegal transfers 100 million might made immediately disaster suspicion people advance knowledge approximate time plane crashes order move amounts exceeding 100 million says thought records transactions could traced main frames destroyed 38 wagners observation illegal financial transactions shortly wtc disaster matches observation ruppert describes crossing rubicon ruppert contacted employee deutsche bank survived wtc disaster leaving scene second aircraft hit target according employee five minutes attack entire deutsche bank computer system taken something external one office recognized every file downloaded lightning speed unknown location employee afraid life lost many friends september 11 well aware role deutsche bank subsidiary alex brown played insider trading 39 specifically asked financial journalist max keiser years worked wall street stock options trader put option trades keiser pointed context spoken many brokers towers world trade center around time heard firsthand airline put trade brokers cantor fitzgerald days talked explosive issue ruppert elaborated detail crossing rubicon max keiser many aspects concerning option purchases disclosed yet also worked alex brown amp sons abs deutsche bank bought alex brown amp sons 1999 attacks occurred abs owned deutsche bank important person abs buzzy krongard met several times offices baltimore krongard transferred become executive director cia option purchases abs involved occurred offices abs baltimore noise occurred baltimore new york city langley interesting imagine say least consideration fact alex brown subsidiary deutsche bank many alleged 911 hijackers handled banking transactions example mohammed atta traded massive put options purchases united airlines company ual chicago board option exchange cboe embarrassment investigators british newspaper independent reported 7 september 12 chairman board deutsche bank alex brown mayo shattuck iii suddenly quietly renounced post although still threeyear contract annual salary several million us dollars one could perceive somehow strange weeks later press spokesperson central intelligence agency cia time tom crispell declined comments contacted report rupperts website wilderness asked whether treasury department fbi federal bureau investigation questioned cia executive director former deutsche bankalex brown ceo chief executive officer b buzzy krongard cia monitoring financial markets using promis former position overseer browns private client relations 8 recruited personally former cia chief george tenet cia krongard supervised mainly private client banking alex brown 9 case 911 first trading day us stock markets open stock price ual declined 43 four aircraft hijacked september 11 american airlines flight 11 american airlines flight 77 ual flights 175 93 | 816 |
<p>Donald Trump’s meteoric rise has perplexed most pundits. Trump doesn’t fit into the traditional categories of GOP aspirants, so many have found it hard to say why he has risen and to discern whether he has a realistic shot at the nomination. The most common explanations are that he is either attracting tea-party conservatives or wooing the same bloc of socio-economically “downscale” voters that backed Ross Perot in 1992.</p>
<p>A close look at the data, however, shows that neither explanation is quite accurate. The polls indicate that Trump’s support is unusually balanced among the GOP’s ideological factions for a candidate this early in the race. While this superficially suggests that his chances of winning the nomination are better than commonly thought, an even closer look shows that Trump’s appeal is likely to be deep but very limited.</p>
<p>Trump’s early lead doesn’t mean as much as the media say, because presidential nominations are not the typical one-day primary. In a normal primary, a candidate can win the nomination with a small plurality in a multi-candidate field simply by getting one more vote than his closest rival. That’s why Matt Bevin became Kentucky’s Republican nominee for governor this year: In a four-way race, he received 83 votes more than the runner-up, securing victory with only 33 percent of the vote.</p>
<p>Presidential-nomination contests, by contrast, are a series of one-day votes held over many months. Since many candidates drop out after disappointing losses, a candidate can easily win early contests with small pluralities but get clobbered later on, as voters who would have supported rivals who dropped out swing toward another candidate.</p>
<p>This is what happened to Pat Buchanan in 1996: He won New Hampshire and finished second in Iowa, with about a quarter of the vote in each instance. But as other candidates dropped out, voters swung to Bob Dole, propelling him to easy wins in most subsequent contests. So the key question for Trump is whether he has a chance to build on his early lead — assuming he holds it — in later races as losing candidates drop out.</p>
<p>Virtually all the available poll data show that Trump is drawing his current support from across the center–right ideological spectrum. The six national polls that show how candidates fare among voters with different ideologies find that moderates, “somewhat conservatives,” and hard-core (“very”) conservative voters support him in roughly equal measures. All polls show Trump’s share of support from each faction within three points of his share of the total. Support from “movement conservatives” is far from the sole — or even the primary — reason for his rise.</p>
<p>The data from Iowa and New Hampshire also present a mixed message. Post-debate Iowa polls show Trump running best among moderates, while pre-debate New Hampshire polls show him running best among tea partiers and the very conservative, two groups whose adherents largely overlap. In neither case, however, does his support tilt so strongly toward one faction that he can be said to be that faction’s candidate.</p>
<p>Compare Trump’s profile with Ted Cruz’s. Many observers have interpreted Cruz’s refusal to criticize Trump as evidence that the two are competing for the same bloc of voters. Cruz’s support tilts heavily toward the most conservative wing of the party. The Public Policy Polling post-debate Iowa poll, for example, shows Cruz supported by 16 percent of voters whose most important criterion for a nominee is that he be the most conservative on the issues. Cruz gets only 4 percent among the larger group whose most important criterion is that the nominee be able to beat the eventual Democratic candidate. Trump, in contrast, gets 21 percent of those who want the most conservative candidate, and 16 percent of those who want to beat the Democrat.</p>
<p>Trump’s support is also evenly distributed among independents, and among Evangelicals and non-Evangelicals. Polls are mixed on whether he is significantly stronger among tea-party voters, but even surveys that find him with higher support among tea partiers than among all Republican-primary voters show that he has strong support among non–tea partiers as well. Cruz, by contrast, typically does very well among tea partiers and very poorly among non–tea partiers.</p>
<p>Trump often polls better among voters without a college degree (although this difference does not consistently carry over when voters are sorted by income). Voters without a college degree typically back Trump by two to four points more than his overall total; those with a college degree support him by two to four points less. This suggests that Trump’s support is slightly “downscale” in a way reminiscent of Perot’s. But the fact that Trump runs evenly among Republicans and independents, on the other hand, suggests that Trump and Perot are not quite the same: The latter was more popular among independents than among Republicans. The one poll that has asked whom voters would support in the event of a Clinton–Bush–Trump race found that the voters likeliest to back Trump were Republicans and very conservative voters. These voters largely stayed with Bush 41 in 1992, when Perot got 18 percent of the vote.</p>
<p>If these were all the data, we would have to conclude that Trump is currently a strong candidate to win the nomination. But these aren’t all the data, and other information suggests that Trump will have a very hard time building on his current support in later races.</p>
<p>We can see this from two other questions polls often ask — namely, whether voters have a favorable or unfavorable impression of a candidate and whether voters cannot support a candidate under any circumstances. Trump polls much more poorly on these questions than he does on questions of voter preference.</p>
<p>Trump’s favorable-to-unfavorable ratio is the lowest of the major candidates’. His positive rating always ranges between 52 and 44 percent, whether the poll is of national or state voters. His negative rating always ranges between 33 and 46 percent, and is usually in the 38–43 range. Most major Republican candidates are getting positive ratings in the 60s and low 70s, with negative ratings well below 20 percent. Even Jeb Bush has significantly higher positives and lower negatives than Trump. Christie, Graham, and Pataki are typically the only candidates thought of less highly than Trump.</p>
<p>Moreover, Trump receives the highest “would never vote for” ratings among the major candidates. A Quinnipiac national poll taken before the debate, for example, found that 30 percent of Republican-primary voters would never support Trump, the highest number among all the candidates. A late-July Fox national poll similarly found that 33 percent of GOP voters would never support Trump in the primary, a share that only Christie, Pataki, and Graham exceeded.</p>
<p>These data are even more troubling for Trump when we dig deeper. Sharp ideological differences are apparent in Trump’s favorable–unfavorable ratios, in contrast with the voter-preference question. His favorable rating exceeds his unfavorable one by roughly a 3–1 margin among tea partiers and a 2–1 margin among “very conservative” voters. “Somewhat conservatives” tend to split evenly, and moderates dislike him by a 55–40 percent margin.</p>
<p>Why is this problematic for Trump? Tea partiers and “very conservative” voters are a large minority, but a minority nonetheless. In primary states, exit polls show that moderates tend to constitute 30–40 percent of the total vote outside the Deep South, rising to 40–50 percent in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states. “Somewhat conservatives” tend to constitute 33–40 percent of Republican-primary voters in most states. Trump’s poor showing among these groups bodes ill for his ability to win outside the South and in midwestern caucus states once the early primaries have winnowed the candidates.</p>
<p>These ideological differences are mirrored in the measures of those who say they will never back Trump. In the Quinnipiac poll, only 19 percent of tea partiers said they would never back him. But that number rose to 22 percent among “very conservatives,” 26 percent among Evangelicals, 29 percent among “somewhat conservatives,” and a whopping 39 percent among moderates. Trump’s currently high vote shares among moderates and establishment conservatives, then, may represent a ceiling more than a floor.</p>
<p>There was also a strong gender gap among Trump’s supporters, even before the Megyn Kelly debate dustup. Men typically support Trump by at least three points more than his overall total, while women back him by two to six points less. Men also view Trump much more favorably than do women: Men tend to view him positively by a ten- to 20-point net margin, whereas women either split evenly or view him negatively by up to a ten-point net margin.</p>
<p>We see an even larger gender gap in answers to the “would never vote for” question. Before the debate, about 36 percent of women said they would never vote for Trump, compared with between 25 and 29 percent of men. One cannot imagine that women have become more favorable toward Trump since then.</p>
<p>The takeaway is pretty clear. Trump may have more appeal among tea-party and “very conservative” voters than among others, but he is primarily a protest candidate for the angry of all persuasions. Unless he can somehow persuade women, the college-educated, and those from the center and the center–left of the GOP to change their minds, he is very likely to find his upside limited as other candidates start to drop out, assuming that he is in for the duration. This suggests that an establishment alternative will still have the advantage, passions unleashed by Trump notwithstanding.</p>
<p>— Henry Olsen is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. This article also appears in the September 7, 2015, issue of National Review.</p> | false | 1 | donald trumps meteoric rise perplexed pundits trump doesnt fit traditional categories gop aspirants many found hard say risen discern whether realistic shot nomination common explanations either attracting teaparty conservatives wooing bloc socioeconomically downscale voters backed ross perot 1992 close look data however shows neither explanation quite accurate polls indicate trumps support unusually balanced among gops ideological factions candidate early race superficially suggests chances winning nomination better commonly thought even closer look shows trumps appeal likely deep limited trumps early lead doesnt mean much media say presidential nominations typical oneday primary normal primary candidate win nomination small plurality multicandidate field simply getting one vote closest rival thats matt bevin became kentuckys republican nominee governor year fourway race received 83 votes runnerup securing victory 33 percent vote presidentialnomination contests contrast series oneday votes held many months since many candidates drop disappointing losses candidate easily win early contests small pluralities get clobbered later voters would supported rivals dropped swing toward another candidate happened pat buchanan 1996 new hampshire finished second iowa quarter vote instance candidates dropped voters swung bob dole propelling easy wins subsequent contests key question trump whether chance build early lead assuming holds later races losing candidates drop virtually available poll data show trump drawing current support across centerright ideological spectrum six national polls show candidates fare among voters different ideologies find moderates somewhat conservatives hardcore conservative voters support roughly equal measures polls show trumps share support faction within three points share total support movement conservatives far sole even primary reason rise data iowa new hampshire also present mixed message postdebate iowa polls show trump running best among moderates predebate new hampshire polls show running best among tea partiers conservative two groups whose adherents largely overlap neither case however support tilt strongly toward one faction said factions candidate compare trumps profile ted cruzs many observers interpreted cruzs refusal criticize trump evidence two competing bloc voters cruzs support tilts heavily toward conservative wing party public policy polling postdebate iowa poll example shows cruz supported 16 percent voters whose important criterion nominee conservative issues cruz gets 4 percent among larger group whose important criterion nominee able beat eventual democratic candidate trump contrast gets 21 percent want conservative candidate 16 percent want beat democrat trumps support also evenly distributed among independents among evangelicals nonevangelicals polls mixed whether significantly stronger among teaparty voters even surveys find higher support among tea partiers among republicanprimary voters show strong support among nontea partiers well cruz contrast typically well among tea partiers poorly among nontea partiers trump often polls better among voters without college degree although difference consistently carry voters sorted income voters without college degree typically back trump two four points overall total college degree support two four points less suggests trumps support slightly downscale way reminiscent perots fact trump runs evenly among republicans independents hand suggests trump perot quite latter popular among independents among republicans one poll asked voters would support event clintonbushtrump race found voters likeliest back trump republicans conservative voters voters largely stayed bush 41 1992 perot got 18 percent vote data would conclude trump currently strong candidate win nomination arent data information suggests trump hard time building current support later races see two questions polls often ask namely whether voters favorable unfavorable impression candidate whether voters support candidate circumstances trump polls much poorly questions questions voter preference trumps favorabletounfavorable ratio lowest major candidates positive rating always ranges 52 44 percent whether poll national state voters negative rating always ranges 33 46 percent usually 3843 range major republican candidates getting positive ratings 60s low 70s negative ratings well 20 percent even jeb bush significantly higher positives lower negatives trump christie graham pataki typically candidates thought less highly trump moreover trump receives highest would never vote ratings among major candidates quinnipiac national poll taken debate example found 30 percent republicanprimary voters would never support trump highest number among candidates latejuly fox national poll similarly found 33 percent gop voters would never support trump primary share christie pataki graham exceeded data even troubling trump dig deeper sharp ideological differences apparent trumps favorableunfavorable ratios contrast voterpreference question favorable rating exceeds unfavorable one roughly 31 margin among tea partiers 21 margin among conservative voters somewhat conservatives tend split evenly moderates dislike 5540 percent margin problematic trump tea partiers conservative voters large minority minority nonetheless primary states exit polls show moderates tend constitute 3040 percent total vote outside deep south rising 4050 percent northeast midatlantic states somewhat conservatives tend constitute 3340 percent republicanprimary voters states trumps poor showing among groups bodes ill ability win outside south midwestern caucus states early primaries winnowed candidates ideological differences mirrored measures say never back trump quinnipiac poll 19 percent tea partiers said would never back number rose 22 percent among conservatives 26 percent among evangelicals 29 percent among somewhat conservatives whopping 39 percent among moderates trumps currently high vote shares among moderates establishment conservatives may represent ceiling floor also strong gender gap among trumps supporters even megyn kelly debate dustup men typically support trump least three points overall total women back two six points less men also view trump much favorably women men tend view positively ten 20point net margin whereas women either split evenly view negatively tenpoint net margin see even larger gender gap answers would never vote question debate 36 percent women said would never vote trump compared 25 29 percent men one imagine women become favorable toward trump since takeaway pretty clear trump may appeal among teaparty conservative voters among others primarily protest candidate angry persuasions unless somehow persuade women collegeeducated center centerleft gop change minds likely find upside limited candidates start drop assuming duration suggests establishment alternative still advantage passions unleashed trump notwithstanding henry olsen senior fellow ethics public policy center article also appears september 7 2015 issue national review | 960 |
<p>James Corden’s “Carpool Karaoke Primetime Special” has won the Emmy for variety special, kicking off the 69th annual Creative Arts Emmy Awards at the Microsoft Theater in downtown Los Angeles.</p>
<p>SEE MORE: <a href="http://variety.com/e/contenders/" type="external">Awards: The Contenders</a></p>
<p>The non-televised award categories will be handed out tonight and on Sunday, followed on Sept. 17 by CBS’ live telecast of the Primetime Emmy Awards.</p>
<p>Follow all the action and the winners at Variety.com. Here’s a list of the categories to be presented tonight.</p>
<p>Variety Special“Carpool Karaoke Primetime Special 2017” (CBS)</p>
<p>Writing for a Variety SpecialSamantha Bee, Jo Miller, Ashley Nicole Black, Patt Cassels, Eric Drysdale, Mathan Erhardt, Travon Free, Joe Grossman, Miles Kahn &amp; Melinda Taub (“Full Frontal with Samantha Bee Presents Not the White House Correspondents’ Dinner”)</p>
<p>Directing for a Variety Special&#160;Glenn Weiss (“The Oscars”)</p>
<p>Lighting Design/ Lighting Direction for a Variety Special&#160;Robert Barnhart, David Grill, Pete Radice &amp; Jason Rudolph (“Super Bowl LI Halftime Show Starring Lady Gaga”)</p>
<p>Casting for a Reality ProgramSasha Alpert &amp; Megan Sleeper (“Born This Way”)</p>
<p>Costumes for Variety, Nonfiction or Reality Programming&#160;Zaldy Goco &amp; Perry Meek (“RuPaul’s Drag Race”)</p>
<p>Picture Editing for a Structured or Competition Reality ProgramJohn Lim &amp; Michael Roha (“RuPaul’s Drag Race”)</p>
<p>Cinematography for a Reality ProgramPeter Rieveschl, Alan Weeks, Petr Cikhart, Ryan O’Donnell &amp; Joshua Gitersonke (“The Amazing Race”)Bruce Ready (“Born This Way”)David Reichert, Dave Arnold, Kelvon Agee, Josh Thomas &amp; Todd Stanley (“Deadliest Catch”)Mike Cheeseman, John Griber, Simeon Houtman, Terry Pratt, Danny Day &amp; Ben Mullin (“Life Below Zero”)Cinematography Team (“Survivor”)</p>
<p>Hairstyling for a Multi-Camera Series or Special&#160;Mary Guerrero, Kimi Messina, Gail Ryan, Derrick Spruill, Rene Vaca &amp; Patricia Pineda (“Dancing with the Stars”)Miia Kovero, Terry Baliel, Roxane Griffin, Lawrence Davis, Jill Crosby &amp; Joy Zapata (“Hairspray Live!”)Gabriel Villarreal &amp; Hector Pocasangre (“RuPaul’s Drag Race”)Jodi Mancuso, Jennifer Serio, Inga Thrasher, Joe Whitmeyer, Cara Hannah Sullivan &amp; Christen Edwards (“Saturday Night Live”)Jerilynn Stephens, Meagan Herrera-Schaff, Cory Rotenberg, Anna Maria Orzano, Stacey Morris &amp; Darbie Wieczorek (“The Voice”)</p>
<p>k and Michelle Obama”)</p>
<p>Lighting Design/ Lighting Direction for a Variety SeriesNoah Mitz, Ryan Tanker, Mike Berger, Andrew Webberley &amp; Matthew Benson (“America’s Got Talent”)Simon Miles, Matthew Cotter, Suzanne Sotelo &amp; Matt McAdam (“Dancing With the Stars”)Phil Hymes, Geoff Amoral &amp; Rick McGuinness (“Saturday Night Live”)Robert Barnhart, Matt Firestone, Patrick Boozer &amp; Pete Radice (“So You Think You Can Dance”)Oscar Dominguez, Sam Barker, Daniel Boland &amp; Johnny Bradley (“The Voice”)</p>
<p>Production Design for a Variety, Nonfiction, Reality or Reality-Competition SeriesJames Pearse Connelly, Lydia Smyth &amp; Stephanie Hines Trigg (“Bill Nye Saves the World”)Chloe Arbiture, Monica Soto &amp; Rae Deslich (“Drunk History”)Schuyler Telleen &amp; Katherine Isom (“Portlandia”)Eugene Lee, Akira Yoshimura, Keith Ian Raywood &amp; N. Joseph DeTullio (“Saturday Night Live”)Anton Goss, James Pearse Connelly, Zeya Maurer, Brittany MacWhorter &amp; Stephanie Hines (“The Voice”)</p>
<p>Animated Program&#160;“Archer” (FX Networks)“Bob’s Burgers” (FOX)“Elena and the Secret of Avalor (Sofia the First)” (Disney Channel)“The Simpsons” (FOX)“South Park” (Comedy Central)</p>
<p>Character Voice-Over Performance&#160;Dee Bradley Baker (“American Dad!”)Kevin Kline (“Bob’s Burgers”)Kristen Schaal (“BoJack Horseman”)Mo Collins (“F is for Family”)Seth MacFarlane (“Family Guy”)Nancy Cartwright (“The Simpsons”)</p>
<p>Choreography&#160;Derek Hough (“Dancing with the Stars”)Mandy Moore (“Dancing with the Stars”)Fred Tallaksen (“The Real O’Neals”)Travis Wall (“So You Think You Can Dance”)Mandy Moore (“So You Think You Can Dance”)</p>
<p>Cinematography for a Nonfiction ProgramTodd Lieber &amp; Zach Zamboni (“Anthony Bourdain Parts Unknown”)Will Basanta (“Chef’s Table”)Nick Higgins (“O.J.: Made In America”)Cinematography Team (“Planet Earth II: Cities”)Cinematography Team (“Planet Earth II: Islands”)Hans Charles &amp; Kira Kelly (“13th”)</p>
<p>Creative Achievement in Interactive Media Within an Unscripted ProgramJohn Najarian &amp; Darren Hand (“E! Live 360”)Meghan de Boer, Rich Preuss, Teeny Stillings, Augie Vargas &amp; Shelby Sundling Lathrop (“The Oscars: All Access”)Eric Gurian, Evan Jonigkeit, Jerry Kupfer, Jack Burditt &amp; Nick Bernardone (“Stand For Rights: A Benefit for the ACLU with Tom Hanks”)Stand Up To Cancer: A Program of the Entratainment Industry Foundation, Done + Dusted Inc., Telescope Inc., Blue State Digital &amp; ID-PR (“Stand Up to Cancer: #Reasons2StandUp”)NBC (“The Voice on Snapchat Now Show”)</p>
<p>Directing for a Nonfiction ProgramAlexis Bloom and Fisher Stevens (“Bright Lights: Starring Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds”)Ezra Edelman (“O.J.: Made in America”)Fredi Devas (“Planet Earth II”)Elizabeth White (“Planet Earth II”)Ava DuVernay (“13th”)</p>
<p>Documentary or Nonfiction Series“American Masters” (PBS)“Chef’s Table” (Netflix)“The Keepers” (Netflix)“Planet Earth II” (BBC America)“30 for 30” (ESPN)</p>
<p>Documentary or Nonfiction Special&#160;“Amanda Knox” (Netflix)“The Beatles: Eight Days a Week – The Touring Years” (Hulu)“A House Divided (Vice Special Report)” (HBO)“L.A. Burning: The Riots 25 Years Later” (A&amp;E)“13th” (Netflix)</p>
<p>Documentary FilmmakingAlexis Bloom, Fisher Stevens, Sheila Nevins, Brett Ratner &amp; Nancy Abraham (“Bright Lights: Starring Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds”)TJ Martin, Dan Lindsay, Jonathan Chinn &amp; Simon Chinn (“LA 92”)Ezra Edelman, Caroline Waterlow, Connor Schell, Libby Geist, Tamara Rosenberg &amp; Nina Krstic (“O.J.: Made In America”)Barak Goodman, Emily Singer Chapman, Mark Samels &amp; Susan Bellows (“Oklahoma City (American Experience)”)Joanna Natasegara (“The White Helmets”)</p>
<p>Host for a Reality/Reality-Competition ProgramAlec Baldwin (“Match Game”)W. Kamau Bell (“United Shades Of America With W. Kamau Bell)RuPaul Charles (“RuPaul’s Drag Race)Heidi Klum and Tim Gunn (“Project Runway)Gordon Ramsay (“MasterChef Junior)Martha Stewart and Snoop Dogg (“Martha &amp; Snoop’s Potluck Dinner Party”)</p>
<p>Informational Series or Special“Anthony Bourdain Parts Unknown” (CNN)“Inside The Actors Studio” (Bravo)“Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath” (A&amp;E)“StarTalk with Neil deGrasse Tyson” (National Geographic)“Vice” (HBO)</p>
<p>Interactive ProgramCarol Ray Hartsell, Kim Burdges, Ana Breton, Caroline Schaper &amp; Brittany Van Horne (“Full Frontal with Samantha Bee Online”)Partially Important Productions (“Last Week Tonight with John Oliver”)James Corden, Ben Winston, Rob Crabbe &amp; Adam Abramson (“The Late Late Show with James Corden”)NBC (“Saturday Night Live Multiplatform Experience”)Jimmy Fallon, Marina Cockenberg, Felicia Daniels &amp; Tonight Show Social Team (“The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon”)</p>
<p>Original Interactive ProgramDisney/ ABC Television Group &amp; Kids Digital Media (“Amigo to the Rescue: Disney Junior Interactive Show”)Oculus Story Studio (“Dear Angelica”)Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Jared Geller, ACLU &amp; Hitrecord (“Hitrecord x ACLU: Are You There Democracy? It’s Me, The Internet”)Ben Grossmann, Adrian Sciutto, Amaresh Kollipara, David Swift &amp; Oculus (“Mission: ISS”)Felix &amp; Paul Studios (“The People’s House – Inside the White House With Barack and Michelle Obama”)</p>
<p>Lighting Design/ Lighting Direction for a Variety SeriesNoah Mitz, Ryan Tanker, Mike Berger, Andrew Webberley &amp; Matthew Benson (“America’s Got Talent”)Simon Miles, Matthew Cotter, Suzanne Sotelo &amp; Matt McAdam (“Dancing With the Stars”)Phil Hymes, Geoff Amoral &amp; Rick McGuinness (“Saturday Night Live”)Robert Barnhart, Matt Firestone, Patrick Boozer &amp; Pete Radice (“So You Think You Can Dance”)Oscar Dominguez, Sam Barker, Daniel Boland &amp; Johnny Bradley (“The Voice”)</p>
<p>Makeup for a Multi-Camera Series or Special (Non-Prosthetic)Zena Shteysel, Angela Moos, Julie Socash, Patti-Ramsey Bortoli, Sara Woolf, Donna Bard (“Dancing with the Stars” — “Halloween Night”)Melanie Hughes, Judy Yonemoto, Jill Cady, Julie Socash, Shutchai Tym Buacharern, Angela Moos (“Hairspray Live!”)Jennifer Aspinall, Scott G. Wheeler, David Williams, James Rohland, Ned Niedhardt (“MADtv” — “Episode #1.4”)David Petruschin (“RuPaul’s Drag Race” — “Oh. My Gaga!”)Louie Zakarian, Amy Tagliamonti, Jason Milani, Daniela Zivcovic, Rachel Pagani, Andrew Sotomeyer (“Saturday Night Live” — “Host: Alec Baldwin”)Darcy Gilmore, Kristene Bernard, Thea Samuels, Gina Ghiglieri, Diane Mayo, Jackie Dobbie (“The Voice” — “Live Playoffs, Night 1”)</p>
<p>OUTSTANDING MOTION DESIGN</p>
<p>Music DirectionBernard MacMahon, Duke Erikson, Jack White, T Bone Burnett (“American Epic” — “The American Epic Sessions”)David Lai (“Joshua Bell: Seasons of Cuba (Live from Lincoln Center)”)Rickey Minor (“Stayin’ Alive: A Grammy Salute to The Music of The Bee Jees”)Michael Bearden (“Super Bowl LI Halftime Show Starring Lady Gaga”)Rickey Minor (“Taking the Stage: African American Music And Stories That Changed America”)Tom Scott (“Tony Bennett Celebrates 90: The Best Is Yet To Come”)</p>
<p>Original Music and LyricsAdam Schlesinger, Rachel Bloom, Jack Dolgen (“Crazy Ex Girlfriend” — “We Tapped That Ass”)Christopher Willis, Darrick Bachman, Paul Rudish (“Duck the Halls: A Mickey Mouse Christmas Special” — “Jing-A-Ling-A-Ling”)Jonathan Kimmel, Gary Greenberg (“Jimmy Kimmel Live” — “The Ballad of Claus Jorstad (Devil Stool)”)Eli Brueggemann, Chancelor Johnathan Bennett, Kenan Thompson, Will Stephen (“Saturday Night Live” — “Last Christmas”)Common, Robert Glasper, Karriem Riggins (“13th” — “Letter to the Free”)Jeff Richmond, Tina Fey, Sam Means (“Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt” — “Hell No”)</p>
<p>NarratorMeryl Streep (“Five Came Back” — “The Price Of Victory”)Liev Schreiber (“Muhammad Ali: Only One”)Liev Schreiber (“UConn: The March To Madness” — “Episode 1”)Sam Neill (“Wild New Zealand”)Ewan McGregor (“Wild Scotland”)Laurence Fishburne (“Year Million”)</p>
<p>Picture Editing for an Unstructured Reality ProgramJarrod Burt, Jacob Lane, Stephanie Lyra, M’Daya Meliani, Paul Cross, Dave McIntosh &amp; Ryan Rambach (“Dream Come True”)Peggy Tachdjian, Tonya Noll, Jacob Lane &amp; Jarrod Burt (“Oh Baby!”)Daysha M. Broadway, Dan Zimmerman, Jacob Lane, Jarrod Burt, M’Daya Meliani &amp; Ryan Rambach (“Born This Way”)Josh Earl, Rob Butler, Nathen Araiza &amp; Ben Bulatao (“Deadliest Catch”)Ian Richardson, Tony Diaz, Eric Michael Schrader &amp; Matt Mercer (“Life Below Zero”)</p>
<p>Picture Editing for a Nonfiction Program&#160;Paul Crowder (“The Beatles: Eight Days A Week – The Touring Years”)Bret Granato, Maya Mumma &amp; Ben Sozanski (“O.J.: Made in America”)Dave Pearce (“Planet Earth II”)Matt Meech (“Planet Earth II”)Spencer Averick (“13th”)Joe Langford, Richard Lowe, Denny Thomas (“Vice”)</p>
<p>Picture Editing for Variety Program&#160;Robert James Ashe, Christopher Heller, Meaghan Wilbur &amp; David Grecu (“Conan In Berlin”)Aaron Morris (“Drunk History”)Ryan Barger (“Last Week Tonight With John Oliver”)Anthony Miale (“Last Week Tonight With John Oliver”)Adam Epstein (“Saturday Night Live”)</p>
<p>Production Design for a Variety Nonfiction, Event or Award SpecialJohn Yeck (“Full Frontal with Samanta Bee Presents Not The White House Correspondents’ Dinner”)Brian Stonestreet &amp; John Zuiker (“74th Annual Golden Globes”)Derek McLane, Joe Celli &amp; Jason Howard (“Hairspray Live!”)Derek McLane &amp; Alana Billingsley (“The Oscars”)Bruce Rodgers, LeRoy Bennett, Shelley Rodgers &amp; Lindsey Breslauer (“Super Bowl LI Halftime Show Starring Lady Gaga”)</p>
<p>Short Form Animated Program“Adventure Time” (Cartoon Network)“Disney Mickey Mouse” (Disney Channel)Marvel’s Rocket &amp; Groot (“Disney XD App)“Steven Universe” (Cartoon Network)“Teen Titans Go!” (Cartoon Network)</p>
<p>Short Form Nonfiction or Reality Series“Creating Saturday Night Live” (NBC)“Feud: Bette and Joan: Inside Look” (FX.com)“Jay Leno’s Garage” (nbc.com)“National Endowment for the Arts: United States of Arts” (arts.gov)“Viceland at the Women’s March” (Viceland)</p>
<p>Short Form Variety Series“Behind The Voice”(YouTube)“The Daily Show – Between the Scenes” (TheDailyShow.com)“Epic Rap Battles of History” (YouTube)“Honest Trailers” (YouTube)“The Star Wars Show” (YouTube)</p>
<p>Sound Editing for a Nonfiction Program (Single Camera)Benny Mouthon (“Anthony Bourdain Parts Unknown”)Jon Michaels, Harrison Meyle, Dan Kenyon, Will Digby &amp; Melissa Muik (“The Beatles: Eight Days a Week – The Touring Years”)David Crocco &amp; Rolando Nadal (“Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath”)Kate Hopkins &amp; Tim Owens (“Planet Earth II”)Tim Boggs, Alex Lee, Julie Pierce &amp; Lise Richardson (“13th”)</p>
<p>Sound Mixing For a Variety Special Series or SpecialJosh Morton, Thomas Holmes, Mikael Stewart, Eric Schilling, John Harris, Ron Reaves, Thomas Pesa, Michael Parker, Eric Johnston, Pablo Munguia, Bob LaMasney (“59th Grammy Awards”)Steve Watson, Charlie Jones, Steve Lettie, Jonathan Herrera (“Last Week Tonight with John Oliver” — “Sub-Prime Auto Loans”)Kristian Pedregon, Paul Sandweiss, Tommy Vicari, Pablo Munguia, Pat Baltzell, Michael Parker, Bob LaMasney, John Perez, Tom Pesa, Brian Flanzbaum (“The Oscars”)Al Centrella, Susan Pelino, Jay Vicari, Dave Natale, Erik Von Ranson, Simon Welch (“2017 Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame Induction Ceremony”)Paul Sandweiss, Christian Schrader, Alex Guessard, Simon Higgs, Tom Pesa, Paul Ramsay, Pablo Munguia, Andre Bowman (“Super Bowl LI Halftime Show Starring Lady Gaga”)Ryan Young, Brian Riordan, Michael Abbott, Eric White, Tim Hatayama, Randy Faustino, Kenyata Westbrook, Sterling Cross, Robert P. Matthews Jr., John Koster, Andrew Fletcher, Christian Schrader, Carlos Torres, William Dietzman, Michael Bernard (“The Voice” — “Season Finale”)</p>
<p>Sound Mixing For a Nonfiction Program (Single or Multi-Camera)Brian Bracken (“Anthony Bourdain Parts Unknown” — “Rome”)Chris Jenkins, Cameron Frankley, Nathan Evans, Sam O’Kell (“The Beatles: Eight Days A Week – The Touring Years”)Keith Hodne, Eric Di Stefano (“O.J.: Made In America” — “Part 2”)Graham Wild (“Planet Earth II” — “Cities”)Jeffrey Perkins (“13th”)</p>
<p>Special Class Program“Hairspray Live!” (NBC)“The Oscars” (ABC)“Super Bowl LI Halftime Show Starring Lady Gaga” (FOX)“7th Annual Tony Awards” (CBS)</p>
<p>Structured Reality Program“Antiques Roadshow” (PBS)“Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives” (Food Network)“Fixer Upper” (HGTV)“Lip Sync Battle” (Spike TV)“Shark Tank” (ABC)“Who Do You Think You Are” (TLC)</p>
<p>Technical Direction, Camerawork, Video Control For A Limited Series, Movie, or SpecialOleg Sekulovski, Taylor Campanian, Jordan Harriman, Scott Acosta, Joel Binger, Scott Daniels, Joshua Gitersonke,Peter Hutchison, Scott Kaye, Mark McIntire, Ed Nelson, James Velarde (“Carpool Karaoke Primetime Special 2017”)Charles Ciup, Billy Steinberg, Chris Hill, Bert Atkinson, Randy Gomez, Nathanial Havholm, Ron Lehman, Bettina Levesque, Dave Levisohn, Tore Livia, Mike Malone, Adam Margolis, Rob Palmer, Brian Reason, Damien Tuffereau, Andrew Waruszewski (“Hairspray Live!”)Eric Becker, Kenneth Shapiro, John Pritchett, Guy Jones, Terrance Ho, Keith Winikoff, Robert Del Russo, David Eastwood, Ralph Bolton, Jr., David Carline, Jay Kulick, Dan Webb, Shaun Harkins, Garrett Hurt, Toré Livia, Allen Merriweather, Lyn Noland, Fred Frederick, Jr., George Prince, Mark Whitman, Rob Balton, Danny Bonilla, Rob Palmer, David Plakos, Easter Xua, Devin Atwood (“The Oscars”)Rod Wardell, Eric Becker, Guy P. Jones, Rob Levy, Stephen Dressman, Brian Neher, Steven Leotta, Jimmy Lucas, Lyn Noland, Jay Kulick, Robert Delrusso, Robert Balton, Kevin French, Jofre Rosero, Tore Livia, Mark Whitman, Vinnie Scaffidi, Ed Horton, Dave Levisohn, Phil Jaques, Buzz Schwing, Jeff Cuales, Mike Dranes, Dan Gibbons, Dave Elendt (“Super Bowl LI Halftime Show Starring Lady Gaga”)Eric Becker, Mike Anderson, J.M. Hurley, Ka Lai Wong, Rob Balton, Bob Del Russo, Charlie Huntley, Ernie Jew, Jay Kulick, Tore Livia, John Meiklejohn, Lyn Noland, Jimmy O’Donnell, Mark Whitman, Shaun Harkins, Jim Tufaro, Joe DeBonis (“70th Annual Tony Awards”)</p>
<p>Technical Direction, Camerawork, Video Control for a SeriesJohn D. O’Brien, John Pierre Dechene, Richard G. Price, James L. Hitchcock, Brian Wayne Armstrong, Nick Gomez (“The Big Bang Theory”)Charles Cuip, Chris Hill, Ed Moore, Brian Reason, Ron Lehman, Nathanial Havholm, Bettina Levesque, Bert Atkinson, Daryl Studebaker, Adam Margolis, Damien Tuffereau, Andy Waruszewski, Mike Malone, Mike Carr, Rob Palmer, Keith Dicker, Freddy Frederick, Ed Horton, Helena Jackson (“Dancing with the Stars”)Dave Saretsky, Augie Yuson, Dante Pagano, John Harrison, Rob Balton, Jeff Latonero, Jerry Cancel (“Last Week Tonight with John Oliver” — “Gerrymandering”)Steven Cimino, John Pinto, Paul Cangialosi, Len Wechsler, Eric Eisenstein, Dave Driscoll, Susan Noll, Frank Grisanti, Jeff Latonero, Ann Bergstrom, Randy Bittle (“Saturday Night Live” — “Host: Jimmy Fallon”)Allan Wells, Terrance Ho, Diane Biederbeck, Danny Bonilla, Suzanne Ebner, Gudio Frenzel, Alex Hernandez, Dave Hilmer, Marc Hunter, Scott Hylton, Katherine Iacofono, Scott Kaye, Ron Lehman, Steve Martynuk, John Perry, Jofre Rosero, Steve Simmons (“The Voice” — “Live Finale (Part 2)”)</p>
<p>Unstructured Reality Program“Born This Way” (A&amp;E)“Deadliest Catch” (Discovery Channel)“Gaycation With Ellen Page” (Viceland)“Intervention” (A&amp;E)“RuPaul’s Drag Race: Untucked” (YouTube)“United Shades Of America: With W. Kamau Bell” (CNN)</p>
<p>Writing for a Nonfiction ProgramMatthew Hamachek and Brian McGinn (“Amanda Knox”)Anthony Bourdain (“Anthony Bourdain Parts Unknown”)Mark Monroe (“The Beatles: Eight Days a Week – The Touring Years”)Prashanth Venkataramanujam, CeCe Pleasants, Sanden Totten, Mike Drucker &amp; Flora Lichtman (“Bill Nye Saves the World”)Ava DuVernay &amp; Spencer Averick (“13th”)</p> | false | 1 | james cordens carpool karaoke primetime special emmy variety special kicking 69th annual creative arts emmy awards microsoft theater downtown los angeles see awards contenders nontelevised award categories handed tonight sunday followed sept 17 cbs live telecast primetime emmy awards follow action winners varietycom heres list categories presented tonight variety specialcarpool karaoke primetime special 2017 cbs writing variety specialsamantha bee jo miller ashley nicole black patt cassels eric drysdale mathan erhardt travon free joe grossman miles kahn amp melinda taub full frontal samantha bee presents white house correspondents dinner directing variety special160glenn weiss oscars lighting design lighting direction variety special160robert barnhart david grill pete radice amp jason rudolph super bowl li halftime show starring lady gaga casting reality programsasha alpert amp megan sleeper born way costumes variety nonfiction reality programming160zaldy goco amp perry meek rupauls drag race picture editing structured competition reality programjohn lim amp michael roha rupauls drag race cinematography reality programpeter rieveschl alan weeks petr cikhart ryan odonnell amp joshua gitersonke amazing racebruce ready born waydavid reichert dave arnold kelvon agee josh thomas amp todd stanley deadliest catchmike cheeseman john griber simeon houtman terry pratt danny day amp ben mullin life zerocinematography team survivor hairstyling multicamera series special160mary guerrero kimi messina gail ryan derrick spruill rene vaca amp patricia pineda dancing starsmiia kovero terry baliel roxane griffin lawrence davis jill crosby amp joy zapata hairspray livegabriel villarreal amp hector pocasangre rupauls drag racejodi mancuso jennifer serio inga thrasher joe whitmeyer cara hannah sullivan amp christen edwards saturday night livejerilynn stephens meagan herreraschaff cory rotenberg anna maria orzano stacey morris amp darbie wieczorek voice k michelle obama lighting design lighting direction variety seriesnoah mitz ryan tanker mike berger andrew webberley amp matthew benson americas got talentsimon miles matthew cotter suzanne sotelo amp matt mcadam dancing starsphil hymes geoff amoral amp rick mcguinness saturday night liverobert barnhart matt firestone patrick boozer amp pete radice think danceoscar dominguez sam barker daniel boland amp johnny bradley voice production design variety nonfiction reality realitycompetition seriesjames pearse connelly lydia smyth amp stephanie hines trigg bill nye saves worldchloe arbiture monica soto amp rae deslich drunk historyschuyler telleen amp katherine isom portlandiaeugene lee akira yoshimura keith ian raywood amp n joseph detullio saturday night liveanton goss james pearse connelly zeya maurer brittany macwhorter amp stephanie hines voice animated program160archer fx networksbobs burgers foxelena secret avalor sofia first disney channelthe simpsons foxsouth park comedy central character voiceover performance160dee bradley baker american dadkevin kline bobs burgerskristen schaal bojack horsemanmo collins f familyseth macfarlane family guynancy cartwright simpsons choreography160derek hough dancing starsmandy moore dancing starsfred tallaksen real onealstravis wall think dancemandy moore think dance cinematography nonfiction programtodd lieber amp zach zamboni anthony bourdain parts unknownwill basanta chefs tablenick higgins oj made americacinematography team planet earth ii citiescinematography team planet earth ii islandshans charles amp kira kelly 13th creative achievement interactive media within unscripted programjohn najarian amp darren hand e live 360meghan de boer rich preuss teeny stillings augie vargas amp shelby sundling lathrop oscars accesseric gurian evan jonigkeit jerry kupfer jack burditt amp nick bernardone stand rights benefit aclu tom hanksstand cancer program entratainment industry foundation done dusted inc telescope inc blue state digital amp idpr stand cancer reasons2standupnbc voice snapchat show directing nonfiction programalexis bloom fisher stevens bright lights starring carrie fisher debbie reynoldsezra edelman oj made americafredi devas planet earth iielizabeth white planet earth iiava duvernay 13th documentary nonfiction seriesamerican masters pbschefs table netflixthe keepers netflixplanet earth ii bbc america30 30 espn documentary nonfiction special160amanda knox netflixthe beatles eight days week touring years hulua house divided vice special report hbola burning riots 25 years later aampe13th netflix documentary filmmakingalexis bloom fisher stevens sheila nevins brett ratner amp nancy abraham bright lights starring carrie fisher debbie reynoldstj martin dan lindsay jonathan chinn amp simon chinn la 92ezra edelman caroline waterlow connor schell libby geist tamara rosenberg amp nina krstic oj made americabarak goodman emily singer chapman mark samels amp susan bellows oklahoma city american experiencejoanna natasegara white helmets host realityrealitycompetition programalec baldwin match gamew kamau bell united shades america w kamau bellrupaul charles rupauls drag raceheidi klum tim gunn project runwaygordon ramsay masterchef juniormartha stewart snoop dogg martha amp snoops potluck dinner party informational series specialanthony bourdain parts unknown cnninside actors studio bravoleah remini scientology aftermath aampestartalk neil degrasse tyson national geographicvice hbo interactive programcarol ray hartsell kim burdges ana breton caroline schaper amp brittany van horne full frontal samantha bee onlinepartially important productions last week tonight john oliverjames corden ben winston rob crabbe amp adam abramson late late show james cordennbc saturday night live multiplatform experiencejimmy fallon marina cockenberg felicia daniels amp tonight show social team tonight show starring jimmy fallon original interactive programdisney abc television group amp kids digital media amigo rescue disney junior interactive showoculus story studio dear angelicajoseph gordonlevitt jared geller aclu amp hitrecord hitrecord x aclu democracy internetben grossmann adrian sciutto amaresh kollipara david swift amp oculus mission issfelix amp paul studios peoples house inside white house barack michelle obama lighting design lighting direction variety seriesnoah mitz ryan tanker mike berger andrew webberley amp matthew benson americas got talentsimon miles matthew cotter suzanne sotelo amp matt mcadam dancing starsphil hymes geoff amoral amp rick mcguinness saturday night liverobert barnhart matt firestone patrick boozer amp pete radice think danceoscar dominguez sam barker daniel boland amp johnny bradley voice makeup multicamera series special nonprostheticzena shteysel angela moos julie socash pattiramsey bortoli sara woolf donna bard dancing stars halloween nightmelanie hughes judy yonemoto jill cady julie socash shutchai tym buacharern angela moos hairspray livejennifer aspinall scott g wheeler david williams james rohland ned niedhardt madtv episode 14david petruschin rupauls drag race oh gagalouie zakarian amy tagliamonti jason milani daniela zivcovic rachel pagani andrew sotomeyer saturday night live host alec baldwindarcy gilmore kristene bernard thea samuels gina ghiglieri diane mayo jackie dobbie voice live playoffs night 1 outstanding motion design music directionbernard macmahon duke erikson jack white bone burnett american epic american epic sessionsdavid lai joshua bell seasons cuba live lincoln centerrickey minor stayin alive grammy salute music bee jeesmichael bearden super bowl li halftime show starring lady gagarickey minor taking stage african american music stories changed americatom scott tony bennett celebrates 90 best yet come original music lyricsadam schlesinger rachel bloom jack dolgen crazy ex girlfriend tapped asschristopher willis darrick bachman paul rudish duck halls mickey mouse christmas special jingalingalingjonathan kimmel gary greenberg jimmy kimmel live ballad claus jorstad devil stooleli brueggemann chancelor johnathan bennett kenan thompson stephen saturday night live last christmascommon robert glasper karriem riggins 13th letter freejeff richmond tina fey sam means unbreakable kimmy schmidt hell narratormeryl streep five came back price victoryliev schreiber muhammad ali oneliev schreiber uconn march madness episode 1sam neill wild new zealandewan mcgregor wild scotlandlaurence fishburne year million picture editing unstructured reality programjarrod burt jacob lane stephanie lyra mdaya meliani paul cross dave mcintosh amp ryan rambach dream come truepeggy tachdjian tonya noll jacob lane amp jarrod burt oh babydaysha broadway dan zimmerman jacob lane jarrod burt mdaya meliani amp ryan rambach born wayjosh earl rob butler nathen araiza amp ben bulatao deadliest catchian richardson tony diaz eric michael schrader amp matt mercer life zero picture editing nonfiction program160paul crowder beatles eight days week touring yearsbret granato maya mumma amp ben sozanski oj made americadave pearce planet earth iimatt meech planet earth iispencer averick 13thjoe langford richard lowe denny thomas vice picture editing variety program160robert james ashe christopher heller meaghan wilbur amp david grecu conan berlinaaron morris drunk historyryan barger last week tonight john oliveranthony miale last week tonight john oliveradam epstein saturday night live production design variety nonfiction event award specialjohn yeck full frontal samanta bee presents white house correspondents dinnerbrian stonestreet amp john zuiker 74th annual golden globesderek mclane joe celli amp jason howard hairspray livederek mclane amp alana billingsley oscarsbruce rodgers leroy bennett shelley rodgers amp lindsey breslauer super bowl li halftime show starring lady gaga short form animated programadventure time cartoon networkdisney mickey mouse disney channelmarvels rocket amp groot disney xd appsteven universe cartoon networkteen titans go cartoon network short form nonfiction reality seriescreating saturday night live nbcfeud bette joan inside look fxcomjay lenos garage nbccomnational endowment arts united states arts artsgovviceland womens march viceland short form variety seriesbehind voiceyoutubethe daily show scenes thedailyshowcomepic rap battles history youtubehonest trailers youtubethe star wars show youtube sound editing nonfiction program single camerabenny mouthon anthony bourdain parts unknownjon michaels harrison meyle dan kenyon digby amp melissa muik beatles eight days week touring yearsdavid crocco amp rolando nadal leah remini scientology aftermathkate hopkins amp tim owens planet earth iitim boggs alex lee julie pierce amp lise richardson 13th sound mixing variety special series specialjosh morton thomas holmes mikael stewart eric schilling john harris ron reaves thomas pesa michael parker eric johnston pablo munguia bob lamasney 59th grammy awardssteve watson charlie jones steve lettie jonathan herrera last week tonight john oliver subprime auto loanskristian pedregon paul sandweiss tommy vicari pablo munguia pat baltzell michael parker bob lamasney john perez tom pesa brian flanzbaum oscarsal centrella susan pelino jay vicari dave natale erik von ranson simon welch 2017 rock roll hall fame induction ceremonypaul sandweiss christian schrader alex guessard simon higgs tom pesa paul ramsay pablo munguia andre bowman super bowl li halftime show starring lady gagaryan young brian riordan michael abbott eric white tim hatayama randy faustino kenyata westbrook sterling cross robert p matthews jr john koster andrew fletcher christian schrader carlos torres william dietzman michael bernard voice season finale sound mixing nonfiction program single multicamerabrian bracken anthony bourdain parts unknown romechris jenkins cameron frankley nathan evans sam okell beatles eight days week touring yearskeith hodne eric di stefano oj made america part 2graham wild planet earth ii citiesjeffrey perkins 13th special class programhairspray live nbcthe oscars abcsuper bowl li halftime show starring lady gaga fox7th annual tony awards cbs structured reality programantiques roadshow pbsdiners driveins dives food networkfixer upper hgtvlip sync battle spike tvshark tank abcwho think tlc technical direction camerawork video control limited series movie specialoleg sekulovski taylor campanian jordan harriman scott acosta joel binger scott daniels joshua gitersonkepeter hutchison scott kaye mark mcintire ed nelson james velarde carpool karaoke primetime special 2017charles ciup billy steinberg chris hill bert atkinson randy gomez nathanial havholm ron lehman bettina levesque dave levisohn tore livia mike malone adam margolis rob palmer brian reason damien tuffereau andrew waruszewski hairspray liveeric becker kenneth shapiro john pritchett guy jones terrance ho keith winikoff robert del russo david eastwood ralph bolton jr david carline jay kulick dan webb shaun harkins garrett hurt toré livia allen merriweather lyn noland fred frederick jr george prince mark whitman rob balton danny bonilla rob palmer david plakos easter xua devin atwood oscarsrod wardell eric becker guy p jones rob levy stephen dressman brian neher steven leotta jimmy lucas lyn noland jay kulick robert delrusso robert balton kevin french jofre rosero tore livia mark whitman vinnie scaffidi ed horton dave levisohn phil jaques buzz schwing jeff cuales mike dranes dan gibbons dave elendt super bowl li halftime show starring lady gagaeric becker mike anderson jm hurley ka lai wong rob balton bob del russo charlie huntley ernie jew jay kulick tore livia john meiklejohn lyn noland jimmy odonnell mark whitman shaun harkins jim tufaro joe debonis 70th annual tony awards technical direction camerawork video control seriesjohn obrien john pierre dechene richard g price james l hitchcock brian wayne armstrong nick gomez big bang theorycharles cuip chris hill ed moore brian reason ron lehman nathanial havholm bettina levesque bert atkinson daryl studebaker adam margolis damien tuffereau andy waruszewski mike malone mike carr rob palmer keith dicker freddy frederick ed horton helena jackson dancing starsdave saretsky augie yuson dante pagano john harrison rob balton jeff latonero jerry cancel last week tonight john oliver gerrymanderingsteven cimino john pinto paul cangialosi len wechsler eric eisenstein dave driscoll susan noll frank grisanti jeff latonero ann bergstrom randy bittle saturday night live host jimmy fallonallan wells terrance ho diane biederbeck danny bonilla suzanne ebner gudio frenzel alex hernandez dave hilmer marc hunter scott hylton katherine iacofono scott kaye ron lehman steve martynuk john perry jofre rosero steve simmons voice live finale part 2 unstructured reality programborn way aampedeadliest catch discovery channelgaycation ellen page vicelandintervention aamperupauls drag race untucked youtubeunited shades america w kamau bell cnn writing nonfiction programmatthew hamachek brian mcginn amanda knoxanthony bourdain anthony bourdain parts unknownmark monroe beatles eight days week touring yearsprashanth venkataramanujam cece pleasants sanden totten mike drucker amp flora lichtman bill nye saves worldava duvernay amp spencer averick 13th | 2,079 |
<p>Chris Christie’s victory has predictably ignited talk of his seeking the presidency. Before his backers start reserving the moving van, though, it’s worth stepping back and calmly surveying what he’s accomplished. For all his notoriety and political acumen, neither his political nor his policy victories are directly translatable to the national stage.</p>
<p>Christie’s backers argue that his tremendous margin in a deep-blue state and his much-larger-than-normal support from blue-collar whites, women, and minorities show that his appeal transcends partisan boundaries. This contention, however, ignores the context in which those margins were obtained. Plenty of Republicans have done well in non-presidential elections among non-traditional GOP voters. Former New Jersey governor Tom Kean won nearly half of the black vote in 1985; former Jersey City mayor Bret Schundler won reelection in his heavily Democratic city because of his appeal among minorities. Neither result was a harbinger of future GOP success. Schundler was unable to transfer his city appeal to his statewide run for governor, and Kean’s accomplishment remains merely a ripple in an otherwise stagnant sea of GOP support among blacks.</p>
<p>The similar experience of former governor William Weld in Massachusetts is useful to recall. In 1994, this fiscally conservative, socially moderate Republican won reelection with almost 71 percent of the vote. He carried every county in the state, including Boston’s Suffolk County, in which he received 60.4 percent. National speculation grew that the GOP had a winner, and so Weld tried to take a step up to the presidency by challenging Senator John Kerry in 1996.</p>
<p>Weld lost that race by seven and a half points, 52.2 to 44.7 percent, and the race’s geographic breakdown mirrored national election trends rather than those Weld had had in 1994. Weld lost Suffolk by over 30 points, getting barely 30 percent, and dropped over 25 points in most other counties. Voters who were willing to pull the lever for a Republican for a state reelection were unwilling to do so when national issues were thrust to the fore.</p>
<p>The real question Christie backers need to ask is whether Christie’s New Jersey accomplishment translates well to the national level. On that score, I’d invoke ancient Scottish law and say the verdict is not proven.</p>
<p>Christie owes his state dominance and national fame to two acts. First, he limited public-employee pensions at a time of fiscal straits, thereby preventing large tax hikes that the bulk of voters would have had to bear. Second, he presided over a great catastrophe, Hurricane Sandy, with skill and compassion, turning from a fiscal lion into a socially responsible lamb.</p>
<p>The latter experience is unlikely to help Christie go national. Rudy Giuliani presided over a much more searing and nationally prominent catastrophe, 9/11, with similar calm, compassion, and aplomb. America’s Mayor, however, found that such qualities did not lead to Republican primary votes because voters were looking for something else from a potential president. And that brings us to Christie’s signature accomplishment, the pension battle.</p>
<p>As difficult as this battle was, it was politically easy compared with the national fiscal issues he will have to address. Public employees are a distinct minority in New Jersey; the taxes that would have had to be raised to pay for their benefits would have been borne by all. Christie showed courage in fighting the unions, but because he was addressing only compensation excesses rather than the programs themselves, he was able to rally the many—the voters—in opposition to the few.</p>
<p>At the federal level, the fiscal problem comes from the programs themselves. Any credible attempt to deal with our fiscal challenge without raising tax rates must involve persuading the many that restricting their own benefits is in their interest. That’s going to be a hard battle and one utterly unlike any Christie has yet fought.</p>
<p>Furthermore, he will have to fight this battle on two fronts simultaneously, among Republicans angling to get to his right and Democrats angling to hold the center from the left. Each battle will pose a challenge the governor has not yet had to face.</p>
<p>The standard Republican argument on entitlements, which is made by establishment and base alike, stands Christie’s New Jersey argument on its head. This argument—cut entitlements to avoid tax hikes on the well-off, which indirectly come back to hurt the many—is complicated and lacks immediate intuitive appeal to the swing voter. It makes the many appear to sacrifice on behalf of the few, and as such would immediately eliminate Christie’s ability to obtain extra votes among non-traditional constituencies. This approach simply reestablishes traditional partisan lines and will cause Democratic-leaning groups to return to their party just as Massachusetts Democrats and independents returned to Kerry against Weld.</p>
<p>Christie cannot avoid this trap by simply invoking his purported ability to work across the aisle. Without a clear rationale as to why Democrats would submit to his will, Christie will be unable to explain either how he is substantively different from his competitors or how his plan works in behalf of everyone.</p>
<p>It will be relatively easy for his competitors to demonstrate this; all one needs to do is work through the ten-for-one question Byron York asked in the summer of 2011. York famously asked the 2012 GOP competitors if they would accept a deal that raised taxes $1 for every $10 in spending cuts. Not one candidate said he would. Should such a question be posed to Christie, he would have to break ranks—or else he would have to drop his contention that he can work with Democrats, as no one believes Democrats will deal without new revenue. But an opponent could then skewer him by asking why he thinks Democrats would take that deal, given the popularity of the programs he would have to cut. Without explaining how he can persuade average Americans that such a lopsided ratio would be in their interest and not in the interest of the rich, Christie’s answer would have to be solely personal: His charisma and will would compel the Democrats to make a deal. That would be patently unpersuasive to both a primary- and a general-election audience.</p>
<p>Christie does have a powerful advantage that was in evidence in his New Jersey experience that would help him address this national dilemma, but it is not one he has yet brought forth. Christie has an unusual ability to connect with the common person because of his background and his manner of speech. As such, he is perhaps the only one of the major GOP contenders being bruited about who could conceivably rally mass public opinion behind a coherent center-right economic platform. But such ability does not come from the fighting Christie or the crisis leader, nor is it directly connected to the issues involved in the pension war: It comes straight from the average-Joe part of the Christie persona.</p>
<p>Christie’s New Jersey success ultimately rests on the notion that he represents the aspirations of average New Jerseyites against the elites. Translating that to the national stage would necessarily require him to explain to Republican elites why they must sacrifice to deal with our fiscal woes. Subsidies for business and the upper middle class will have to be cut to simply maintain today’s tax rates. Such translation would also apply to average Americans: Those who can afford to do more themselves will need to do so to avoid the tax hikes that could cripple our economy. Such a formulation would avoid the “many versus the few” trap the Democrats are waiting to deploy. Christie as the tribune for the common man would be defending the common good, asking the many to contribute for themselves.</p>
<p>Such an approach would draw on, but not simply repeat, Christie’s New Jersey experiences. Common Man Christie can be angry at times and soft at times, so long as in each case the emotion is deployed on behalf of the many and not on behalf of the few.</p>
<p>Christie enthusiasts may want to believe that Christie need not learn anything new from his New Jersey experience or that the standard GOP economic playbook will fly if only we have an articulate messenger. But I think that deep down the governor knows this is what he’ll have to do. And if we can see this Christie start to develop over the next year, then this November’s reelection could be very consequential indeed.</p>
<p>Henry Olsen is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p> | false | 1 | chris christies victory predictably ignited talk seeking presidency backers start reserving moving van though worth stepping back calmly surveying hes accomplished notoriety political acumen neither political policy victories directly translatable national stage christies backers argue tremendous margin deepblue state muchlargerthannormal support bluecollar whites women minorities show appeal transcends partisan boundaries contention however ignores context margins obtained plenty republicans done well nonpresidential elections among nontraditional gop voters former new jersey governor tom kean nearly half black vote 1985 former jersey city mayor bret schundler reelection heavily democratic city appeal among minorities neither result harbinger future gop success schundler unable transfer city appeal statewide run governor keans accomplishment remains merely ripple otherwise stagnant sea gop support among blacks similar experience former governor william weld massachusetts useful recall 1994 fiscally conservative socially moderate republican reelection almost 71 percent vote carried every county state including bostons suffolk county received 604 percent national speculation grew gop winner weld tried take step presidency challenging senator john kerry 1996 weld lost race seven half points 522 447 percent races geographic breakdown mirrored national election trends rather weld 1994 weld lost suffolk 30 points getting barely 30 percent dropped 25 points counties voters willing pull lever republican state reelection unwilling national issues thrust fore real question christie backers need ask whether christies new jersey accomplishment translates well national level score id invoke ancient scottish law say verdict proven christie owes state dominance national fame two acts first limited publicemployee pensions time fiscal straits thereby preventing large tax hikes bulk voters would bear second presided great catastrophe hurricane sandy skill compassion turning fiscal lion socially responsible lamb latter experience unlikely help christie go national rudy giuliani presided much searing nationally prominent catastrophe 911 similar calm compassion aplomb americas mayor however found qualities lead republican primary votes voters looking something else potential president brings us christies signature accomplishment pension battle difficult battle politically easy compared national fiscal issues address public employees distinct minority new jersey taxes would raised pay benefits would borne christie showed courage fighting unions addressing compensation excesses rather programs able rally manythe votersin opposition federal level fiscal problem comes programs credible attempt deal fiscal challenge without raising tax rates must involve persuading many restricting benefits interest thats going hard battle one utterly unlike christie yet fought furthermore fight battle two fronts simultaneously among republicans angling get right democrats angling hold center left battle pose challenge governor yet face standard republican argument entitlements made establishment base alike stands christies new jersey argument head argumentcut entitlements avoid tax hikes welloff indirectly come back hurt manyis complicated lacks immediate intuitive appeal swing voter makes many appear sacrifice behalf would immediately eliminate christies ability obtain extra votes among nontraditional constituencies approach simply reestablishes traditional partisan lines cause democraticleaning groups return party massachusetts democrats independents returned kerry weld christie avoid trap simply invoking purported ability work across aisle without clear rationale democrats would submit christie unable explain either substantively different competitors plan works behalf everyone relatively easy competitors demonstrate one needs work tenforone question byron york asked summer 2011 york famously asked 2012 gop competitors would accept deal raised taxes 1 every 10 spending cuts one candidate said would question posed christie would break ranksor else would drop contention work democrats one believes democrats deal without new revenue opponent could skewer asking thinks democrats would take deal given popularity programs would cut without explaining persuade average americans lopsided ratio would interest interest rich christies answer would solely personal charisma would compel democrats make deal would patently unpersuasive primary generalelection audience christie powerful advantage evidence new jersey experience would help address national dilemma one yet brought forth christie unusual ability connect common person background manner speech perhaps one major gop contenders bruited could conceivably rally mass public opinion behind coherent centerright economic platform ability come fighting christie crisis leader directly connected issues involved pension war comes straight averagejoe part christie persona christies new jersey success ultimately rests notion represents aspirations average new jerseyites elites translating national stage would necessarily require explain republican elites must sacrifice deal fiscal woes subsidies business upper middle class cut simply maintain todays tax rates translation would also apply average americans afford need avoid tax hikes could cripple economy formulation would avoid many versus trap democrats waiting deploy christie tribune common man would defending common good asking many contribute approach would draw simply repeat christies new jersey experiences common man christie angry times soft times long case emotion deployed behalf many behalf christie enthusiasts may want believe christie need learn anything new new jersey experience standard gop economic playbook fly articulate messenger think deep governor knows hell see christie start develop next year novembers reelection could consequential indeed henry olsen senior fellow ethics public policy center | 787 |
<p>(The Sports Xchange) – Highlights of Sunday’s Major League Baseball games:</p>
<p>Cubs 5, Brewers 0</p>
<p>Jose Quintana struck out 10 in a three-hitter game as the Chicago Cubs moved closer to clinching the National League Central by beating the Milwaukee Brewers 5-0 on Sunday.</p>
<p>Ben Zobrist hit a two-run homer for the defending World Series champions, who have a magic number of two to clinch.</p>
<p>Milwaukee starter Chase Anderson allowed three runs on seven hits in 6 1/3 innings.</p>
<p>Diamondbacks 3, Marlins 2</p>
<p>J.D. Martinez singled with two outs in the ninth inning and Arizona edged Miami to clinch its first playoff spot since 2011.</p>
<p>Chris Herrmann homered for Arizona, which holds the first National League wild-card spot.</p>
<p>Giancarlo Stanton increased his RBI total to 126, moving into a tie with Colorado’s Nolan Arenado for the major league lead.</p>
<p>Angels 7, Astros 5</p>
<p>Brandon Phillips and Justin Upton homered and drove in two runs apiece, and Luis Valbuena also had two RBIs in Los Angeles win over Houston.</p>
<p>The Angels remain 4 1/2 games behind the Minnesota Twins for the second American League wild-card slot.</p>
<p>In the seventh, Valbuena drove one to the wall in right-center for a two-run double, breaking a tie and giving the Angels the 6-4 lead.</p>
<p>Twins 10, Tigers 4</p>
<p>Eduardo Escobar hit a three-run homer and drove in four runs as Minnesota rolled over Detroit.</p>
<p>Jorge Polanco also homered and Joe Mauer drove in two runs as Minnesota moved within four games of the New York Yankees for the first AL wild card.</p>
<p>Ian Kinsler hit a two-run homer for Detroit, which dropped its seventh straight.</p>
<p>Red Sox 5, Reds 4</p>
<p>Mookie Betts hit a three-run double in the eighth inning and scored on a single by Rafael Devers as Boston beat Cincinnati.</p>
<p>Betts helped the Red Sox lower their magic number for clinching the American League East to four. The Red Sox moved five games ahead of the Yankees.</p>
<p>Billy Hamilton stole his 59th base for the Reds, who blew a four-run lead.</p>
<p>Blue Jays 9, Yankees 5</p>
<p>Russell Martin doubled twice and drove in three runs as Toronto beat New York.</p>
<p>Teoscar Hernandez homered and Jose Bautista singled twice for the Blue Jays.</p>
<p>Aaron Judge hit his league-leading 47th and 48th homers of the season for New York, bringing him within one of matching Mark McGwire’s rookie record.</p>
<p>Rockies 8, Padres 4</p>
<p>Pat Valaika and Charlie Blackmon homered as Colorado inched closer to the second National League wild card by beating San Diego.</p>
<p>Colorado holds a two-game lead over the Milwaukee Brewers and a 2 1/2 game edge over the St. Louis Cardinals.</p>
<p>Wil Myers and Yangervis Solarte homered for the Padres.</p>
<p>Indians 4, Mariners 2</p>
<p>Corey Kluber struck out 10 in seven innings as Cleveland beat Seattle.</p>
<p>Kluber allowed two unearned runs and upped his record to 18-4. He is tied with the Dodgers’ Clayton Kershaw for the major league lead in victories. Jose Ramirez hit his 29th homer as Cleveland won for the 29th time in 31 games.</p>
<p>Ben Gamel homered for Seattle.</p>
<p>Dodgers 3, Giants 1</p>
<p>Clayton Kershaw allowed a run in eight innings as Los Angeles beat San Francisco.</p>
<p>Kershaw gave up eight hits and struck out six while throwing 70 of 93 pitches for strikes.</p>
<p>Yasmani Grandal hit a two-run homer for the Dodgers. Mac Williamson homered for the Giants.</p>
<p>Athletics 8, Rangers 1</p>
<p>Khris Davis hit his 41st home run of the season, Jharel Cotton allowed one hit over five shutout innings as Oakland routed Texas.</p>
<p>The A’s won their season-high seventh straight game overall and defeated Texas at the Coliseum for the eighth straight time, matching their franchise high.</p>
<p>Nomar Mazara hit his 20th home run of the season, ending the Rangers’ season-worst, 21-inning scoreless streak.</p>
<p>Nationals 3, Mets 2</p>
<p>Max Scherzer outdueled Jacob deGrom in a matchup of aces as Washington edged New York.</p>
<p>Scherzer allowed one run on three hits in six innings to go along with 10 strikeouts. DeGrom allowed three runs (two earned) on five hits while striking out 11 in six innings.</p>
<p>Trea Turner hit a two-run homer for Washington. Brandon Nimmo homered for the Mets.</p>
<p>White Sox 8, Royals 1</p>
<p>Avisail Garcia homered and drove in three runs as Chicago blasted Kansas City.</p>
<p>Kevan Smith also homered while Lucas Giolito allowed one run in seven innings.</p>
<p>Lorenzo Cain homered for Kansas City. Royals starter Ian Kennedy allowed five runs and seven hits in 5 1/3 innings.</p>
<p>Pirates 4, Cardinals 1</p>
<p>Starling Marte hit a two-run homer as Pittsburgh defeated St. Louis.</p>
<p>Jordan Luplow homered and tripled for the Pirates, and Jameson Taillon allowed one run in five innings.</p>
<p>Matt Carpenter homered for the Cardinals.</p>
<p>Orioles 9, Rays 4</p>
<p>J.J. Hardy and Chance Sisco hit two-run homers as Baltimore knocked off Tampa Bay.</p>
<p>Hardy hit the tiebreaking homer in the fourth inning while Sisco homered in the sixth.</p>
<p>Chris Archer dropped his fifth consecutive decision, allowing six runs and eight hits in 3 2/3 innings as Tampa Bay moved to the verge of officially being eliminated from the wild-card race.</p>
<p>Phillies 2, Braves 0</p>
<p>Nick Pivetta allowed five hits in six innings as Philadelphia blanked Atlanta.</p>
<p>Maikel Franco hit his 21st homer for Philadelphia.</p>
<p>Atlanta’s Luiz Gohara allowed one run on five hits in seven innings.</p> | false | 1 | sports xchange highlights sundays major league baseball games cubs 5 brewers 0 jose quintana struck 10 threehitter game chicago cubs moved closer clinching national league central beating milwaukee brewers 50 sunday ben zobrist hit tworun homer defending world series champions magic number two clinch milwaukee starter chase anderson allowed three runs seven hits 6 13 innings diamondbacks 3 marlins 2 jd martinez singled two outs ninth inning arizona edged miami clinch first playoff spot since 2011 chris herrmann homered arizona holds first national league wildcard spot giancarlo stanton increased rbi total 126 moving tie colorados nolan arenado major league lead angels 7 astros 5 brandon phillips justin upton homered drove two runs apiece luis valbuena also two rbis los angeles win houston angels remain 4 12 games behind minnesota twins second american league wildcard slot seventh valbuena drove one wall rightcenter tworun double breaking tie giving angels 64 lead twins 10 tigers 4 eduardo escobar hit threerun homer drove four runs minnesota rolled detroit jorge polanco also homered joe mauer drove two runs minnesota moved within four games new york yankees first al wild card ian kinsler hit tworun homer detroit dropped seventh straight red sox 5 reds 4 mookie betts hit threerun double eighth inning scored single rafael devers boston beat cincinnati betts helped red sox lower magic number clinching american league east four red sox moved five games ahead yankees billy hamilton stole 59th base reds blew fourrun lead blue jays 9 yankees 5 russell martin doubled twice drove three runs toronto beat new york teoscar hernandez homered jose bautista singled twice blue jays aaron judge hit leagueleading 47th 48th homers season new york bringing within one matching mark mcgwires rookie record rockies 8 padres 4 pat valaika charlie blackmon homered colorado inched closer second national league wild card beating san diego colorado holds twogame lead milwaukee brewers 2 12 game edge st louis cardinals wil myers yangervis solarte homered padres indians 4 mariners 2 corey kluber struck 10 seven innings cleveland beat seattle kluber allowed two unearned runs upped record 184 tied dodgers clayton kershaw major league lead victories jose ramirez hit 29th homer cleveland 29th time 31 games ben gamel homered seattle dodgers 3 giants 1 clayton kershaw allowed run eight innings los angeles beat san francisco kershaw gave eight hits struck six throwing 70 93 pitches strikes yasmani grandal hit tworun homer dodgers mac williamson homered giants athletics 8 rangers 1 khris davis hit 41st home run season jharel cotton allowed one hit five shutout innings oakland routed texas seasonhigh seventh straight game overall defeated texas coliseum eighth straight time matching franchise high nomar mazara hit 20th home run season ending rangers seasonworst 21inning scoreless streak nationals 3 mets 2 max scherzer outdueled jacob degrom matchup aces washington edged new york scherzer allowed one run three hits six innings go along 10 strikeouts degrom allowed three runs two earned five hits striking 11 six innings trea turner hit tworun homer washington brandon nimmo homered mets white sox 8 royals 1 avisail garcia homered drove three runs chicago blasted kansas city kevan smith also homered lucas giolito allowed one run seven innings lorenzo cain homered kansas city royals starter ian kennedy allowed five runs seven hits 5 13 innings pirates 4 cardinals 1 starling marte hit tworun homer pittsburgh defeated st louis jordan luplow homered tripled pirates jameson taillon allowed one run five innings matt carpenter homered cardinals orioles 9 rays 4 jj hardy chance sisco hit tworun homers baltimore knocked tampa bay hardy hit tiebreaking homer fourth inning sisco homered sixth chris archer dropped fifth consecutive decision allowing six runs eight hits 3 23 innings tampa bay moved verge officially eliminated wildcard race phillies 2 braves 0 nick pivetta allowed five hits six innings philadelphia blanked atlanta maikel franco hit 21st homer philadelphia atlantas luiz gohara allowed one run five hits seven innings | 648 |
<p>After months of delay, the Trump administration is finalizing plans to revamp the nation’s military command for defensive and offensive cyber operations in hopes of intensifying America’s ability to wage cyberwar against the Islamic State group and other foes, according to U.S. officials.</p>
<p>Under the plans, U.S. Cyber Command would eventually be split off from the intelligence-focused National Security Agency.</p>
<p>Details are still being worked out, but officials say they expect a decision and announcement in the coming weeks. The officials weren’t authorized to speak publicly on the matter so requested anonymity.</p>
<p>The goal, they said, is to give U.S. Cyber Command more autonomy, freeing it from any constraints that stem from working alongside the NSA, which is responsible for monitoring and collecting telephone, internet and other intelligence data from around the world — a responsibility that can sometimes clash with military operations against enemy forces.</p>
<p>Making cyber an independent military command will put the fight in digital space on the same footing as more traditional realms of battle on land, in the air, at sea and in space. The move reflects the escalating threat of cyberattacks and intrusions from other nation states, terrorist groups and hackers, and comes as the U.S. faces ever-widening fears about Russian hacking following Moscow’s efforts to meddle in the 2016 American election.</p>
<p>The U.S. has long operated quietly in cyberspace, using it to collect information, disrupt enemy networks and aid conventional military missions. But as other nations and foes expand their use of cyberspying and attacks, the U.S. is determined to improve its ability to incorporate cyber operations into its everyday warfighting.</p>
<p>Experts said the command will need time to find its footing.</p>
<p>“Right now I think it’s inevitable, but it’s on a very slow glide path,” said Jim Lewis, a cybersecurity expert with the Center for Strategic and International Studies. But, he added, “A new entity is not going to be able to duplicate NSA’s capabilities.”</p>
<p>The NSA, for examples, has 300 of the country’s leading mathematicians “and a gigantic super computer,” Lewis said. “Things like this are hard to duplicate.”</p>
<p>He added, however, that over time, the U.S. has increasingly used cyber as a tactical weapon, bolstering the argument for separating it from the NSA.</p>
<p>The two highly secretive organizations, based at Fort Meade, Maryland, have been under the same four-star commander since Cyber Command’s creation in 2009.</p>
<p>But the Defense Department has been agitating for a separation, perceiving the NSA and intelligence community as resistant to more aggressive cyberwarfare, particularly after the Islamic State’s transformation in recent years from an obscure insurgent force into an organization holding significant territory across Iraq and Syria and with a worldwide recruiting network.</p>
<p>While the military wanted to attack IS networks, intelligence objectives prioritized gathering information from them, according to U.S. officials familiar with the debate. They weren’t authorized to discuss internal deliberations publicly and requested anonymity.</p>
<p>Then-Defense Secretary Ash Carter sent a plan to President Barack Obama last year to make Cyber Command an independent military headquarters and break it away from the NSA, believing that the agency’s desire to collect intelligence was at times preventing the military from eliminating IS’ ability to raise money, inspire attacks and command its widely dispersed network of fighters.</p>
<p>Carter, at the time, also pushed for the ouster of Adm. Mike Rogers, who still heads both bodies. The Pentagon, he warned, was losing the war in the cyber domain, focusing on cyberthreats from nations such as Iran, Russia and China, rather than on countering the communications and propaganda campaigns of internet-savvy insurgents.</p>
<p>Officials also grew alarmed by the growing number of cyberattacks against the U.S. government, including several serious, high-level Defense Department breaches that occurred under Rogers’ watch.</p>
<p>“NSA is truly an intelligence-collection organization,” said Lauren Fish, a research associate with the Center for a New American Security. “It should be collecting information, writing reports on it. Cyber Command is meant to be an organization that uses tools to have military operational effect.”</p>
<p>After President Donald Trump’s inauguration, officials said Defense Secretary Jim Mattis endorsed much of the plan. But debate over details has dragged on for months.</p>
<p>It’s unclear how fast the Cyber Command will break off on its own. Some officials believe the new command isn’t battle-ready, given its current reliance on the NSA’s expertise, staff and equipment. That effort will require the department to continue to attract and retain cyber experts.</p>
<p>Cyber Command was created in 2009 by the Obama administration to address threats of cyber espionage and other attacks. It was set up as a sub-unit under U.S. Strategic Command to coordinate the Pentagon’s ability to conduct cyberwarfare and to defend its own networks, including those that are used by combat forces in battle.</p>
<p>Officials originally said the new cyber effort would likely involve hundreds, rather than thousands, of new employees.</p>
<p>Since then, the command has grown to more than 700 military and civilian employees. The military services also have their own cyber units, with a goal of having 133 fully operational teams with as many as 6,200 personnel.</p>
<p>Its proposed budget for next year is $647 million. Rogers told Congress in May that represents a 16 percent increase over this year’s budget to cover costs associated with building the cyber force, fighting IS and becoming an independent command.</p>
<p>Under the new plan being forwarded by the Pentagon to the White House, officials said Army Lt. Gen. William Mayville would be nominated to lead Cyber Command. Leadership of the NSA could be turned over to a civilian.</p>
<p>Mayville is currently the director of the military’s joint staff and has extensive experience as a combat-hardened commander. He deployed to both Iraq and Afghanistan, leading the 173rd Airborne Brigade when it made its assault into Iraq in March 2003 and later heading coalition operations in eastern Afghanistan.</p> | false | 1 | months delay trump administration finalizing plans revamp nations military command defensive offensive cyber operations hopes intensifying americas ability wage cyberwar islamic state group foes according us officials plans us cyber command would eventually split intelligencefocused national security agency details still worked officials say expect decision announcement coming weeks officials werent authorized speak publicly matter requested anonymity goal said give us cyber command autonomy freeing constraints stem working alongside nsa responsible monitoring collecting telephone internet intelligence data around world responsibility sometimes clash military operations enemy forces making cyber independent military command put fight digital space footing traditional realms battle land air sea space move reflects escalating threat cyberattacks intrusions nation states terrorist groups hackers comes us faces everwidening fears russian hacking following moscows efforts meddle 2016 american election us long operated quietly cyberspace using collect information disrupt enemy networks aid conventional military missions nations foes expand use cyberspying attacks us determined improve ability incorporate cyber operations everyday warfighting experts said command need time find footing right think inevitable slow glide path said jim lewis cybersecurity expert center strategic international studies added new entity going able duplicate nsas capabilities nsa examples 300 countrys leading mathematicians gigantic super computer lewis said things like hard duplicate added however time us increasingly used cyber tactical weapon bolstering argument separating nsa two highly secretive organizations based fort meade maryland fourstar commander since cyber commands creation 2009 defense department agitating separation perceiving nsa intelligence community resistant aggressive cyberwarfare particularly islamic states transformation recent years obscure insurgent force organization holding significant territory across iraq syria worldwide recruiting network military wanted attack networks intelligence objectives prioritized gathering information according us officials familiar debate werent authorized discuss internal deliberations publicly requested anonymity thendefense secretary ash carter sent plan president barack obama last year make cyber command independent military headquarters break away nsa believing agencys desire collect intelligence times preventing military eliminating ability raise money inspire attacks command widely dispersed network fighters carter time also pushed ouster adm mike rogers still heads bodies pentagon warned losing war cyber domain focusing cyberthreats nations iran russia china rather countering communications propaganda campaigns internetsavvy insurgents officials also grew alarmed growing number cyberattacks us government including several serious highlevel defense department breaches occurred rogers watch nsa truly intelligencecollection organization said lauren fish research associate center new american security collecting information writing reports cyber command meant organization uses tools military operational effect president donald trumps inauguration officials said defense secretary jim mattis endorsed much plan debate details dragged months unclear fast cyber command break officials believe new command isnt battleready given current reliance nsas expertise staff equipment effort require department continue attract retain cyber experts cyber command created 2009 obama administration address threats cyber espionage attacks set subunit us strategic command coordinate pentagons ability conduct cyberwarfare defend networks including used combat forces battle officials originally said new cyber effort would likely involve hundreds rather thousands new employees since command grown 700 military civilian employees military services also cyber units goal 133 fully operational teams many 6200 personnel proposed budget next year 647 million rogers told congress may represents 16 percent increase years budget cover costs associated building cyber force fighting becoming independent command new plan forwarded pentagon white house officials said army lt gen william mayville would nominated lead cyber command leadership nsa could turned civilian mayville currently director militarys joint staff extensive experience combathardened commander deployed iraq afghanistan leading 173rd airborne brigade made assault iraq march 2003 later heading coalition operations eastern afghanistan | 578 |
<p>PITTSBURGH — The <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Pittsburgh_Steelers/" type="external">Pittsburgh Steelers</a> went into their bye week feeling proud of the few big plays they had allowed.</p>
<p>Opponents have gashed them with big plays ever since, and in the Steelers’ 31-28 win over the Green Bay Backers on Sunday, Pittsburgh gave up three more.</p>
<p>To a backup quarterback.</p>
<p>Brett Hundley, in his fifth start since replacing <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Aaron_Rodgers/" type="external">Aaron Rodgers</a>, entered the night with two touchdown passes and a long pass of 46 yards. On Sunday, he smashed those numbers in throwing three touchdown passes on plays of 39, 54 and 55 yards.</p>
<p>In their two previous games, the Steelers allowed touchdown passes of 60, 61 and 75 yards.</p>
<p>For a team that entered the game with the league’s No. 3 pass defense, it is a head-scratcher.</p>
<p>“We know how teams are attacking us,” Pittsburgh cornerback Artie Burns said. “We just have to do a better job of preventing them. We come in on Mondays and Tuesdays knowing what a team is going to do to us in certain situations. We haven’t been making plays on those balls. We will get it right, though.”</p>
<p>Burns was burned when Hundley found a wide-open <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Randall-Cobb/" type="external">Randall Cobb</a> for a 39-yard score on Green Bay’s first possession.</p>
<p>On the Packers’ second possession, Hundley caught the Steelers in a blitz and hit Jamaal Williams with a screen pass. Strong safety Sean Davis took a bad angle that opened a seam for Williams, who took it 54 yards for the score.</p>
<p>The third big play came on the Packers’ first series of the second half. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Davante-Adams/" type="external">Davante Adams</a> beat cornerback <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Coty-Sensabaugh/" type="external">Coty Sensabaugh</a>, and free safety <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Mike_Mitchell/" type="external">Mike Mitchell</a> missed a tackle to allow Adams a 55-yard touchdown.</p>
<p>Those three plays represented 65 percent of the Packers’ passing yardage in the game.</p>
<p>The Steelers appeared confused and undisciplined at times.</p>
<p>“I wouldn’t say confusion,” Sensabaugh said. “Maybe undisciplined, because we’re an aggressive group. We try to go get the ball. But I wouldn’t necessarily say confusion. We all know the coverage and where each other’s supposed to be.”</p>
<p>How will the Steelers clean it up?</p>
<p>“We’re going to stay aggressive and keep working,” Sensabaugh said. “That’s one thing we’re going to do, we’re going to stay an aggressive unit. We’re going to make more plays than we get beat on. We’re going to stick with it.”</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>Steelers running back <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/LeVeon-Bell/" type="external">Le’Veon Bell</a> rushed 20 times for 95 yards to increase his NFL-leading rushing total to 981 yards.</p>
<p>No one from the Steelers has led the league in rushing since Bill Dudley did it in 1946. A tiff with coach Jock Sutherland forced a trade, and the question has been whether Dudley cursed Steelers running backs ever since.</p>
<p>Dudley also led the league in 1942, and he played in 11 games each of those league-leading seasons. Steelers running back <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jerome_Bettis/" type="external">Jerome Bettis</a> was leading the league in rushing in 2001 when he was injured in the 11th game and missed the rest of the season.</p>
<p>Sunday night was Bell’s 11th game of the season. And he walked away just fine.</p>
<p>“I’m glad you didn’t tell me that before,” Bell said. “So, it’s over. Appreciate it.”</p>
<p>Bell, of course, admitted he would like to lead the league in rushing, but he is more focused on winning games.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Ben_Roethlisberger/" type="external">Ben Roethlisberger</a> leaned heavily on Bell in the win over Green Bay, with the back making 12 catches for 88 yards.</p>
<p>“I want to say ( <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Antonio_Brown/" type="external">Antonio Brown</a>) is special,” Roethlisberger said, “but to me, the big story in the passing game was Le’Veon. They were trying to get some depth and take away a lot of passes, and Le’Veon made play after play and bailed me out with a lot of check-downs, getting out quick and making things happen. As great as A.B. always is, Le’Veon was extra special today, too.”</p>
<p>Bell said, “The last drive I saw I had 95 rushing yards. I had 85 passing yards and thought, ‘Man, I could get a hundred in both.’ But the last drive I only cared about winning this game.”</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>Pittsburgh’s Cam Heyward had another dominating performance Sunday night. He had two sacks for the second consecutive game to give him nine for the season. The only 3-4 defensive lineman to reach double digits in sacks for the Steelers was Keith Willis, who had 14 in 1983 and 12 in 1986.</p>
<p>Heyward passed other top team totals by 5-techs <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Aaron_Smith/" type="external">Aaron Smith</a> (eight), Kimo von Oelhoffen (eight) and Ray Seals (8.5) on Sunday night.</p>
<p>“I still have a long way to go,” said Heyward, who talked the previous week about his dream of making the Pro Bowl for the first time. He also said he realizes that production is difficult for an interior linemen, and that it is almost impossible to get recognition while categorized as a defensive end.</p>
<p>The Steelers didn’t make it easier on Heyward when the used him at times as the only defensive lineman on the field Sunday. Pittsburgh occasionally employed four linebackers and six defensive backs.</p>
<p>“Just a different look. It worked,” he said. “But I like having (Stephon) Tuitt out there, too. We just play what’s called, but I prefer having my running mate out there.”</p>
<p>Heyward was happier about <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/TJ-Watt/" type="external">T.J. Watt</a>‘s sack on Green Bay’s final possession. The rookie who grew up in Wisconsin capped an outstanding game against the Packers with the sack on first down. It put the Packers in a hole, and they punted three plays later to set up the Steelers’ game-winning drive.</p>
<p>Did Heyward, the defensive captain, say anything to the unit before that series?</p>
<p>“Not really,” he said. “We talked about the things that are going to win this game: communication, understanding down and distance, knowing what they want to do there. We got our hands up and T.J. came in and smacked the quarterback, and then we sniffed out the screen, and then we got off quick. We gave the ball back to our offense, and Ben made some really good throws.”</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>Steelers reserve offensive tackle Jerald Hawkins played in his first NFL game — as a tight end. He said he was in on six or seven plays as the team’s third tight end in the jumbo package. Chris Hubbard, filling in for suspended right tackle Marcus Gilbert, has developed that role into something more than a short-yardage ploy.</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>Pittsburgh special teams coach Danny Smith told head coach <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Mike_Tomlin/" type="external">Mike Tomlin</a> to get the ball inside the 35-yard line for kicker <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Chris-Boswell/" type="external">Chris Boswell</a>‘s final attempt. The Steelers got it to the 33, and then lost 2 yards on a pass to Bell before Boswell kicked a career-long 53-yarder, the longest by a Steeler at Heinz Field and tied for the longest at the stadium (with Dallas’ <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Dan-Bailey/" type="external">Dan Bailey</a>).</p>
<p>“I don’t tell them numbers and they don’t ask me numbers,” Boswell said. “If we need it, I kick it. That’s about it.”</p> | false | 1 | pittsburgh pittsburgh steelers went bye week feeling proud big plays allowed opponents gashed big plays ever since steelers 3128 win green bay backers sunday pittsburgh gave three backup quarterback brett hundley fifth start since replacing aaron rodgers entered night two touchdown passes long pass 46 yards sunday smashed numbers throwing three touchdown passes plays 39 54 55 yards two previous games steelers allowed touchdown passes 60 61 75 yards team entered game leagues 3 pass defense headscratcher know teams attacking us pittsburgh cornerback artie burns said better job preventing come mondays tuesdays knowing team going us certain situations havent making plays balls get right though burns burned hundley found wideopen randall cobb 39yard score green bays first possession packers second possession hundley caught steelers blitz hit jamaal williams screen pass strong safety sean davis took bad angle opened seam williams took 54 yards score third big play came packers first series second half davante adams beat cornerback coty sensabaugh free safety mike mitchell missed tackle allow adams 55yard touchdown three plays represented 65 percent packers passing yardage game steelers appeared confused undisciplined times wouldnt say confusion sensabaugh said maybe undisciplined aggressive group try go get ball wouldnt necessarily say confusion know coverage others supposed steelers clean going stay aggressive keep working sensabaugh said thats one thing going going stay aggressive unit going make plays get beat going stick steelers running back leveon bell rushed 20 times 95 yards increase nflleading rushing total 981 yards one steelers led league rushing since bill dudley 1946 tiff coach jock sutherland forced trade question whether dudley cursed steelers running backs ever since dudley also led league 1942 played 11 games leagueleading seasons steelers running back jerome bettis leading league rushing 2001 injured 11th game missed rest season sunday night bells 11th game season walked away fine im glad didnt tell bell said appreciate bell course admitted would like lead league rushing focused winning games ben roethlisberger leaned heavily bell win green bay back making 12 catches 88 yards want say antonio brown special roethlisberger said big story passing game leveon trying get depth take away lot passes leveon made play play bailed lot checkdowns getting quick making things happen great ab always leveon extra special today bell said last drive saw 95 rushing yards 85 passing yards thought man could get hundred last drive cared winning game pittsburghs cam heyward another dominating performance sunday night two sacks second consecutive game give nine season 34 defensive lineman reach double digits sacks steelers keith willis 14 1983 12 1986 heyward passed top team totals 5techs aaron smith eight kimo von oelhoffen eight ray seals 85 sunday night still long way go said heyward talked previous week dream making pro bowl first time also said realizes production difficult interior linemen almost impossible get recognition categorized defensive end steelers didnt make easier heyward used times defensive lineman field sunday pittsburgh occasionally employed four linebackers six defensive backs different look worked said like stephon tuitt play whats called prefer running mate heyward happier tj watts sack green bays final possession rookie grew wisconsin capped outstanding game packers sack first put packers hole punted three plays later set steelers gamewinning drive heyward defensive captain say anything unit series really said talked things going win game communication understanding distance knowing want got hands tj came smacked quarterback sniffed screen got quick gave ball back offense ben made really good throws steelers reserve offensive tackle jerald hawkins played first nfl game tight end said six seven plays teams third tight end jumbo package chris hubbard filling suspended right tackle marcus gilbert developed role something shortyardage ploy pittsburgh special teams coach danny smith told head coach mike tomlin get ball inside 35yard line kicker chris boswells final attempt steelers got 33 lost 2 yards pass bell boswell kicked careerlong 53yarder longest steeler heinz field tied longest stadium dallas dan bailey dont tell numbers dont ask numbers boswell said need kick thats | 658 |
<p />
<p>A great deal of attention has recently been lavished on&#160;Iran’s nuclear ambition. Framed in terms familiar to those hardened hawks of a bygone Cold War, the drums of war in Southwest Asia have revived talk of that old “sum of all fears.”</p>
<p>But behind the scenes in Tehran, battle lines have already been drawn in this increasingly isolated and fractious body politic. &#160;The recent parliamentary elections – though largely overlooked and critically under-analyzed – signaled a turning point in a simmering power struggle that will shake the foundations of Khomeini’s Revolutionary Republic.</p>
<p>It’s time to pay attention to the men behind the curtain.</p>
<p>Weeks have passed since the first round of elections was held to determine the parliamentary profile of the Iranian Majilis. The assumption has been that regardless of the outcome,&#160;Iran’s 48 million voters wouldn’t have much say in the matter&#160;– theirs is simply a choice between largely immaterial bearded faces slotted to occupy hollow seats in the new Parliament.</p>
<p>Yet these recent elections were of great significance, serving as a critical referendum on a growing rift between Grand Ayatollah Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.</p>
<p>Iran’s hardliners, conservatives and clerics alike, hold certain truths self-evident. Social conservatism in accordance with the Ja’fari school of Sharia law is fundamental, and presumes the segregation of the sexes, mandated veiling and other strict observances – imposed and enforced by the state – in adherence with traditional Islamic values. By and large, conservatives favor strict state control of the nation’s divinely apportioned oil wealth. Despite the providence of petroleum, both the clerical and uniformed classes eschew the trappings of wealth. For his part, Ahmadinejad famously drove his Carter-era Puegeot to the presidency, in a studied rejection of decadent Western materialism. The conservative credo of anti-Western, anti-Israeli sentiment has won great acclaim among the lower classes, lower clerics, security services and&#160;bazaari&#160;merchant caste.</p>
<p>But most importantly, the hardliners in&#160;Iran&#160;have celebrated Ayatollah Khomeini’s&#160;welayat-faqih&#160;custodianship over the Iranian people. This Shi’a specific, post-“Age of Mehdi Occultation” theory is unique to&#160;Iran, and presumes “guardianship” of Islamic jurisprudence is represented by a “supreme” clerical leader. This doyen is to be supported by his devotional lieutenants in other critical realms of governance – most notably the Assembly of Experts (all must boast clerical&#160;bona fides), the Council of Guardians (of whom, half must be ordained), the courts and state-appointed leaders of Friday prayers.</p>
<p>This basic tenet is recognized as the foundational standard of&#160;Iran’s supposed theocracy, and the true path for the Islamic Republic. Yet recent events suggest this clerical supremacy has been challenged by some who initially mobilized the revolutionary fervor – President Ahmadinejad&#160;included.</p>
<p>From the ashes of the Green Revolution, in February 2010, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton observed that the elite Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) had acquired sufficient power to displace the government.</p>
<p>“We see that the government of&#160;Iran, the supreme leader, the president, the parliament, is being supplanted and that&#160;Iran&#160;is moving toward a military dictatorship. That is our view.”</p>
<p>Established in 1979 specifically to protect the rule of&#160;welayat faqih&#160;and the Supreme Leader from attacks outside and within&#160;Iran, the IRGC has entwined its interests with the state economy. It now controls major domestic industry and enterprise. Its commercial wing presides over construction, oil exports, petroleum imports, defense contracts and transportation infrastructure. Of the 18 current cabinet ministers, 12 are former members of the IRGC or their&#160;basij&#160;paramilitary.</p>
<p>The IRGC’s international entanglement is similarly extended. In addition to military clients in Iraq, Afghanistan and Lebanon, the former head of the Guard’s engineering division, Rostam Ghasemi,&#160;was named&#160;Iran’s oil minister in 2011, and subsequently elevated to the presidency of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).</p>
<p>Secretary Clinton was correct to recognize the growing power of the IRGC, but she misapprehended their designs on the country. Rather than supplanting the Supreme Leader, it appears they have further entrenched themselves as his faithful Praetorians – at the expense of&#160;Iran’s Islamic “legitimacy” and the office of the president.</p>
<p>Since 2009’s elections, there’s been a presumption that Grand Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad marched in political lock-step. By now, we should know this is not the case.&#160;In Tehran, the past year has been shadowed by growing tensions between the president and the Supreme Leader. The electoral majority secured in the first round of recent parliamentary elections suggests that the people have cast their lot with the Divine – supporting the shifting alliance of Khamenei-IRGC backed candidates among the Conservatives, Principlists and Ultraconservatives – in repudiation of Ahmadinejad’s political influence.</p>
<p>Rumors are again rife that Ahmadenjad – whose faction lost significant ground to Khamenei’s loyalists in this most recent round of elections&#160;– may now be close to resigning. Or, closer still, to arching back against political rivals. How did it come to this?</p>
<p>These latest elections may prove more damaging to stability in the Islamic Republic than Mir Hossein Moussavi’s ill-fated hopes at the ballot in 2009. Since Ahmadinejad attempted to sack&#160;Iran’s intelligence Minister, Heydar Moslehi, last April, the president’s maneuvers have been closely watched by the nation’s political elite. To make matters worse, Ahmadinejad made the insulting assertion that he’s worked in express communion with the Hidden Twelfth Iman – a scriptural partnership strictly reserved for the Supreme Leader. Whether speaking from the arrogance of power or the misplaced assumptions that the clergy can’t touch him, Amhedinejad has clearly and critically fractured the Iranian hard-liners between those who support his presidency and those who side with the Supreme Leader and his confederates in the IRGC.</p>
<p>Since this time last year, Khamenei has hinted at removing the presidency, overturned two Ahmadinejad cabinet appointments, and summoned parliamentary censure of his economic “mismanagement.” Such public criticism is unprecedented in the history of the Islamic Republic – and accusations of negligence sound strangely like scapegoating, given the disastrous sanctions applied on&#160;Iran.</p>
<p>For his part, Khamenei has been stuck in a dicey posture since he was abruptly appointed “Grand Ayatollah,” mere hours after Khomeini’s death. Clerical peers glanced askance at his comparatively shallow Islamic erudition, and he soon found himself in search of more dependable allies. At that time, he was clever enough to ally himself to friendly factions in the IRGC and their brownshirts in the&#160;basij&#160;militia.</p>
<p>Since his elevation to Supreme Leader, analysts have suggested he’s become increasingly more indebted to those sleeping in the barracks than praying in the mosques.</p>
<p>But if he’s counting on support from the military, he does so on a knife’s edge. The IRGC’s multi-billion dollar interests in the Iranian “brand” are increasingly threatened by economic sanctions and political isolation. Although Khamenei has outmaneuvered his political rivals in the ranks of reformers and supporters of presidential federalism, it is unlikely he will be able to slip past debts owed his personal Praetorians. As conservatives and traditionalists battle for power behind the scenes, Khamenei’s is losing his grip on factional consensus about the fundamental meaning and structure of an Islamic Republic.</p>
<p>All this comes at a sensitive moment when words of war have reached a crescendo. Regardless of who should emerge from the fray between political conservatives in the Islamic Republic, it is unlikely that&#160;Iran’s nuclear ambitions will evaporate.&#160;&#160;Membership in the world’s nuclear powers translates into too much international currency for any party to ignore.</p>
<p>Of course the IAEA recently announced a deal to widen &#160;inspections of Iran’s nuclear facilities for the first time since 2007. News of the agreement was announced days ahead of a second round of talks to be held in Baghdad between an increasingly isolated Iran, and the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, plus Germany. The goal of the negotiations likely hinges on an Iranian agreement to shutter its higher-grade uranium plant at Fordow – the enrichment facility is located underground, and would prove largely impervious to an air assault.</p>
<p>In the wake of Ahmadinejad’s fall from grace, and Khamenei’s growing dependence on his military backing, some analysts have suggested that Western powers circumvent the Supreme Leader and engage the IRGC, directly.</p>
<p>This task will prove impossible, at present. The Supreme Leader tapped one Saeed Jalili&#160; as his personal emissary and chief negotiator. He’s a hardline ideologue – one of the true believers in the guardianship of Islamic jurists. His doctoral thesis in political science actually considered how the Prophet Muhammad’s seventh century teachings might be applied to present day international affairs. According to Richard Cohen of The New York Times, Jalili was a “chief architect” of 2009’s post-election crackdown. He’s also a veteran of the IRGC who left half his right leg on the front-lines in the war against Iraq.</p>
<p>Despite skepticism that Iran’s agreement with the IAEA is simply a strategy to gain leverage going into the Baghdad negotiations with Tehran’s intractable emissary, political fractures within the Islamic Republic are very real.</p>
<p>However, if Western powers hold any hope that war to diminish (not demolish) Iran’s nuclear infrastructure can be avoided it will be necessary to target these human-fault lines. The imposition of real, fiscal cost on the IRGC might compel them to negotiate with the United States, directly, behind Khamenei’s back.</p>
<p>Of course, nothing cements support for a regime like the call to arms – particularly under the immediate threat of foreign ordnance. Until that time, let’s remember that the isolation and fracture of Iranian leadership may prove our best bet for buying ourselves a little more time.</p> | false | 1 | great deal attention recently lavished on160irans nuclear ambition framed terms familiar hardened hawks bygone cold war drums war southwest asia revived talk old sum fears behind scenes tehran battle lines already drawn increasingly isolated fractious body politic 160the recent parliamentary elections though largely overlooked critically underanalyzed signaled turning point simmering power struggle shake foundations khomeinis revolutionary republic time pay attention men behind curtain weeks passed since first round elections held determine parliamentary profile iranian majilis assumption regardless outcome160irans 48 million voters wouldnt much say matter160 simply choice largely immaterial bearded faces slotted occupy hollow seats new parliament yet recent elections great significance serving critical referendum growing rift grand ayatollah khamenei president mahmoud ahmadinejad irans hardliners conservatives clerics alike hold certain truths selfevident social conservatism accordance jafari school sharia law fundamental presumes segregation sexes mandated veiling strict observances imposed enforced state adherence traditional islamic values large conservatives favor strict state control nations divinely apportioned oil wealth despite providence petroleum clerical uniformed classes eschew trappings wealth part ahmadinejad famously drove carterera puegeot presidency studied rejection decadent western materialism conservative credo antiwestern antiisraeli sentiment great acclaim among lower classes lower clerics security services and160bazaari160merchant caste importantly hardliners in160iran160have celebrated ayatollah khomeinis160welayatfaqih160custodianship iranian people shia specific postage mehdi occultation theory unique to160iran presumes guardianship islamic jurisprudence represented supreme clerical leader doyen supported devotional lieutenants critical realms governance notably assembly experts must boast clerical160bona fides council guardians half must ordained courts stateappointed leaders friday prayers basic tenet recognized foundational standard of160irans supposed theocracy true path islamic republic yet recent events suggest clerical supremacy challenged initially mobilized revolutionary fervor president ahmadinejad160included ashes green revolution february 2010 secretary state hillary clinton observed elite iranian revolutionary guard corps irgc acquired sufficient power displace government see government of160iran supreme leader president parliament supplanted that160iran160is moving toward military dictatorship view established 1979 specifically protect rule of160welayat faqih160and supreme leader attacks outside within160iran irgc entwined interests state economy controls major domestic industry enterprise commercial wing presides construction oil exports petroleum imports defense contracts transportation infrastructure 18 current cabinet ministers 12 former members irgc their160basij160paramilitary irgcs international entanglement similarly extended addition military clients iraq afghanistan lebanon former head guards engineering division rostam ghasemi160was named160irans oil minister 2011 subsequently elevated presidency organization petroleum exporting countries opec secretary clinton correct recognize growing power irgc misapprehended designs country rather supplanting supreme leader appears entrenched faithful praetorians expense of160irans islamic legitimacy office president since 2009s elections theres presumption grand ayatollah ali khamenei mahmoud ahmadinejad marched political lockstep know case160in tehran past year shadowed growing tensions president supreme leader electoral majority secured first round recent parliamentary elections suggests people cast lot divine supporting shifting alliance khameneiirgc backed candidates among conservatives principlists ultraconservatives repudiation ahmadinejads political influence rumors rife ahmadenjad whose faction lost significant ground khameneis loyalists recent round elections160 may close resigning closer still arching back political rivals come latest elections may prove damaging stability islamic republic mir hossein moussavis illfated hopes ballot 2009 since ahmadinejad attempted sack160irans intelligence minister heydar moslehi last april presidents maneuvers closely watched nations political elite make matters worse ahmadinejad made insulting assertion hes worked express communion hidden twelfth iman scriptural partnership strictly reserved supreme leader whether speaking arrogance power misplaced assumptions clergy cant touch amhedinejad clearly critically fractured iranian hardliners support presidency side supreme leader confederates irgc since time last year khamenei hinted removing presidency overturned two ahmadinejad cabinet appointments summoned parliamentary censure economic mismanagement public criticism unprecedented history islamic republic accusations negligence sound strangely like scapegoating given disastrous sanctions applied on160iran part khamenei stuck dicey posture since abruptly appointed grand ayatollah mere hours khomeinis death clerical peers glanced askance comparatively shallow islamic erudition soon found search dependable allies time clever enough ally friendly factions irgc brownshirts the160basij160militia since elevation supreme leader analysts suggested hes become increasingly indebted sleeping barracks praying mosques hes counting support military knifes edge irgcs multibillion dollar interests iranian brand increasingly threatened economic sanctions political isolation although khamenei outmaneuvered political rivals ranks reformers supporters presidential federalism unlikely able slip past debts owed personal praetorians conservatives traditionalists battle power behind scenes khameneis losing grip factional consensus fundamental meaning structure islamic republic comes sensitive moment words war reached crescendo regardless emerge fray political conservatives islamic republic unlikely that160irans nuclear ambitions evaporate160160membership worlds nuclear powers translates much international currency party ignore course iaea recently announced deal widen 160inspections irans nuclear facilities first time since 2007 news agreement announced days ahead second round talks held baghdad increasingly isolated iran permanent members united nations security council plus germany goal negotiations likely hinges iranian agreement shutter highergrade uranium plant fordow enrichment facility located underground would prove largely impervious air assault wake ahmadinejads fall grace khameneis growing dependence military backing analysts suggested western powers circumvent supreme leader engage irgc directly task prove impossible present supreme leader tapped one saeed jalili160 personal emissary chief negotiator hes hardline ideologue one true believers guardianship islamic jurists doctoral thesis political science actually considered prophet muhammads seventh century teachings might applied present day international affairs according richard cohen new york times jalili chief architect 2009s postelection crackdown hes also veteran irgc left half right leg frontlines war iraq despite skepticism irans agreement iaea simply strategy gain leverage going baghdad negotiations tehrans intractable emissary political fractures within islamic republic real however western powers hold hope war diminish demolish irans nuclear infrastructure avoided necessary target humanfault lines imposition real fiscal cost irgc might compel negotiate united states directly behind khameneis back course nothing cements support regime like call arms particularly immediate threat foreign ordnance time lets remember isolation fracture iranian leadership may prove best bet buying little time | 927 |
<p>1. Many Italians do not understand why so many American lawyers, judges, newspapers, magazines and TV are raising accusations against the Vatican and against the person of the Pope regarding the sex abuses scandals. Can you please explain to us the atmosphere in America and&#160;its roots?</p>
<p>It is important to distinguish between the U.S. crisis of 2002 and this latest tempest of criticism of the Church. In 2002, the press did an important job of bringing to light situations of clerical sexual abuse and some bishops’ mishandling of that abuse that had too long been hidden. The Church, which had begun to address these problems seriously in the early 1990s, then accelerated its efforts to discipline abusers and to create safe environments for young people throughout American Catholicism. Those measures have worked. There are 68 million Catholics in the United States, and there were only six credible reports of the sexual abuse of a young person in the Church last year; that is, of course, six too many, but it completely falsifies the picture the press has painted of an ongoing crisis of sexual abuse and cover-up in the Catholic Church in the U.S.. Cardinal Ratzinger’s support of the bishops of the U.S. in their post-2002 efforts to put this awful problem behind us was a large part of the U.S. bishops’ success. The firestorm of the past few weeks has been shaped by several different factors, few of which have anything to do with protecting young people: grossly distorted reporting of abuse cases in Milwaukee and Munich, falsely implicating the Pope in cover-ups; the inability of American editors and reporters to understand that the Catholic Church is not a gigantic international corporation in which the Pope controls every aspect of Catholic life down to the parish level; commentators (and some reporters and editors) who see an opportunity to take the Catholic Church out of the public debate over issues like the nature of marriage and the right to life by painting a picture of the Church as a hypocritical criminal conspiracy of abusers and their enablers; and unscrupulous lawyers who see in that false portrait a way to bring the resources of the Vatican within the reach of American courts. The Church and its defenders were beginning to get a more fair hearing this past week; but then Father Cantalamessa made some exceptionally stupid and inappropriate remarks during the Solemn Liturgy of Good Friday, which have made the Church look insensitive and inept. I do not think, however, that serious Catholics have, as yet, been much affected by this recent controversy. At the same time, every serious Catholic wishes the Holy See would take a firmer grip on this story, get the facts out in a coherent, comprehensive, and compelling way, and take decisive action against prelates (as in Ireland) who were clearly irresponsible in handling abuse cases.&#160;</p>
<p>2. You have also who fears that behind this “public offensive” in the US there is a “plot against the Catholic Church”. What do you answer to them?&#160;</p>
<p>I’ve just described some of the interests that are at work in this, although I certainly wouldn’t call it a coordinated “plot.” There are political people and commentators on public affairs who want to destroy the moral credibility of the Church; there are lawyers pressing suits that would expose the Vatican to financial damage; there are anti-Catholic secularists who will take any occasion to beat the Church; and there are Catholics who see in all of this — however strangely — an opportunity to press again for the Revolution That Never Was (an end to priestly celibacy, the ordination of women, a kind of Catholic “congregationalism” in which the bishops’ authority is radically diminished). All of these people are having their say in the present tempest, but you cannot add it all up and come up with a “plot.”&#160;</p>
<p>3. How do you judge the way the Vatican is handling the accuses on the sex abuses coming from different countries?</p>
<p>John Paul II and Cardinal Ratzinger were helpful to the U.S. bishops in 2002, as they were trying to put even stronger measures against abusers in place. I thought Pope Benedict’s letter to the Church in Ireland was moving, sincere, and very strong; the fact remains that the Irish hierarchy has, as the Pope said, lost a lot of its credibility, so an effective follow-up to the Pope’s letter must include dramatic changes in the Church’s leadership in Ireland. The response from the Sala Stampa has been better in recent weeks, but I think it would be helpful if the Holy See would make more of its senior leaders available for serious conversation with reporters; Cardinal Levada’s recent interview with the New York Times was helpful here.&#160;</p>
<p>4. Yesterday Father Cantalmessa, speaking from the Vatican, described a possible parallel between the bias against the Vatican and the antisemitism against the Jews. Do you agree with this interpretation?</p>
<p>These remarks were stupid in themselves; they were utterly inappropriate in a Good Friday liturgy; and they must have hurt Benedict XVI, who has done more than perhaps any other modern Catholic theologian to acknowledge the Catholic Church’s debt to God’s covenant with the Jewish people and to living Judaism. So, no, you may safely assume that I do not agree with this “interpretation.”&#160;</p>
<p>5. In Kentucky and Oregon the top officials of the Vatican may be requested to be in Court to answer to the accusations. What should they do?</p>
<p>The Vatican has good legal counsel on this, so it doesn’t need my advice.</p>
<p>6. How is this story about the sex abuses affecting the public image of the Catholic Church in the US?</p>
<p>It depends on the audience. Serious Catholics know that the Church had a problem, has dealt with it, and is now the safest environment for young people in America; serious Catholics are also deeply offended by news stories, editorials, and cartoons suggesting that all priests are sexual predators. This kind of vicious anti-Catholic bias has to be challenged for the gross prejudice and calumny that it is. &#160;</p>
<p>People who dislike Catholicism for various reasons will find in distorted news and commentary more reasons to dislike the Church, of course. It’s too early to measure the effect of all of this on the Church’s pro-life witness, but the pro-life movement remained strong after 2002, and I don’t think it will be seriously undermined by the current controversies.</p>
<p>Perhaps most importantly, tens of thousands of people were baptized in the Catholic Church or entered into full communion with the Catholic Church at the Easter Vigil this year — that tells you something important about the vitality of Catholicism in the United States.&#160;</p>
<p>7. Please add anything thing more you may consider relevant:</p>
<p>Let me emphasize again that, in the U.S. perspective, 2002 and 2010 are different. The problems brought to light in 2002 were real, and they have been dealt with. The current controversy cannot be about the ongoing abuse of young people in the Catholic Church in the United States,&#160;because there is no crisis of abuse in the Church in America today.&#160;The Irish crisis is being dealt with, I hope, firmly and vigorously; let me repeat that a massive change in the Church’s leadership in Ireland is required.&#160;</p>
<p>The current controversy seems to have a lot to do with the “culture-war” that is being fought throughout the West. The Catholic Church is the last institutional defender of the idea that there are moral truths built into the world and into human beings: truths we can know by reason, and truths that set the boundaries within which we can live good and noble lives. There are powerful forces in the West that deny that such truths exist, and that urge us to believe that humanity is infinitely plastic and malleable: that “marriage” can mean what the law says it means; that sex is simply another form of sports; that unborn human beings, radically handicapped human beings, and gravely ill human beings count for nothing; and that coercive state power can and should impose what Cardinal Ratzinger once called a “dictatorship of relativism.” Those powerful forces see in the failures of some of the sons and daughters of the Church — and the past mishandling of these failures by some Church authorities — an opportunity to destroy the public moral teaching authority of the Church. That sinful priests and religious, and incompetent and irresponsible bishops, have, by their actions in the past, given the Church’s critics weapons with which to attack Catholicism is undeniable; that is all the more reason for serious Catholics to recommit themselves to authentically Catholic reform, and for the senior leadership of the Church to enforce the Church’s discipline rigorously.&#160;</p>
<p><a href="http://www.lastampa.it/_web/cmstp/tmplRubriche/giornalisti/grubrica.asp?ID_blog=43&amp;ID_articolo=1623&amp;ID_sezione=&amp;sezione=" type="external">You can also read the interview as it appeared in La Stampa (in Italian) here.</a></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>
<p>&#160;</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | false | 1 | 1 many italians understand many american lawyers judges newspapers magazines tv raising accusations vatican person pope regarding sex abuses scandals please explain us atmosphere america and160its roots important distinguish us crisis 2002 latest tempest criticism church 2002 press important job bringing light situations clerical sexual abuse bishops mishandling abuse long hidden church begun address problems seriously early 1990s accelerated efforts discipline abusers create safe environments young people throughout american catholicism measures worked 68 million catholics united states six credible reports sexual abuse young person church last year course six many completely falsifies picture press painted ongoing crisis sexual abuse coverup catholic church us cardinal ratzingers support bishops us post2002 efforts put awful problem behind us large part us bishops success firestorm past weeks shaped several different factors anything protecting young people grossly distorted reporting abuse cases milwaukee munich falsely implicating pope coverups inability american editors reporters understand catholic church gigantic international corporation pope controls every aspect catholic life parish level commentators reporters editors see opportunity take catholic church public debate issues like nature marriage right life painting picture church hypocritical criminal conspiracy abusers enablers unscrupulous lawyers see false portrait way bring resources vatican within reach american courts church defenders beginning get fair hearing past week father cantalamessa made exceptionally stupid inappropriate remarks solemn liturgy good friday made church look insensitive inept think however serious catholics yet much affected recent controversy time every serious catholic wishes holy see would take firmer grip story get facts coherent comprehensive compelling way take decisive action prelates ireland clearly irresponsible handling abuse cases160 2 also fears behind public offensive us plot catholic church answer them160 ive described interests work although certainly wouldnt call coordinated plot political people commentators public affairs want destroy moral credibility church lawyers pressing suits would expose vatican financial damage anticatholic secularists take occasion beat church catholics see however strangely opportunity press revolution never end priestly celibacy ordination women kind catholic congregationalism bishops authority radically diminished people say present tempest add come plot160 3 judge way vatican handling accuses sex abuses coming different countries john paul ii cardinal ratzinger helpful us bishops 2002 trying put even stronger measures abusers place thought pope benedicts letter church ireland moving sincere strong fact remains irish hierarchy pope said lost lot credibility effective followup popes letter must include dramatic changes churchs leadership ireland response sala stampa better recent weeks think would helpful holy see would make senior leaders available serious conversation reporters cardinal levadas recent interview new york times helpful here160 4 yesterday father cantalmessa speaking vatican described possible parallel bias vatican antisemitism jews agree interpretation remarks stupid utterly inappropriate good friday liturgy must hurt benedict xvi done perhaps modern catholic theologian acknowledge catholic churchs debt gods covenant jewish people living judaism may safely assume agree interpretation160 5 kentucky oregon top officials vatican may requested court answer accusations vatican good legal counsel doesnt need advice 6 story sex abuses affecting public image catholic church us depends audience serious catholics know church problem dealt safest environment young people america serious catholics also deeply offended news stories editorials cartoons suggesting priests sexual predators kind vicious anticatholic bias challenged gross prejudice calumny 160 people dislike catholicism various reasons find distorted news commentary reasons dislike church course early measure effect churchs prolife witness prolife movement remained strong 2002 dont think seriously undermined current controversies perhaps importantly tens thousands people baptized catholic church entered full communion catholic church easter vigil year tells something important vitality catholicism united states160 7 please add anything thing may consider relevant let emphasize us perspective 2002 2010 different problems brought light 2002 real dealt current controversy ongoing abuse young people catholic church united states160because crisis abuse church america today160the irish crisis dealt hope firmly vigorously let repeat massive change churchs leadership ireland required160 current controversy seems lot culturewar fought throughout west catholic church last institutional defender idea moral truths built world human beings truths know reason truths set boundaries within live good noble lives powerful forces west deny truths exist urge us believe humanity infinitely plastic malleable marriage mean law says means sex simply another form sports unborn human beings radically handicapped human beings gravely ill human beings count nothing coercive state power impose cardinal ratzinger called dictatorship relativism powerful forces see failures sons daughters church past mishandling failures church authorities opportunity destroy public moral teaching authority church sinful priests religious incompetent irresponsible bishops actions past given churchs critics weapons attack catholicism undeniable reason serious catholics recommit authentically catholic reform senior leadership church enforce churchs discipline rigorously160 also read interview appeared la stampa italian george weigel distinguished senior fellow washingtons ethics public policy center holds william e simon chair catholic studies 160 160 | 777 |
<p>How has the Obama administration’s <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/419525/obamas-next-transformation-and-how-stop-it-stanley-kurtz" type="external">radically transformative</a> Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH) regulation—released in <a href="http://www.huduser.org/portal/affht_pt.html" type="external">preliminary form</a> nearly two years ago—largely escaped public scrutiny until now?</p>
<p>AFFH will dramatically undercut the independence of local governments, will mean significant population transfers across metropolitan areas, and will force densified development on suburbs and cities alike. Last week, by <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/419560/affirmatively-furthering-fair-housing-sleeper-presidential-campaign-issue-stanley" type="external">passing an amendment</a> authored by Arizona Congressman <a href="http://gosar.house.gov/press-release/house-passes-gosar-amendment-protecting-local-zoning-rights-federal-overreach" type="external">Paul Gosar</a>, House Republicans moved to starve the Department of Housing and Urban Development of the funds required to enforce the rule. Also, last week at a congressional hearing, HUD Secretary Julian Castro, widely touted as Hillary Clinton’s most likely vice-presidential running mate, was <a href="http://video.foxbusiness.com/v/4290978199001/rep-love-presses-hud-secretary-on-obamas-housing-plan/?#sp=show-clips" type="external">sharply questioned</a> about AFFH by Utah Congresswoman Mia Love. If all that’s not news, what is? Yet the mainstream media has been <a href="http://newsbusters.org/blogs/curtis-houck/2015/06/11/networks-skimp-obama-administrations-plan-force-diversity-wealthy" type="external">missing in action</a> on this issue since the preliminary version of AFFH was promulgated in July of 2013. Why?</p>
<p>The answer is that President Obama understands how politically explosive AFFH is, and is at pains to enact it as quietly as possible.&#160; Meanwhile, a thoroughly biased and compliant press plays along.</p>
<p>My 2012 book on Obama’s anti-suburban policies, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Spreading-Wealth-Robbing-Suburbs-Cities/dp/B00D9TE8TS" type="external">Spreading the Wealth</a>, highlighted several admissions of stealth by advocates and scholars sympathetic to the Obama administration. But that was three years ago, and a year before the initial draft of AFFH was released. So it’s helpful now to find a video confession by a sympathetic observer of the Obama administration’s policies to the effect that, when it comes to AFFH, stealth is the order of the day.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.brookings.edu/events/2015/06/01-place-and-opportunity-social-mobility-reeves" type="external">video</a> in question is of a June 1, 2015 Brookings Institution event, “Place Opportunity and Social Mobility: What Now for Policy?” Brookings, by the way, is ground zero for the Obama administration’s anti-suburban “regionalist” policies. Brookings specialists help stock Obama’s HUD with pro-regionalist bureaucrats; and Brookings fellows help to build stealthily regionalist policies into Obama administration initiatives. Obama’s only serious public foray into urban-suburban issues during his first term came in an important 2009 Brookings Institution address that received virtually no press coverage.</p>
<p>The June 1, 2015 Brookings event on “Place and Opportunity” was streamed on video by 30 officials at HUD and 9 officials from the Seattle Housing Authority, a national center of regionalist policies. The section of the video of particular interest comes in the form of a comment by event host, Brookings Fellow <a href="http://www.brookings.edu/experts/reevesr" type="external">Richard Reeves</a>, on remarks by panelist <a href="http://www.urban.org/author/margery-austin-turner" type="external">Margery Austin Turner</a>. Turner, senior vice president for Program, Planning, and Management at the Urban Institute, is also a former deputy assistant secretary for research at HUD, and so (as Reeves points out) was addressing many of her former HUD colleagues online. What we’re seeing on video, then, is not an isolated opinion, but evidence of the state of mind of the core advocates and officials who shape the Obama administration’s housing policies.</p>
<p>The key exchange comes between 1:21:08 and 1:23:59 on the <a href="http://www.brookings.edu/events/2015/06/01-place-and-opportunity-social-mobility-reeves" type="external">video</a>. In response to a question from Reeves about what “getting serious” about housing policy would mean, Turner cites AFFH, arguing that the rule could bring “incredibly important” changes to America. Slyly, she acknowledges that AFFH isn’t so much enforcing the original legal obligation to “affirmatively further fair housing,” as it is changing our understanding of what that obligation means. (In other words, AFFH is stretching a directive to prevent discrimination into a mandate for social engineering.) Turner then says that it would take decades for AFFH to fully transform society along the lines she desires. (I’d add that the rule won’t take nearly that long to gut local government in America.)</p>
<p>What’s interesting is that when Turner finishes her discussion of AFFH by saying that the rule “sounds very obscure, but I think it could be hugely important,” Reeves breaks in and says: “Perhaps it’s important to keep [the AFFH rule] sounding obscure in order to get it through.” (In other words, to get the AFFH rule enacted before public opposition and congressional Republicans can block it, we’ve got to keep its existence and importance quiet.) At this point, the audience laughs sympathetically. Then Reeves adds: “Sometimes obscurity is the best political strategy, particularly in this area.”</p>
<p>You don’t often see a direct admission by AFFH advocates that they are trying to fly under the political and media radar, but here it is—and at a Brookings event that Reeves himself emphasizes was being streamed by bureaucrats at HUD. Reeves clearly has no worries that his call for stealth might stir outrage from the 30 Obama administration officials listening in.</p>
<p>Another revealing section of the video comes between 42:30 and 48:24 when we hear from Emily Badger, a staff writer at The Washington Post. Not only is Badger an enthusiastic advocate of precisely the sort of policies represented by AFFH, but she’s clearly aware of how politically awkward the topic is. So why won’t the mainstream press fairly report—or indeed report at all—on the sweeping ambitions of AFFH? If Badger is any indication, the press has refused to do its job because it is thoroughly on the side of AFFH’s advocates, and is complicit in their plans to keep this issue out of the public eye.</p>
<p>Why wasn’t Reeves ashamed to call for keeping AFFH quiet, in front of a reporter for The Washington Post? And why didn’t Badger write a story, say, about the stealthy ways of AFFH supporters? Obviously, it’s because Badger is herself an advocate of AFFH, and holds that interest above her obligations as a reporter.</p>
<p>It’s also notable that Margery Turner begins her remarks on AFFH by revealing that “any week now” HUD will promulgate the rule in its final form. (Remember, the panel was held on June 1, 2015.) This is consistent with the last week’s <a href="http://thehill.com/regulation/244620-obamas-bid-to-diversify-wealthy-neighborhoods" type="external">report</a> in The Hill that AFFH is “due out this month.” Turner is an insider, so her prediction carries weight. A release toward the end of June, in the hopes that the July 4 holiday and summer vacation will dampen public attention, seems likely. &#160;(Or will the unexpected wave of publicity among conservatives over the past week frighten the Obama administration into yet another delay?)</p>
<p>In any case, the lesson here is clear. Don’t take silence on the part of the media or the administration as an indication of how significant AFFH is. As Turner herself says, despite its apparent obscurity, AFFH is “incredibly important.” And when the mainstream press finally gets around to reporting on AFFH, treat them not as fair-minded observers, but as the advocates-in-reporters-clothing they are.</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 | obama administrations radically transformative affirmatively furthering fair housing affh regulationreleased preliminary form nearly two years agolargely escaped public scrutiny affh dramatically undercut independence local governments mean significant population transfers across metropolitan areas force densified development suburbs cities alike last week passing amendment authored arizona congressman paul gosar house republicans moved starve department housing urban development funds required enforce rule also last week congressional hearing hud secretary julian castro widely touted hillary clintons likely vicepresidential running mate sharply questioned affh utah congresswoman mia love thats news yet mainstream media missing action issue since preliminary version affh promulgated july 2013 answer president obama understands politically explosive affh pains enact quietly possible160 meanwhile thoroughly biased compliant press plays along 2012 book obamas antisuburban policies spreading wealth highlighted several admissions stealth advocates scholars sympathetic obama administration three years ago year initial draft affh released helpful find video confession sympathetic observer obama administrations policies effect comes affh stealth order day video question june 1 2015 brookings institution event place opportunity social mobility policy brookings way ground zero obama administrations antisuburban regionalist policies brookings specialists help stock obamas hud proregionalist bureaucrats brookings fellows help build stealthily regionalist policies obama administration initiatives obamas serious public foray urbansuburban issues first term came important 2009 brookings institution address received virtually press coverage june 1 2015 brookings event place opportunity streamed video 30 officials hud 9 officials seattle housing authority national center regionalist policies section video particular interest comes form comment event host brookings fellow richard reeves remarks panelist margery austin turner turner senior vice president program planning management urban institute also former deputy assistant secretary research hud reeves points addressing many former hud colleagues online seeing video isolated opinion evidence state mind core advocates officials shape obama administrations housing policies key exchange comes 12108 12359 video response question reeves getting serious housing policy would mean turner cites affh arguing rule could bring incredibly important changes america slyly acknowledges affh isnt much enforcing original legal obligation affirmatively fair housing changing understanding obligation means words affh stretching directive prevent discrimination mandate social engineering turner says would take decades affh fully transform society along lines desires id add rule wont take nearly long gut local government america whats interesting turner finishes discussion affh saying rule sounds obscure think could hugely important reeves breaks says perhaps important keep affh rule sounding obscure order get words get affh rule enacted public opposition congressional republicans block weve got keep existence importance quiet point audience laughs sympathetically reeves adds sometimes obscurity best political strategy particularly area dont often see direct admission affh advocates trying fly political media radar isand brookings event reeves emphasizes streamed bureaucrats hud reeves clearly worries call stealth might stir outrage 30 obama administration officials listening another revealing section video comes 4230 4824 hear emily badger staff writer washington post badger enthusiastic advocate precisely sort policies represented affh shes clearly aware politically awkward topic wont mainstream press fairly reportor indeed report allon sweeping ambitions affh badger indication press refused job thoroughly side affhs advocates complicit plans keep issue public eye wasnt reeves ashamed call keeping affh quiet front reporter washington post didnt badger write story say stealthy ways affh supporters obviously badger advocate affh holds interest obligations reporter also notable margery turner begins remarks affh revealing week hud promulgate rule final form remember panel held june 1 2015 consistent last weeks report hill affh due month turner insider prediction carries weight release toward end june hopes july 4 holiday summer vacation dampen public attention seems likely 160or unexpected wave publicity among conservatives past week frighten obama administration yet another delay case lesson clear dont take silence part media administration indication significant affh turner says despite apparent obscurity affh incredibly important mainstream press finally gets around reporting affh treat fairminded observers advocatesinreportersclothing stanley kurtz senior fellow ethics public policy center reached commentskurtznationalreviewcom | 638 |
<p>Obamacare’s apologists and their allies in the mainstream press have spent an inordinate amount of time and energy dissecting the supposed hypocrisy of conservatives on the individual mandate. They are indignant that the GOP is now in lockstep opposition to the mandate even though two decades ago some Republican senators—most of whom have long since departed from the scene—supported the concept in theory in large part to fight against even heavier-handed government intrusion into the health sector by President Clinton. How transparently political and outrageous of them!</p>
<p>But it’s hard to take these attacks seriously when those launching them systematically ignore the much more important, immediate, and consequential flip-flopping on this issue by their health-care hero, President Obama.</p>
<p>The president’s contortions on the individual mandate didn’t take place two decades ago and didn’t evolve over a period of years. He changed his position abruptly in early 2009 after he was elected president, just months after taking a hardline position on the opposing side during the entirety of the presidential campaign. And it’s a safe bet that, if the outcome of the Supreme Court’s decision on Obamacare makes it convenient for him, he will change his position yet again. Indeed, if recent history is any guide, he will do so with nary a peep from an adoring press.</p>
<p>The story of the president’s…evolution…on this issue begins in early 2008. Then-senator Barack Obama was locked in a bitter struggle with his Senate rival, Hillary Clinton, for the Democratic presidential nomination. On most issues, there was no discernible space between them, with both staking out traditional liberal positions on the various issues of import to Democratic primary voters.</p>
<p>But on health care, Senator Obama saw an opportunity. He had put out a health-care plan that checked all of the boxes of the standard Democratic approach to reform: expand Medicaid, provide new subsidies for insurance coverage, require employers to offer plans, and establish a new “public option” modeled on Medicare. But he left off of his list one crucial item: the individual mandate.</p>
<p>This was no small matter. Without the mandate, the Obama plan would not be considered a “universal coverage” plan in Democratic circles, as analysts, including those at the Congressional Budget Office, would expect large numbers of Americans to decline to sign up for coverage in a voluntary system. Party elites and activists would regard this as a major, perhaps even fatal, flaw. Nothing in the Democratic catechism is more sacred than the goal of “universal coverage” in health care.</p>
<p>So Senator Obama was taking a risk in not toeing the party line. But it was a calculated risk. He knew from polling data that, despite its popularity among party elites and left-leaning health-care analysts, the individual mandate was far less popular among Democratic primary voters. Here was a policy difference with Senator Clinton that he could exploit to his advantage in the primaries.</p>
<p>And exploit it he did. In ads, mailings, and <a href="http://eppc.us4.list-manage2.com/track/click?u=be333e74ea841be93db60da61&amp;id=8613ac3f35&amp;e=4de8d3b2b6" type="external">debates</a>, Senator Obama in the crucial months of the campaign hammered Senator Clinton for forcing people who couldn’t afford premiums to pay them anyway or face sanctions from the federal government. And, from Senator Clinton’s indignant reaction, it’s safe to say the attacks hit the mark.</p>
<p>Now, fast-forward to late 2008 and early 2009, as Senator Obama was on the road to becoming President Obama. The November election could not have gone better for the Democrats. Obama won his race against John McCain handily, and the incoming 111th Congress would have commanding Democratic majorities in both houses, giving the president essentially free rein to enact a sweeping agenda. Democratic activists across the board were salivating at the prospect of using those majorities to finally push through a “universal coverage” health-care plan.</p>
<p>But there was a small problem. The Obama plan didn’t have a mandate and therefore wasn’t “universal coverage.”</p>
<p>What to do? Change positions, of course. By December 2008, just weeks after the election, rumors were already circulating to that effect. By spring 2009, as initial drafts of the legislation were being assembled in Congress, the administration made it official that the president was changing his position and would push for the mandate.</p>
<p>Some journalists have tried to paper over this head-spinning flip-flop as simply a matter of new and better information. According to the account popularized by <a href="http://eppc.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=be333e74ea841be93db60da61&amp;id=f64a3e0978&amp;e=4de8d3b2b6" type="external">Ryan Lizza’s pieces in The New Yorker</a>, the president received a memo in April 2009 explaining that official estimates would show that, at a cost that was only slightly higher, a health-care plan with the mandate would cover millions more people than would a voluntary program. That is said to have changed the president’s mind.</p>
<p>This is nonsense. It was always known that a plan with a mandate would do better on coverage numbers than would one without it. That was the whole point of the mandate: It would force millions to use their private resources to buy coverage and thereby increase the number of the insured without too much more public spending. This was not new information in 2009. Senator Obama chose to oppose the mandate in 2008 because it was politically expedient. In 2009, he changed his position because he found it advantageous. It’s as simple as that.</p>
<p>Since its enactment two years ago, the individual mandate has been challenged in federal court on constitutional grounds. The Obama administration has filed brief after brief in these cases, arguing that the mandate is essential to the operation of the rest of the law. Indeed, somewhat surprisingly, the administration has gone so far as to tell the various courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court, that if the mandate were to fall, then community rating and guaranteed issue would have to go too because, without the mandate, these provisions would destroy the private insurance market.</p>
<p>Why would the administration take such a position, which might expose even more of the law to the risk of an adverse court ruling? For political reasons, of course. The administration’s lawyers were attempting to turn up the heat on the judges by essentially telling them that they couldn’t kill just the unpopular provision in the law; they would have to take out the popular ones, too.</p>
<p>But what if the Supreme Court ignores the administration’s request and kills just the individual mandate? Would the administration continue to adhere to the logic of its legal briefs and go back to Congress for fixes to prevent the destruction of the private insurance industry?</p>
<p>Don’t count on it. If the Court goes that route, expect the president and the administration to turn on a dime and, on the day of the court ruling, to adopt an entirely new position regarding the mandate. If it goes, they will claim they never really needed it anyway to make the law work and that they have the tools they need to sign up nearly all Americans to affordable insurance. In other words: Full steam ahead! This new administration line is <a href="http://eppc.us4.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=be333e74ea841be93db60da61&amp;id=380d356775&amp;e=4de8d3b2b6" type="external">already being tested</a>&#160;by trusted surrogates.</p>
<p>President Obama isn’t the first politician to shift his position on an important issue when it was politically convenient for him to do so, and he won’t be the last. But he has done it in a particularly brazen manner, complaining all the while that it’s his political opponents who are craven opportunists. Perhaps he’s just delivering the audacity he promised when running for office.</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.</p> | false | 1 | obamacares apologists allies mainstream press spent inordinate amount time energy dissecting supposed hypocrisy conservatives individual mandate indignant gop lockstep opposition mandate even though two decades ago republican senatorsmost long since departed scenesupported concept theory large part fight even heavierhanded government intrusion health sector president clinton transparently political outrageous hard take attacks seriously launching systematically ignore much important immediate consequential flipflopping issue healthcare hero president obama presidents contortions individual mandate didnt take place two decades ago didnt evolve period years changed position abruptly early 2009 elected president months taking hardline position opposing side entirety presidential campaign safe bet outcome supreme courts decision obamacare makes convenient change position yet indeed recent history guide nary peep adoring press story presidentsevolutionon issue begins early 2008 thensenator barack obama locked bitter struggle senate rival hillary clinton democratic presidential nomination issues discernible space staking traditional liberal positions various issues import democratic primary voters health care senator obama saw opportunity put healthcare plan checked boxes standard democratic approach reform expand medicaid provide new subsidies insurance coverage require employers offer plans establish new public option modeled medicare left list one crucial item individual mandate small matter without mandate obama plan would considered universal coverage plan democratic circles analysts including congressional budget office would expect large numbers americans decline sign coverage voluntary system party elites activists would regard major perhaps even fatal flaw nothing democratic catechism sacred goal universal coverage health care senator obama taking risk toeing party line calculated risk knew polling data despite popularity among party elites leftleaning healthcare analysts individual mandate far less popular among democratic primary voters policy difference senator clinton could exploit advantage primaries exploit ads mailings debates senator obama crucial months campaign hammered senator clinton forcing people couldnt afford premiums pay anyway face sanctions federal government senator clintons indignant reaction safe say attacks hit mark fastforward late 2008 early 2009 senator obama road becoming president obama november election could gone better democrats obama race john mccain handily incoming 111th congress would commanding democratic majorities houses giving president essentially free rein enact sweeping agenda democratic activists across board salivating prospect using majorities finally push universal coverage healthcare plan small problem obama plan didnt mandate therefore wasnt universal coverage change positions course december 2008 weeks election rumors already circulating effect spring 2009 initial drafts legislation assembled congress administration made official president changing position would push mandate journalists tried paper headspinning flipflop simply matter new better information according account popularized ryan lizzas pieces new yorker president received memo april 2009 explaining official estimates would show cost slightly higher healthcare plan mandate would cover millions people would voluntary program said changed presidents mind nonsense always known plan mandate would better coverage numbers would one without whole point mandate would force millions use private resources buy coverage thereby increase number insured without much public spending new information 2009 senator obama chose oppose mandate 2008 politically expedient 2009 changed position found advantageous simple since enactment two years ago individual mandate challenged federal court constitutional grounds obama administration filed brief brief cases arguing mandate essential operation rest law indeed somewhat surprisingly administration gone far tell various courts including us supreme court mandate fall community rating guaranteed issue would go without mandate provisions would destroy private insurance market would administration take position might expose even law risk adverse court ruling political reasons course administrations lawyers attempting turn heat judges essentially telling couldnt kill unpopular provision law would take popular ones supreme court ignores administrations request kills individual mandate would administration continue adhere logic legal briefs go back congress fixes prevent destruction private insurance industry dont count court goes route expect president administration turn dime day court ruling adopt entirely new position regarding mandate goes claim never really needed anyway make law work tools need sign nearly americans affordable insurance words full steam ahead new administration line already tested160by trusted surrogates president obama isnt first politician shift position important issue politically convenient wont last done particularly brazen manner complaining political opponents craven opportunists perhaps hes delivering audacity promised running office james c capretta fellow ethics public policy center associate director office management budget 2001 2004 | 683 |
<p>As the old year breathed its last in the dark days around the December solstice, so also died “The Soup” which, if you count the decade or so of its previous incarnation as “Talk Soup” on the E! cable network, had for nearly a quarter of a century made fun of television talk shows and the sort of TV to which some wag had already attached the clearly ironic epithet, “reality.” Ultimately, what killed “The Soup” was the same malaise that sooner or later infects nearly all pop cultural attempts at satire in our times. It became indistinguishable from the things it was supposedly satirizing. By eschewing any moral perspective on the stupidity and the vulgarity of the popular media and treating it all as nothing but a good joke, “The Soup” had nowhere to go but to become stupid and vulgar itself in more or less equal measure.</p>
<p>I don’t know if you could find a better example today of that copybook maxim of yesteryear, taken from the apocryphal book of Ecclesiasticus, that “He that toucheth pitch shall be defiled therewith; and he that hath fellowship with a proud man shall be like unto him.” But these words must have a special application to television which, as we have learned in recent years, has a remarkably homogenizing effect on everything it turns its lens on — and, increasingly, on those who spend any time watching it too. Or, to put it another way, stupidity and vulgarity have become so ubiquitous on television that they are hardly recognizable as such anymore. Not to regular TV watchers, anyway. It’s just what they expect, which is why “The Soup” eventually became pointless.</p>
<p>Six years ago, Joel McHale, the long-time host of the show gave an interview to <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/17/arts/television/17mchale.html" type="external">The New York Times</a>&#160;in which he contrasted his part in “The Soup” with the role he was playing at the same time in an NBC sitcom called “Community”:</p>
<p>The difference between his two screen roles, Mr. McHale said, is that on “Community” his character must learn that he is not superior to his classmates and accept his place in their peculiar group. On “The Soup,” however, “almost every single human being is above some of the programming we show,” he said.</p>
<p>But that proved to be just the problem. If anybody could feel superior to the sort of people he was holding up to ridicule, there wasn’t much reason to feel superior. Or, in the end, to hold such people up to ridicule either. He ended the interview by noting that a wedding episode of the reality show “Keeping Up With the Kardashians” — also a show on the E! network — had recently had a bigger audience than the final episode of the latest season of the critically lauded “Mad Men.” “So, that happened,” Mr. McHale recalled his fellow “Soup” satirists as thinking. “I guess: Don’t go to school. Stay up late and drink. It doesn’t matter anymore.’” It was in a similar spirit of surrender to the TV culture, I thought, that he said his final good-byes to “The Soup” audience in December.</p>
<p>In that final episode, Mr McHale hinted that a show like “Keeping Up With the Kardashians” might have been invented just for the scorn with which it must have hoped to be treated, and once was treated, by “The Soup.” But as he had already suggested in 2010, that scorn couldn’t last. By the end, “The Soup” had long since given up on anything as old-fashioned as judgment or discrimination and was laughing mostly with rather than at its happy targets, whose own shows were only boosted by Joel’s good-natured attentions. Meanwhile his audience must have grown increasingly baffled by the number of references to people and events which could only have been understood by the most dedicated consumers of what was once known as trash TV.</p>
<p>Now, of course, it’s pretty much all trash. The scrapping of anything which might resemble a “judgemental” approach to people, no matter how suited to judgement they might once have appeared, suggests an interesting comparison between the end of “The Soup” and that of “American Idol,” which began its final season with the new year. On both shows, what people tuned in for when they were at their peak was that which the popular culture in general and TV in particular constantly pulls against, namely judgmentalism. There was just the hint of the thrillingly transgressive about both Simon Cowell’s famous put-downs of aspirational pop singers and Joel McHale’s ridicule of clueless news anchors or solipsistic reality stars. But both men must have constantly felt the cultural cross-currents, the whisper of the Zeitgeist in their ear: “So you think you’re better than they are?” It’s got to wear you down after a while.</p>
<p>And then there’s this. In the years since 1991 when “Talk Soup” first bravely essayed to administer its reality test to the media, “reality” itself has become politicized. Bruce/Caitlyn Jenner was only the last and most spectacular of the Kardashians’ dares flung in the face of their audience’s latent sense of moral superiority — which like that of Mr McHale, became ever more latent as a result and finally disappeared altogether. Now, the “transgendered” have been culturally and politically licensed to create their own reality out of the fantasy that they “really” belong to the opposite sex. And that factitious, surgically created reality cannot and must not be gainsaid under penalty of social ostracization and media persecution, as such one-time media darlings as <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/oct/24/caitlyn-jenner-wanted-limelight-of-female-kardashians-germaine-greer" type="external">Germaine Greer</a>&#160;and <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comedy/comedians/barry-humphries-caitlyn-jenner-is-a-publicity-seeking-ratbag/" type="external">Barry Humphries (as Dame Edna Everage)</a>&#160;have lately discovered to their cost.</p>
<p>Yet it would be foolish to suppose that, for all the energies of the political culture, the media and academia which are being poured every day into the concerted effort to reshape reality into more progressively congenial forms, most people do not at some level, and however cowed they may be by the unanswerable authority of science and morality, retain a sense of and even a certain loyalty to the realities they grew up with: the realities of two sexes, for instance, and the ineradicable differences between them. Or, to rise above the sexual for just a moment — don’t worry, we’ll get back to it presently — the ancient and unchanging realities of fiscal prudence, national security and international power politics, the neglect of which in the Obama years Donald Trump has grown so popular by pointing out.</p>
<p>It is no accident that Mr Trump comes to the task from the world of reality-TV — a world that has been built on the essential insight that, in the age of non-judgmentalism, every claim to moral authority, implicit or explicit, produces an equal and opposite counter-claim. Only someone with the wiliness of a Kardashian can make this work for him, and the signs so far indicate that Donald Trump has what it takes. The American political culture may never be the same as a result. Interestingly, Mr Trump’s earlier reality shows, “The Apprentice” and “Celebrity Apprentice,” built their success on the same kind of daring judgmentalism as “The Soup” and “American Idol” in their heyday. His catch-phrase, “You’re fired,” was designed to appeal to an audience so weary of the politically-correct pretense that nobody was better than anybody else that only such brutishness could appear as “reality.” He has simply brought the same formula into the political campaign with slashing attacks on so many sacred cows that people are more exhilarated than shocked by them.</p>
<p>Why, then, do his implicit claims to moral authority not wear out their popular welcome the way those of Messrs. McHale and Cowell did? Well, it’s early days yet, and they may well do so before very much longer. But I think there is another, more important reason — the same reason why the many <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/mccarthyism-may-soon-be-replaced-by-trumpism/2016/01/04/37a1b9ae-b31a-11e5-9388-466021d971de_story.html" type="external">comparisons between Mr Trump and Joseph McCarthy</a>&#160;are misconceived. McCarthy, in the end, came across to the public as a bully; Donald Trump still comes across, at the time of writing anyway, as a man standing up to bullies — the media bullies who continue to belabor him with the bludgeon of political correctness. That’s why the more they do so, the more popular he becomes. On this subject at least, his claim is not to moral superiority but to moral equality. He’s the one denying — and denying on behalf of a great many other people who resent being called racist, sexist and other hard names — that the media and political elite who they see as having had things all their own way for so long in this country are any better than he is.</p>
<p>Just look at the first outrage to rattle the media’s cages in the new year.When Hillary Clinton attacked Mr Trump for “sexism” he replied with a flurry of tweets, all more or less to the effect that “If Hillary thinks she can unleash her husband, with his terrible record of women abuse, while playing the women’s card on me, she’s wrong!” At about the same time, someone dug up an old photo of Bill Cosby, who had just been indicted for sexual assault, campaigning with Mrs Clinton in the New York Senate race in 2000. It was the work of a moment for someone in the Trump camp to put together an <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/BAPvZ-1GhbP/" type="external">Instagram video</a>&#160;of that photo, together with ones of Mrs Clinton with Anthony Weiner and Bill Clinton with Monica Lewinsky, intercut with the appropriate tabloid headlines, all to the sound of scary music and Hillary herself intoning: “Women’s rights are human rights, and human rights are women’s rights; once and for all, let’s keep fighting for opportunity and dignity.” As the screen goes black, there then appears, first, the Trump name and motto, “Make America Great Again” and then, as that fades out, in all caps the words: “TRUE DEFENDER OF WOMEN’S RIGHTS.”</p>
<p>It’s enough, as Mark Twain says, to make a cat laugh. One can only imagine the envy that must have been felt among the other Republican candidates who have grown used to thinking of Bill Clinton’s sexual misbehavior as off-limits, especially in relation to Mrs Clinton’s candidacy, and of the man himself as the much beloved figure he is always presented as in the media. They must have been even more shocked than the Clintons. At a stroke the whole “War on Women” trope that did such yeoman service for Democrats in 2012 appeared to have been neutralized — and as a weapon in the hands of a female candidate! Even Donald Trump couldn’t have got away with this, however, except as a response to Mrs Clinton’s own entirely characteristic high-handed self-righteousness. That must also be why he let it be known, according to <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/05/us/politics/bill-clinton-the-subdued-spouse-makes-his-campaign-debut.html?emc=edit_th_20160105&amp;nl=todaysheadlines&amp;nlid=57259899" type="external">The New York Times</a>, that “he had brought up Mr. Clinton’s past simply as a response to provocation. ‘I would be inclined to just let it go’ if the Clintons never again accused him of sexism, Mr Trump said.”</p>
<p>His shrewdness here lay in the essential insight that hypocrisy remains, along with sexism, racism etc., one of the few sins still recognizable as such by the media. Even&#160;The New York Times was forced to sit up and take notice. Its ever-so-superior Editoral Board produced one of its usually utterly <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/08/opinion/donald-trump-drags-bill-clintons-baggage-out.html?ref=opinion" type="external">predictable jeremiads</a>&#160; about the matter that was nevertheless forced to pay a grudging tribute to the Trump genius. The editorial began and ended with a ringing denunciation of his “sexism” but in between it had this to say:</p>
<p>That said, it is indisputable that the Clintons’ political lives have been linked for decades, that Mr. Clinton is now playing a visible role in his wife’s campaign and that Hillary Clinton is accountable for her own public actions. For decades Mrs. Clinton has helped protect her husband’s political career, and hers, from the taint of his sexual misbehavior, in part by attacking the character of women linked to her husband.</p>
<p>The authors even felt constrained to bring up what must be Mrs Clinton’s most embarrassing moment on the campaign trail so far:</p>
<p>In September at the University of Northern Iowa, she pledged to combat sexual assault on college campuses, saying: “I want to send a message to all of the survivors. Don’t let anyone silence your voice. You have the right to be heard, the right to be believed, and we are with you as you go forward.” Last month in New Hampshire, a young woman challenged Mrs. Clinton on that. Speaking at a town hall event, the woman referred to several women who have said they were sexually harassed by her husband. “You recently came out to say that all rape victims should be believed,” she said, asking if Juanita Broaddrick, Kathleen Willey and Paula Jones should also be believed. Mrs. Clinton’s response was odd, and unhelpful. “I would say that everybody should be believed at first until they are disbelieved based on evidence,” she said.</p>
<p>Unhelpful, eh? Well that’s one word for it. That, by the way, was the first time that the name of Juanita Broaddrick — who alleged not sexual harassment but what poor old Todd Akin would have called “legitimate rape” against the former president when he was attorney general of Arkansas in 1978 — has appeared in The New York Times since 2006, when it slipped in in a quotation from Ann Coulter. I checked. And only Donald Trump could have put it there.</p>
<p>Nor was that the limit of his brilliance. The counter-thrust against the charge of sexism not only appeared as yet another of his gratifying assaults on political correctness and those who so seldom hear any answer to it when they employ it against those whom they regard — as Mrs Clinton revealed she does in a Democratic debate last year — their “enemies.” He also reminded people that Bill Clinton himself had once enjoyed the sort of immunity to scandal that Mr Trump now appears to have. And, I would say, for the same reason: because both were the targets of a pack of media — and, in that instance, Republican — moralists who, large segments of the public believed, lacked standing to set themselves up as being so much better than they were.</p>
<p>It is also worth remembering that Monica Lewinsky was seen by many at the time as payback for Anita Hill seven years earlier, in the year that “Talk Soup” began charting the cultural coarsening that, as “The Soup,” it ended up becoming a part of. Nor should we doubt the immense contribution that both of these media sensations — the Clarence Thomas hearings and the Clinton impeachment — themselves made to that coarsening. They were, in a way, the first and greatest of the reality TV shows that have since become so routine that they now even provide the template for political “debates.” Nowadays, all TV is reality TV — if only because it is all equally unreal. And in the kingdom of bad taste, the man who has mastered the finer points of the arts of tastelessness is king.</p>
<p>James Bowman is resident scholar at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p> | false | 1 | old year breathed last dark days around december solstice also died soup count decade previous incarnation talk soup e cable network nearly quarter century made fun television talk shows sort tv wag already attached clearly ironic epithet reality ultimately killed soup malaise sooner later infects nearly pop cultural attempts satire times became indistinguishable things supposedly satirizing eschewing moral perspective stupidity vulgarity popular media treating nothing good joke soup nowhere go become stupid vulgar less equal measure dont know could find better example today copybook maxim yesteryear taken apocryphal book ecclesiasticus toucheth pitch shall defiled therewith hath fellowship proud man shall like unto words must special application television learned recent years remarkably homogenizing effect everything turns lens increasingly spend time watching put another way stupidity vulgarity become ubiquitous television hardly recognizable anymore regular tv watchers anyway expect soup eventually became pointless six years ago joel mchale longtime host show gave interview new york times160in contrasted part soup role playing time nbc sitcom called community difference two screen roles mr mchale said community character must learn superior classmates accept place peculiar group soup however almost every single human programming show said proved problem anybody could feel superior sort people holding ridicule wasnt much reason feel superior end hold people ridicule either ended interview noting wedding episode reality show keeping kardashians also show e network recently bigger audience final episode latest season critically lauded mad men happened mr mchale recalled fellow soup satirists thinking guess dont go school stay late drink doesnt matter anymore similar spirit surrender tv culture thought said final goodbyes soup audience december final episode mr mchale hinted show like keeping kardashians might invented scorn must hoped treated treated soup already suggested 2010 scorn couldnt last end soup long since given anything oldfashioned judgment discrimination laughing mostly rather happy targets whose shows boosted joels goodnatured attentions meanwhile audience must grown increasingly baffled number references people events could understood dedicated consumers known trash tv course pretty much trash scrapping anything might resemble judgemental approach people matter suited judgement might appeared suggests interesting comparison end soup american idol began final season new year shows people tuned peak popular culture general tv particular constantly pulls namely judgmentalism hint thrillingly transgressive simon cowells famous putdowns aspirational pop singers joel mchales ridicule clueless news anchors solipsistic reality stars men must constantly felt cultural crosscurrents whisper zeitgeist ear think youre better got wear theres years since 1991 talk soup first bravely essayed administer reality test media reality become politicized brucecaitlyn jenner last spectacular kardashians dares flung face audiences latent sense moral superiority like mr mchale became ever latent result finally disappeared altogether transgendered culturally politically licensed create reality fantasy really belong opposite sex factitious surgically created reality must gainsaid penalty social ostracization media persecution onetime media darlings germaine greer160and barry humphries dame edna everage160have lately discovered cost yet would foolish suppose energies political culture media academia poured every day concerted effort reshape reality progressively congenial forms people level however cowed may unanswerable authority science morality retain sense even certain loyalty realities grew realities two sexes instance ineradicable differences rise sexual moment dont worry well get back presently ancient unchanging realities fiscal prudence national security international power politics neglect obama years donald trump grown popular pointing accident mr trump comes task world realitytv world built essential insight age nonjudgmentalism every claim moral authority implicit explicit produces equal opposite counterclaim someone wiliness kardashian make work signs far indicate donald trump takes american political culture may never result interestingly mr trumps earlier reality shows apprentice celebrity apprentice built success kind daring judgmentalism soup american idol heyday catchphrase youre fired designed appeal audience weary politicallycorrect pretense nobody better anybody else brutishness could appear reality simply brought formula political campaign slashing attacks many sacred cows people exhilarated shocked implicit claims moral authority wear popular welcome way messrs mchale cowell well early days yet may well much longer think another important reason reason many comparisons mr trump joseph mccarthy160are misconceived mccarthy end came across public bully donald trump still comes across time writing anyway man standing bullies media bullies continue belabor bludgeon political correctness thats popular becomes subject least claim moral superiority moral equality hes one denying denying behalf great many people resent called racist sexist hard names media political elite see things way long country better look first outrage rattle medias cages new yearwhen hillary clinton attacked mr trump sexism replied flurry tweets less effect hillary thinks unleash husband terrible record women abuse playing womens card shes wrong time someone dug old photo bill cosby indicted sexual assault campaigning mrs clinton new york senate race 2000 work moment someone trump camp put together instagram video160of photo together ones mrs clinton anthony weiner bill clinton monica lewinsky intercut appropriate tabloid headlines sound scary music hillary intoning womens rights human rights human rights womens rights lets keep fighting opportunity dignity screen goes black appears first trump name motto make america great fades caps words true defender womens rights enough mark twain says make cat laugh one imagine envy must felt among republican candidates grown used thinking bill clintons sexual misbehavior offlimits especially relation mrs clintons candidacy man much beloved figure always presented media must even shocked clintons stroke whole war women trope yeoman service democrats 2012 appeared neutralized weapon hands female candidate even donald trump couldnt got away however except response mrs clintons entirely characteristic highhanded selfrighteousness must also let known according new york times brought mr clintons past simply response provocation would inclined let go clintons never accused sexism mr trump said shrewdness lay essential insight hypocrisy remains along sexism racism etc one sins still recognizable media even160the new york times forced sit take notice eversosuperior editoral board produced one usually utterly predictable jeremiads160 matter nevertheless forced pay grudging tribute trump genius editorial began ended ringing denunciation sexism say said indisputable clintons political lives linked decades mr clinton playing visible role wifes campaign hillary clinton accountable public actions decades mrs clinton helped protect husbands political career taint sexual misbehavior part attacking character women linked husband authors even felt constrained bring must mrs clintons embarrassing moment campaign trail far september university northern iowa pledged combat sexual assault college campuses saying want send message survivors dont let anyone silence voice right heard right believed go forward last month new hampshire young woman challenged mrs clinton speaking town hall event woman referred several women said sexually harassed husband recently came say rape victims believed said asking juanita broaddrick kathleen willey paula jones also believed mrs clintons response odd unhelpful would say everybody believed first disbelieved based evidence said unhelpful eh well thats one word way first time name juanita broaddrick alleged sexual harassment poor old todd akin would called legitimate rape former president attorney general arkansas 1978 appeared new york times since 2006 slipped quotation ann coulter checked donald trump could put limit brilliance counterthrust charge sexism appeared yet another gratifying assaults political correctness seldom hear answer employ regard mrs clinton revealed democratic debate last year enemies also reminded people bill clinton enjoyed sort immunity scandal mr trump appears would say reason targets pack media instance republican moralists large segments public believed lacked standing set much better also worth remembering monica lewinsky seen many time payback anita hill seven years earlier year talk soup began charting cultural coarsening soup ended becoming part doubt immense contribution media sensations clarence thomas hearings clinton impeachment made coarsening way first greatest reality tv shows since become routine even provide template political debates nowadays tv reality tv equally unreal kingdom bad taste man mastered finer points arts tastelessness king james bowman resident scholar ethics public policy center | 1,267 |
<p>The question of whether Robert Menendez will remain one of the most powerful Democrats in the U.S. Senate or go to prison could hinge on whether favors he did for a large donor are deemed “official acts.”</p>
<p>The trial, set to start Sept. 6, is expected to feature dry discussions about Medicare reimbursement policy as well as tawdry testimony about how Salomon Melgen, a married Florida eye doctor, sought visas for girlfriends from Brazil, Ukraine and the Dominican Republic. Melgen is accused of bribing Menendez for his help with the visas and other government disputes.</p>
<p>Prosecutors say Menendez, a U.S. senator from New Jersey since 2006, engaged in “official acts” to help Melgen. Defense lawyers say Menendez’s phone calls and meetings on Melgen’s behalf were not official acts — but rather a longtime friend helping another out.&#160;</p>
<p>The U.S. Supreme Court narrowed the definition of official acts last year when it set aside the conviction of former Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell. The high court ruled that prosecutors must prove how a public official engaged in a corrupt “quid pro quo,” saying they must take specific acts in exchange for things of value.</p>
<p>“It’s harder today for the government to prove what constitutes an official act,” said Adam Lurie, a former federal prosecutor. “They have to prove that what the senator did is something he actually had control over. The McDonnell case has really muddied the water.”</p>
<p>‘Stream of Benefits’</p>
<p>Jury selection began with written questionnaires in June, and the final phase is scheduled to begin Tuesday with lawyers interviewing potential panelists in Newark, New Jersey. Once the trial gets underway, it is expected to last about two months.</p>
<p>Prosecutors say Melgen gave hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions to support Menendez, as well as trips on private jets and a three-night stay at a Paris hotel valued at $4,934. They allege Menendez received a “stream of benefits” and acted on behalf of Melgen “as opportunities arose,” including in a Medicare overbilling dispute, a contract standoff with the Dominican Republic, and visa applications for the girlfriends.</p>
<p>Menendez and Melgen are charged with conspiracy, bribery, honest-services fraud and violating the Travel Act, which prohibits foreign travel for the purpose of committing crimes. Menendez also is accused of making false statements by failing to disclose Melgen’s gifts on ethics forms.</p>
<p>The outcome could have important implications for the balance of power in the U.S. Senate. Republicans hold a narrow 52-seat majority, with Democrats controlling 46 seats and counting on two independents who caucus with them.</p>
<p>If Menendez is convicted and resigns, appointing a replacement falls to the New Jersey governor. Republican Chris Christie leaves office on Jan. 16, and a Democrat is strongly favored in the race to succeed him.</p>
<p>“The big thing is whether this would play out sooner than that, giving Republicans one more seat with which to work,” says Bruce Oppenheimer, a political science professor at Vanderbilt University.</p>
<p>Remote Possibility</p>
<p>In all likelihood, Menendez’s seat will remain in Democratic hands. If he’s convicted, two-thirds of the Senate would still have to vote to expel him. That would require at least a dozen Democrats to vote for his ouster — a remote possibility in the divided Senate. If Menendez were to resign, he also could try to delay it until a Democrat takes office.</p>
<p>In the governor’s race, Democrat Philip Murphy is leading Republican Kim Guadagno by 54 percent to 33 percent, according to an NBC 4 New York/Marist Poll last month.</p>
<p>If the Republicans manage to replace Menendez, it could have a profound impact on possible votes over the tax code and infrastructure. Senate Republicans are still stinging from their failure to repeal the Affordable Care Act, when three of their members sided with Democrats.</p>
<p>The Menendez case has already spawned legal skirmishes, including accusations that the Justice Department engaged in prosecutorial misconduct. FBI agents interviewed more than 200 witnesses, including three girlfriends of Menendez and three of Melgen. U.S. District Judge William Walls ruled that prosecutors and agents acted properly.</p>
<p>Walls hasn’t ruled on whether Menendez’s actions constituted official acts and may leave that question to the jury. Defense lawyers say Menendez didn’t engage in a “formal exercise of governmental power” as defined by the Supreme Court.</p>
<p>“Simply meeting with Executive Branch officials to inquire about an issue or advocate that they do something, or working with his staff to prepare for such meetings would not qualify as an ‘official act,’” the lawyers wrote in an Aug. 2 filing.</p>
<p>But prosecutors said the Supreme Court requires them to pass a two-step test: showing that a cause or controversy comes before a public official who then engages in an action or decision.</p>
<p>“Under the defendants’ flawed interpretation of ‘official act,’ a member of Congress can never be prosecuted for bribery if he accepts things of value in exchange for pressuring executive branch officials,” prosecutors wrote.</p>
<p>After his 2015 indictment, Menendez said that he and Melgen had been friends for decades and never made a corrupt agreement to break the law.</p>
<p>“We celebrate holidays together, have been there for family weddings and funerals, and have given each other birthday, holiday and wedding presents – just as friends do,” Menendez told reporters.</p> | false | 1 | question whether robert menendez remain one powerful democrats us senate go prison could hinge whether favors large donor deemed official acts trial set start sept 6 expected feature dry discussions medicare reimbursement policy well tawdry testimony salomon melgen married florida eye doctor sought visas girlfriends brazil ukraine dominican republic melgen accused bribing menendez help visas government disputes prosecutors say menendez us senator new jersey since 2006 engaged official acts help melgen defense lawyers say menendezs phone calls meetings melgens behalf official acts rather longtime friend helping another out160 us supreme court narrowed definition official acts last year set aside conviction former virginia gov bob mcdonnell high court ruled prosecutors must prove public official engaged corrupt quid pro quo saying must take specific acts exchange things value harder today government prove constitutes official act said adam lurie former federal prosecutor prove senator something actually control mcdonnell case really muddied water stream benefits jury selection began written questionnaires june final phase scheduled begin tuesday lawyers interviewing potential panelists newark new jersey trial gets underway expected last two months prosecutors say melgen gave hundreds thousands dollars campaign contributions support menendez well trips private jets threenight stay paris hotel valued 4934 allege menendez received stream benefits acted behalf melgen opportunities arose including medicare overbilling dispute contract standoff dominican republic visa applications girlfriends menendez melgen charged conspiracy bribery honestservices fraud violating travel act prohibits foreign travel purpose committing crimes menendez also accused making false statements failing disclose melgens gifts ethics forms outcome could important implications balance power us senate republicans hold narrow 52seat majority democrats controlling 46 seats counting two independents caucus menendez convicted resigns appointing replacement falls new jersey governor republican chris christie leaves office jan 16 democrat strongly favored race succeed big thing whether would play sooner giving republicans one seat work says bruce oppenheimer political science professor vanderbilt university remote possibility likelihood menendezs seat remain democratic hands hes convicted twothirds senate would still vote expel would require least dozen democrats vote ouster remote possibility divided senate menendez resign also could try delay democrat takes office governors race democrat philip murphy leading republican kim guadagno 54 percent 33 percent according nbc 4 new yorkmarist poll last month republicans manage replace menendez could profound impact possible votes tax code infrastructure senate republicans still stinging failure repeal affordable care act three members sided democrats menendez case already spawned legal skirmishes including accusations justice department engaged prosecutorial misconduct fbi agents interviewed 200 witnesses including three girlfriends menendez three melgen us district judge william walls ruled prosecutors agents acted properly walls hasnt ruled whether menendezs actions constituted official acts may leave question jury defense lawyers say menendez didnt engage formal exercise governmental power defined supreme court simply meeting executive branch officials inquire issue advocate something working staff prepare meetings would qualify official act lawyers wrote aug 2 filing prosecutors said supreme court requires pass twostep test showing cause controversy comes public official engages action decision defendants flawed interpretation official act member congress never prosecuted bribery accepts things value exchange pressuring executive branch officials prosecutors wrote 2015 indictment menendez said melgen friends decades never made corrupt agreement break law celebrate holidays together family weddings funerals given birthday holiday wedding presents friends menendez told reporters | 536 |
<p>Much has been said about the emotional toll of rescinding the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program on young people. But labor analysts say the economy could also take a hit if lawmakers don't come up with a resolution quickly.</p>
<p>Back in September, the Trump administration decided to roll back DACA, citing concerns about how it was initially introduced.</p>
<p>President Obama issued DACA in 2012, temporarily shielding thousands of undocumented immigrants (also known as "Dreamers"), who were brought into the country as children, and later found themselves undocumented. The program allowed some 800,000 DACA recipients to live and work in the United States without fear of deportation.</p>
<p>When Obama first introduced the program, he did so via an executive action, rather than going through Congress – a move that ruffled some Republican lawmakers.</p>
<p>While Trump says that in working on a deal for DACA, "a lot has to do with the amount of security" at the border, he adds that pulling the plug on DACA will allow Congress to figure out a path for DACA recipients. The move is also in keeping with his campaign promises. In addition, President Trump says he empathizes with DACA recipients. Speaking in a press conference on Sept. 5, the day he scrapped the program, Trump said:</p>
<p>"I have a great heart for the folks we’re talking about. ...and hopefully, now Congress will be able to help them and do it properly. And I can tell you in speaking to members of Congress they want to be able to do something and do it right. And really we have no choice."</p>
<p>The Trump administration charged Congress with finding an alternative solution by March 2018.</p>
<p>As things stand, Democratic lawmakers want to pass some sort of resolution within the budget bill before the end of the year. Many Republicans have said they want to wait to pass a standalone measure in the new year, but as recently as last month, some GOP lawmakers like Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) expressed wanting to work out a deal as part of other legislation. There are currently at least four possible DACA replacement bills floating around Congress, including a bipartisan bill, the Dream Act, Graham introduced in July.</p>
<p>In an interview with CNN's State of the Union, Sen. Graham said, alluding to the list of legislation Congress is trying to get through before the holidays, he thinks it would be "sad" to miss out on addressing DACA now.</p>
<p>But while lawmakers attempt to hammer out a plan forward, an estimated 10,000 DACA recipients have lost their protections, according to data from the Department of Homeland Security compiled by FWD.us, an immigration advocacy group launched and led by leaders in tech, including Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, Microsoft's Bill Gates and Dropbox's Drew Houston. Every day, 122 more will fall out of status. In March, that number will surge to 1,700 each work day.</p>
<p>"We really want to contribute to the communities that we're a part of, and we want to do it the right way," Nancy*, a DACA recipient affiliated with the KIPP Foundation, told Circa. "And we don't want a handout; we just want a pathway."</p>
<p>Another DACA recipient, Leezia*, who works with FWD.us, put it simply: "We're already working and we just want to continue to do that without disruption."</p>
<p>In the days and weeks following the announcement, hundreds of business leaders and entrepreneurs put out statements expressing concern with the decision to repeal DACA. High-profile executives from billionaire Warren Buffett, Disney's Bob Iger and Mozilla's Jascha Kaykas-Wolff to small business owners and schools like the KIPP Academy urged Congress to act swiftly lest they throw the economy into a frenzy.</p>
<p>FWD.us has published <a href="https://dreamers.fwd.us/business-leaders" type="external">two open letters</a> now, urging action on a Dream Act from Congress. Over 800 men and women in business have signed the FWD.us letters. "Dreamers are vital to the future of our companies and our economy. With them, we grow and create jobs. They are part of why we will continue to have a global competitive advantage," the most recent letter reads.</p>
<p>"There would be disruptions, as there would be any time there’s significant change in the composition of the labor force. This would be a significant change," Barry Chiswick, a professor of economics and international affairs at George Washington University, who has studied U.S. immigration history closely, told Circa.</p>
<p>The issue is complex and delicate, and quantifying its reach isn’t clear-cut. But if there's anything the business community fears, it's uncertainty.</p>
<p>Disruptive business</p>
<p>Economists tend to agree immigration has a generally positive impact on the U.S. economy. They also say the decision to wind back the program stands to take a heavy toll on American businesses.</p>
<p>Immigration, broadly speaking, can lead to more innovation, higher productivity, workers with better matched skills for the jobs they're working, and an overall better educated workforce, <a href="http://budgetmodel.wharton.upenn.edu/issues/2016/1/27/the-effects-of-immigration-on-the-united-states-economy" type="external">research out of The Wharton School</a> has found. Their research has also shown immigration to have a positive effect on federal, state and local budgets. Although, for taxpayers living in areas with a larger population of low-income or less-educated immigrants, it can mean more of a cost-burden in the short-term because of immigrants’ use of public services like schooling.</p>
<p>When you zoom into the DACA-eligible population, 81.4 percent have completed high school, and another 17 percent have graduated from college. Currently, 90 percent of DACA recipients hold jobs in a variety of industries with just over four percent actually running their own companies. With DACA up in the air, it’s possible that 300,000 workers will be wiped out from the American workforce by the end of 2018 if their status is revoked. FWD.us estimates that at the national level, the economy could lose $460 billion from the GDP and about $24 billion in Social Security and Medicare tax contributions.</p>
<p>Labor analysts say the sudden loss of jobs would rattle the economy in a way that could leave a lasting dent. Business leaders, meanwhile, have been left to worry about the fate of some of their employees.</p>
<p>"When we think about the people that make up the community of Mozilla, we care about a very diverse view and who they are and how they're able to contribute into the work that we do," Mozilla Chief Marketing Officer Jascha Kaykas-Wolff told Circa. "It certainly weighs on my mind that there's the potential for us to lose out on some of the best candidates in our organization that could support our mission in a meaningful way."</p>
<p>Hundreds of companies, including Mozilla, have come out in support of finding a permanent solution for DACA recipients. "From a purely human perspective, I think it's our responsibility culturally and societally to make sure that we find ways to protect groups of people oftentimes that aren't represented well," Kaykas-Wolff said.</p>
<p>What happens to working DACA recipients?</p>
<p>Eighty-six percent of Americans answered a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/survey-finds-strong-support-for-dreamers/2017/09/24/df3c885c-a16f-11e7-b14f-f41773cd5a14_story.html?tid=a_inl&amp;utm_term=.5482fe2f7f18" type="external">Washington Post/ABC News poll</a> from September saying they supported letting DACA-eligible people stay in the country.</p>
<p>Many of these people came to the U.S. as toddlers and have never known another home. They were educated here and trained for jobs in the U.S. So when people talk about falling out of status, that means not only do they lose their right to work, but it also makes them a priority for deportation to countries they may not even remember. Or, as both Nancy and Leezia pointed out, to regions where they may not be able to secure work for reasons like not being able to speak the language or use the skills they've polished here.</p>
<p>Nancy is from Ghana. She came to the U.S. when she was just five years old. Her passion is the saxophone. She plays it when she wants to escape.</p>
<p>Learning she'd been granted DACA protections was surreal for her – it meant she could lead a fully public life.</p>
<p>"A lot of people take that for granted because it's second nature here, if you're a citizen. But for me, I was able to contribute, to pay my taxes, to work..." she said, thinking back on the day she picked up her paperwork. "I remember crying when I went into the line, because I finally had a line to go into to get my papers. And growing up, I didn't have a line."</p>
<p>Born in Canada, Leezia arrived in Texas at the age of six. She was a Girl Scout, played basketball and wrote for her school paper.</p>
<p>She has a degree in journalism, which she's been putting to use working in communications for the past few years. But all of that won't matter if she loses her DACA status.</p>
<p>"At this point I think all we want to do is be able to use all of our talents that we’ve developed in school and use that in our careers here in the U.S., in the place where we grew up," Leezia said.</p>
<p>It's a globalized world</p>
<p>There are 185 different types of visas applicants can fill out to come to the U.S. There are non-migrant visas and immigrant visas, none of which really apply to the DACA-eligible population, which is something advocates hope is addressed in new legislation.</p>
<p>GWU's Chiswick explained that the primary reason immigrants come to the U.S. is jobs. The issue, however, he says, is that the United States has a somewhat "schizophrenic" immigration policy. While countries like Canada, Australia and New Zealand place emphasis on skills and talent in their immigration policies, the United States has largely focused on the person's family ties.</p>
<p>"Their question is, 'What can you contribute to our economy?'" Chiswick said, adding, "Our primary focus in immigration policy is, 'To whom are you related?'" This, he said, has led to "chain migration," where one person gets a visa, then sponsors a family member, such as a spouse or child.</p>
<p>Sen. Graham, said in the same interview with CNN in November, he believes "we need to go from chain migration, family-based immigration to merit-based immigration."</p>
<p>What's more, experts say, is that the rest of the world is aware that immigration can drive growth. "Increasingly you see countries starting visas for entrepreneurs as they go after high-skilled talent. You have Chile offering $40,000 and a visa for people who want to start their companies," Jeremy Robbins, executive director at New American Economy, told Circa. In the U.S., a scant 7 percent of visas go to fill employment needs, he said, adding that is "just about the lowest as a percentage of any developing nation around the world."</p>
<p>The New American Economy (NEA) is an immigration advocacy group founded by former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg. They crunched numbers and uncovered that right now there are 6 million people in America who work at a company owned by an immigrant. Per FWD.us estimates, DACA recipients are employed at more than two-thirds of the top 25 Fortune 500 companies. The DACA-eligible population earns $20 billion per year, $3 billion of which they pay back in taxes. They hold $16.8 billion in spending power.</p>
<p>Economists and business leaders say immigrants could help the U.S. compete in a more globalized economy.</p>
<p>Diversity of skill-sets, backgrounds, educations, work ethics and ideas, Robbins said, is what helps fill gaps in the economy, and gives businesses a dynamic edge. "One of the great fallacies of the economy," Robbins said, "is the idea that the labor market is a zero-sum game, that there will never be a job for an American or for an immigrant."</p>
<p>Reed Hastings, founder and CEO of Netflix, speaking at a hearing on Capitol Hill put together by KIPP in early December, echoed that thought, saying the American economy has doubled in the last half century. "If you have a mindset of a fixed economy, a fixed number of jobs, then you naturally see the competition," Hastings said.</p>
<p>According to Hastings and Robbins, more flexible immigration policies that attract workers and make them want to stick around are crucial for companies – and the country – to succeed.</p>
<p>"We need to be smarter about using our immigration system to get the talent we need to compete," Robbins said.</p>
<p>And Mozilla's Kaykas-Wolff added, "It kind of brings it all full circle. If we take care of people well, there’s the promise that we can start to create products, especially in technology, that have a global impact, positive global impact."</p>
<p>Working on staying present</p>
<p>Both Nancy and Leezia's parents brought them to the U.S. in hopes of providing them with a better education. Both have college degrees and both work full-time jobs.</p>
<p>For Nancy, her dreams of making a name for herself in marketing and opening up her own shop are currently on hold. Her focus right now is on advocating for herself and others like her.</p>
<p>"After going through this process of getting DACA, I realized that I couldn't stay silent because if I stay silent, then who will be out there to speak for people like me?" she asked.</p>
<p>As for Leezia, she tries to focus on the present moment.</p>
<p>"I try not to think about May 4, when my DACA expires. It's hard to think about having an expiration date stamped on your back when you know that your shelf life is much longer," she said. "I've been in this country for 21 years. I feel like at this point I deserve certainty."</p>
<p>*Last names were omitted out of privacy concerns for the DACA recipients.</p>
<p>See more related Circa stories: <a href="" type="internal">These DACA 'Dreamers' are taking on Capitol Hill</a> <a href="" type="internal">Without a work permit, DACA students race to find a way to pay student loans</a> <a href="" type="internal">Here are 5 common myths about DACA that need to be debunked</a></p> | false | 1 | much said emotional toll rescinding deferred action childhood arrivals daca program young people labor analysts say economy could also take hit lawmakers dont come resolution quickly back september trump administration decided roll back daca citing concerns initially introduced president obama issued daca 2012 temporarily shielding thousands undocumented immigrants also known dreamers brought country children later found undocumented program allowed 800000 daca recipients live work united states without fear deportation obama first introduced program via executive action rather going congress move ruffled republican lawmakers trump says working deal daca lot amount security border adds pulling plug daca allow congress figure path daca recipients move also keeping campaign promises addition president trump says empathizes daca recipients speaking press conference sept 5 day scrapped program trump said great heart folks talking hopefully congress able help properly tell speaking members congress want able something right really choice trump administration charged congress finding alternative solution march 2018 things stand democratic lawmakers want pass sort resolution within budget bill end year many republicans said want wait pass standalone measure new year recently last month gop lawmakers like sen lindsey graham rsc expressed wanting work deal part legislation currently least four possible daca replacement bills floating around congress including bipartisan bill dream act graham introduced july interview cnns state union sen graham said alluding list legislation congress trying get holidays thinks would sad miss addressing daca lawmakers attempt hammer plan forward estimated 10000 daca recipients lost protections according data department homeland security compiled fwdus immigration advocacy group launched led leaders tech including facebooks mark zuckerberg microsofts bill gates dropboxs drew houston every day 122 fall status march number surge 1700 work day really want contribute communities part want right way nancy daca recipient affiliated kipp foundation told circa dont want handout want pathway another daca recipient leezia works fwdus put simply already working want continue without disruption days weeks following announcement hundreds business leaders entrepreneurs put statements expressing concern decision repeal daca highprofile executives billionaire warren buffett disneys bob iger mozillas jascha kaykaswolff small business owners schools like kipp academy urged congress act swiftly lest throw economy frenzy fwdus published two open letters urging action dream act congress 800 men women business signed fwdus letters dreamers vital future companies economy grow create jobs part continue global competitive advantage recent letter reads would disruptions would time theres significant change composition labor force would significant change barry chiswick professor economics international affairs george washington university studied us immigration history closely told circa issue complex delicate quantifying reach isnt clearcut theres anything business community fears uncertainty disruptive business economists tend agree immigration generally positive impact us economy also say decision wind back program stands take heavy toll american businesses immigration broadly speaking lead innovation higher productivity workers better matched skills jobs theyre working overall better educated workforce research wharton school found research also shown immigration positive effect federal state local budgets although taxpayers living areas larger population lowincome lesseducated immigrants mean costburden shortterm immigrants use public services like schooling zoom dacaeligible population 814 percent completed high school another 17 percent graduated college currently 90 percent daca recipients hold jobs variety industries four percent actually running companies daca air possible 300000 workers wiped american workforce end 2018 status revoked fwdus estimates national level economy could lose 460 billion gdp 24 billion social security medicare tax contributions labor analysts say sudden loss jobs would rattle economy way could leave lasting dent business leaders meanwhile left worry fate employees think people make community mozilla care diverse view theyre able contribute work mozilla chief marketing officer jascha kaykaswolff told circa certainly weighs mind theres potential us lose best candidates organization could support mission meaningful way hundreds companies including mozilla come support finding permanent solution daca recipients purely human perspective think responsibility culturally societally make sure find ways protect groups people oftentimes arent represented well kaykaswolff said happens working daca recipients eightysix percent americans answered washington postabc news poll september saying supported letting dacaeligible people stay country many people came us toddlers never known another home educated trained jobs us people talk falling status means lose right work also makes priority deportation countries may even remember nancy leezia pointed regions may able secure work reasons like able speak language use skills theyve polished nancy ghana came us five years old passion saxophone plays wants escape learning shed granted daca protections surreal meant could lead fully public life lot people take granted second nature youre citizen able contribute pay taxes work said thinking back day picked paperwork remember crying went line finally line go get papers growing didnt line born canada leezia arrived texas age six girl scout played basketball wrote school paper degree journalism shes putting use working communications past years wont matter loses daca status point think want able use talents weve developed school use careers us place grew leezia said globalized world 185 different types visas applicants fill come us nonmigrant visas immigrant visas none really apply dacaeligible population something advocates hope addressed new legislation gwus chiswick explained primary reason immigrants come us jobs issue however says united states somewhat schizophrenic immigration policy countries like canada australia new zealand place emphasis skills talent immigration policies united states largely focused persons family ties question contribute economy chiswick said adding primary focus immigration policy related said led chain migration one person gets visa sponsors family member spouse child sen graham said interview cnn november believes need go chain migration familybased immigration meritbased immigration whats experts say rest world aware immigration drive growth increasingly see countries starting visas entrepreneurs go highskilled talent chile offering 40000 visa people want start companies jeremy robbins executive director new american economy told circa us scant 7 percent visas go fill employment needs said adding lowest percentage developing nation around world new american economy nea immigration advocacy group founded former new york mayor michael bloomberg crunched numbers uncovered right 6 million people america work company owned immigrant per fwdus estimates daca recipients employed twothirds top 25 fortune 500 companies dacaeligible population earns 20 billion per year 3 billion pay back taxes hold 168 billion spending power economists business leaders say immigrants could help us compete globalized economy diversity skillsets backgrounds educations work ethics ideas robbins said helps fill gaps economy gives businesses dynamic edge one great fallacies economy robbins said idea labor market zerosum game never job american immigrant reed hastings founder ceo netflix speaking hearing capitol hill put together kipp early december echoed thought saying american economy doubled last half century mindset fixed economy fixed number jobs naturally see competition hastings said according hastings robbins flexible immigration policies attract workers make want stick around crucial companies country succeed need smarter using immigration system get talent need compete robbins said mozillas kaykaswolff added kind brings full circle take care people well theres promise start create products especially technology global impact positive global impact working staying present nancy leezias parents brought us hopes providing better education college degrees work fulltime jobs nancy dreams making name marketing opening shop currently hold focus right advocating others like going process getting daca realized couldnt stay silent stay silent speak people like asked leezia tries focus present moment try think may 4 daca expires hard think expiration date stamped back know shelf life much longer said ive country 21 years feel like point deserve certainty last names omitted privacy concerns daca recipients see related circa stories daca dreamers taking capitol hill without work permit daca students race find way pay student loans 5 common myths daca need debunked | 1,252 |
<p>Your Majesty, my fellow Nobel Laureates, ladies and gentlemen:</p>
<p>Thank you for the honor you have bestowed on me this evening. I accept it in the name of all those brave people of Central America—indeed, in the name of all those throughout the world—who struggle nonviolently for peace, freedom, and justice. In honoring me, you honor them. In honoring them, you acknowledge the great truth, which they have learned: that peace is more than the absence of violent conflict. Peace is a matter of freedom and of institutions of freedom. Peace is a matter of democracy, self-determination, and the pursuit of justice through law and politics rather than through slaughter and oppression. That is the truth upon which we are trying to act in Central America today.</p>
<p>It is a truth that has been learned through pain and suffering. Many of the countries of Central America have not, until this past decade, begun to fulfill the promise of the revolutions by which they cast off the yoke of colonial power and assumed their station among the independent states of the world. That is the promise we now seek to keep.</p>
<p>We are not alone in this quest: throughout the world today, there is a great social ferment. It comes from the realization that men and women need not be serfs and slaves, need not live in conditions of gross deprivation, need not watch their children die in infancy or childhood from easily preventable diseases. Self-determination, a decent standard of living, and a life free from the threat of political terror are not unimaginable dreams; they are possible human achievements. But their accomplishment requires more than a great act of social will.</p>
<p>That is the lesson that many of us in Central America have learned from our great neighbor to the north, the United States of America, which is celebrating the bicentennial of its Constitution this year. Our relations with the United States have not, historically, been without their trials. But we now choose to look to the future. And from the United States we have learned that peace is built on a triad of institutions: a pluralistic culture, free for human creativity and expression; a liberal polity, in which all men and women share the benefits and responsibilities of citizenship under law; and an economy in which individuals may prosper according to their talents, initiative, and hard work.</p>
<p>We have learned that true liberty means shared responsibility for the common good. We have learned that the building blocks of peace and freedom are such institutions as a free press, an independent judiciary, corporations in which entrepreneurs can freely associate, trade unions in which workers join in solidarity for the protection of their rights, and religious bodies in which men and women may worship God according to the dictates of their consciences.</p>
<p>The plan for peace in Central America with which I have been associated is built on these understandings. Peace in Central America—that true peace which includes freedom, security, prosperity, and justice for all—is threatened on many fronts. It is threatened by apathy. It is threatened by narrow self-interest and greed. We in Central America must build a culture of freedom as well as institutions of freedom. We know that, and brave spirits among us are at work on that essential task of civic reconstruction. But I would be less than frank, ladies and gentlemen, if I did not acknowledge before you that peace with freedom and justice in Central America is also threatened by the present government of my neighbor, Nicaragua, and by those armed guerilla forces in the region which, like the Sandinista regime, carry a Marxist-Leninist ideology.</p>
<p>It is often said, in this latter part of the twentieth century, that communism is a spent force. And that is true in this sense: who, today, looks to Moscow or Havana or Hanoi or Addis Ababa for the model of a humane future? The romantic allure of communism, so attractive to Western and Third World intellectuals during the middle part of this century, has exhausted itself. One of the greatest tragedies of this tragic century is the fact that it has taken literally tens of millions of broken lives to prove that point. When one thinks of those victims who otherwise might have lived creative lives, one begins to comprehend the ugliness of the scars which will forever be borne by the phrase, the twentieth century.</p>
<p>But there is another sense in which Marxism-Leninism is not a spent force: and that is as an instrument for seizing and holding political power. That is what has happened in Nicaragua, where the people’s revolution of 1979 has been betrayed by the Leninist leadership of the Sandinista front. And that is what must change in Nicaragua, if there is to be peace with freedom, prosperity, and justice in Central America.</p>
<p>And thus I take the occasion of this Nobel awards ceremony to call on the people of Nicaragua, my neighbors, to stand up against their betrayal: to stand up and claim the rights that are theirs, and to which President Ortega pledged himself in August at the Guatemala summit of Central American presidents.</p>
<p>Let there be religious liberty, an uncensored press, free trade unions, legally sanctioned opposition political parties, and a truly open process of presidential and legislative elections in Nicaragua.</p>
<p>Let there be an end to political prisoners, revolutionary tribunals, block committees to enforce political conformity through control of food and medicine, and “divine mobs” to harass churchmen.</p>
<p>Nicaraguans, stand up and claim the rights that are yours by reason of your human dignity, rights that are enshrined in the U.N. Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the American Convention on Human Rights, rights to which your government has solemnly and publicly pledged itself.</p>
<p>I also call upon the free peoples of the world to stand beside their brothers and sisters in Nicaragua who wish to claim their basic human rights. The Sandinista regime is dependent on the support of forces located beyond our troubled region: it is dependent on the economic and military support of the Soviet bloc; but it is also dependent on the moral support and political power exercised by men and women in the free world who cannot seem to understand the nature of the Sandinista front, or who cannot comprehend the historic pathos of a Central American country in which East Germans design the internal security service and Bulgarians build the new airport runway. We in Central America have had enough of imperialism. But the imperialism by which we are now threatened is not located in Washington, but in Moscow and Havana.</p>
<p>Ladies and gentlemen, you honor me as a peacemaker. My task, and yours, is not done. There can be no peace without freedom in Central America. There can be no peace without democracy in Central America. Many Central Americans know that. But our future in this kind of a world rests in more hands than ours. We shall not be found wanting in meeting our responsibilities. But will you? If you will stand with us for peace and freedom, we may yet be able to set an example that is worthy of this prize with which tonight you honor all the world’s democrats.</p>
<p>Thank you.</p>
<p>As imagined by George Weigel</p>
<p>Your Majesty, my fellow Nobel Laureates, ladies and gentlemen:</p>
<p>Thank you for the honor you have bestowed on me this evening. I accept it in the name of all those brave people of Central America—indeed, in the name of all those throughout the world—who struggle nonviolently for peace, freedom, and justice. In honoring me, you honor them. In honoring them, you acknowledge the great truth, which they have learned: that peace is more than the absence of violent conflict. Peace is a matter of freedom and of institutions of freedom. Peace is a matter of democracy, self-determination, and the pursuit of justice through law and politics rather than through slaughter and oppression. That is the truth upon which we are trying to act in Central America today.</p>
<p>It is a truth that has been learned through pain and suffering. Many of the countries of Central America have not, until this past decade, begun to fulfill the promise of the revolutions by which they cast off the yoke of colonial power and assumed their station among the independent states of the world. That is the promise we now seek to keep.</p>
<p>We are not alone in this quest: throughout the world today, there is a great social ferment. It comes from the realization that men and women need not be serfs and slaves, need not live in conditions of gross deprivation, need not watch their children die in infancy or childhood from easily preventable diseases. Self-determination, a decent standard of living, and a life free from the threat of political terror are not unimaginable dreams; they are possible human achievements. But their accomplishment requires more than a great act of social will.</p>
<p>That is the lesson that many of us in Central America have learned from our great neighbor to the north, the United States of America, which is celebrating the bicentennial of its Constitution this year. Our relations with the United States have not, historically, been without their trials. But we now choose to look to the future. And from the United States we have learned that peace is built on a triad of institutions: a pluralistic culture, free for human creativity and expression; a liberal polity, in which all men and women share the benefits and responsibilities of citizenship under law; and an economy in which individuals may prosper according to their talents, initiative, and hard work.</p>
<p>We have learned that true liberty means shared responsibility for the common good. We have learned that the building blocks of peace and freedom are such institutions as a free press, an independent judiciary, corporations in which entrepreneurs can freely associate, trade unions in which workers join in solidarity for the protection of their rights, and religious bodies in which men and women may worship God according to the dictates of their consciences.</p>
<p>The plan for peace in Central America with which I have been associated is built on these understandings. Peace in Central America—that true peace which includes freedom, security, prosperity, and justice for all—is threatened on many fronts. It is threatened by apathy. It is threatened by narrow self-interest and greed. We in Central America must build a culture of freedom as well as institutions of freedom. We know that, and brave spirits among us are at work on that essential task of civic reconstruction. But I would be less than frank, ladies and gentlemen, if I did not acknowledge before you that peace with freedom and justice in Central America is also threatened by the present government of my neighbor, Nicaragua, and by those armed guerilla forces in the region which, like the Sandinista regime, carry a Marxist-Leninist ideology.</p>
<p>It is often said, in this latter part of the twentieth century, that communism is a spent force. And that is true in this sense: who, today, looks to Moscow or Havana or Hanoi or Addis Ababa for the model of a humane future? The romantic allure of communism, so attractive to Western and Third World intellectuals during the middle part of this century, has exhausted itself. One of the greatest tragedies of this tragic century is the fact that it has taken literally tens of millions of broken lives to prove that point. When one thinks of those victims who otherwise might have lived creative lives, one begins to comprehend the ugliness of the scars which will forever be borne by the phrase, the twentieth century.</p>
<p>But there is another sense in which Marxism-Leninism is not a spent force: and that is as an instrument for seizing and holding political power. That is what has happened in Nicaragua, where the people’s revolution of 1979 has been betrayed by the Leninist leadership of the Sandinista front. And that is what must change in Nicaragua, if there is to be peace with freedom, prosperity, and justice in Central America.</p>
<p>And thus I take the occasion of this Nobel awards ceremony to call on the people of Nicaragua, my neighbors, to stand up against their betrayal: to stand up and claim the rights that are theirs, and to which President Ortega pledged himself in August at the Guatemala summit of Central American presidents.</p>
<p>Let there be religious liberty, an uncensored press, free trade unions, legally sanctioned opposition political parties, and a truly open process of presidential and legislative elections in Nicaragua.</p>
<p>Let there be an end to political prisoners, revolutionary tribunals, block committees to enforce political conformity through control of food and medicine, and “divine mobs” to harass churchmen.</p>
<p>Nicaraguans, stand up and claim the rights that are yours by reason of your human dignity, rights that are enshrined in the U.N. Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the American Convention on Human Rights, rights to which your government has solemnly and publicly pledged itself.</p>
<p>I also call upon the free peoples of the world to stand beside their brothers and sisters in Nicaragua who wish to claim their basic human rights. The Sandinista regime is dependent on the support of forces located beyond our troubled region: it is dependent on the economic and military support of the Soviet bloc; but it is also dependent on the moral support and political power exercised by men and women in the free world who cannot seem to understand the nature of the Sandinista front, or who cannot comprehend the historic pathos of a Central American country in which East Germans design the internal security service and Bulgarians build the new airport runway. We in Central America have had enough of imperialism. But the imperialism by which we are now threatened is not located in Washington, but in Moscow and Havana.</p>
<p>Ladies and gentlemen, you honor me as a peacemaker. My task, and yours, is not done. There can be no peace without freedom in Central America. There can be no peace without democracy in Central America. Many Central Americans know that. But our future in this kind of a world rests in more hands than ours. We shall not be found wanting in meeting our responsibilities. But will you? If you will stand with us for peace and freedom, we may yet be able to set an example that is worthy of this prize with which tonight you honor all the world’s democrats.</p>
<p>Thank you.</p>
<p>As imagined by George Weigel</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 | majesty fellow nobel laureates ladies gentlemen thank honor bestowed evening accept name brave people central americaindeed name throughout worldwho struggle nonviolently peace freedom justice honoring honor honoring acknowledge great truth learned peace absence violent conflict peace matter freedom institutions freedom peace matter democracy selfdetermination pursuit justice law politics rather slaughter oppression truth upon trying act central america today truth learned pain suffering many countries central america past decade begun fulfill promise revolutions cast yoke colonial power assumed station among independent states world promise seek keep alone quest throughout world today great social ferment comes realization men women need serfs slaves need live conditions gross deprivation need watch children die infancy childhood easily preventable diseases selfdetermination decent standard living life free threat political terror unimaginable dreams possible human achievements accomplishment requires great act social lesson many us central america learned great neighbor north united states america celebrating bicentennial constitution year relations united states historically without trials choose look future united states learned peace built triad institutions pluralistic culture free human creativity expression liberal polity men women share benefits responsibilities citizenship law economy individuals may prosper according talents initiative hard work learned true liberty means shared responsibility common good learned building blocks peace freedom institutions free press independent judiciary corporations entrepreneurs freely associate trade unions workers join solidarity protection rights religious bodies men women may worship god according dictates consciences plan peace central america associated built understandings peace central americathat true peace includes freedom security prosperity justice allis threatened many fronts threatened apathy threatened narrow selfinterest greed central america must build culture freedom well institutions freedom know brave spirits among us work essential task civic reconstruction would less frank ladies gentlemen acknowledge peace freedom justice central america also threatened present government neighbor nicaragua armed guerilla forces region like sandinista regime carry marxistleninist ideology often said latter part twentieth century communism spent force true sense today looks moscow havana hanoi addis ababa model humane future romantic allure communism attractive western third world intellectuals middle part century exhausted one greatest tragedies tragic century fact taken literally tens millions broken lives prove point one thinks victims otherwise might lived creative lives one begins comprehend ugliness scars forever borne phrase twentieth century another sense marxismleninism spent force instrument seizing holding political power happened nicaragua peoples revolution 1979 betrayed leninist leadership sandinista front must change nicaragua peace freedom prosperity justice central america thus take occasion nobel awards ceremony call people nicaragua neighbors stand betrayal stand claim rights president ortega pledged august guatemala summit central american presidents let religious liberty uncensored press free trade unions legally sanctioned opposition political parties truly open process presidential legislative elections nicaragua let end political prisoners revolutionary tribunals block committees enforce political conformity control food medicine divine mobs harass churchmen nicaraguans stand claim rights reason human dignity rights enshrined un charter universal declaration human rights american convention human rights rights government solemnly publicly pledged also call upon free peoples world stand beside brothers sisters nicaragua wish claim basic human rights sandinista regime dependent support forces located beyond troubled region dependent economic military support soviet bloc also dependent moral support political power exercised men women free world seem understand nature sandinista front comprehend historic pathos central american country east germans design internal security service bulgarians build new airport runway central america enough imperialism imperialism threatened located washington moscow havana ladies gentlemen honor peacemaker task done peace without freedom central america peace without democracy central america many central americans know future kind world rests hands shall found wanting meeting responsibilities stand us peace freedom may yet able set example worthy prize tonight honor worlds democrats thank imagined george weigel majesty fellow nobel laureates ladies gentlemen thank honor bestowed evening accept name brave people central americaindeed name throughout worldwho struggle nonviolently peace freedom justice honoring honor honoring acknowledge great truth learned peace absence violent conflict peace matter freedom institutions freedom peace matter democracy selfdetermination pursuit justice law politics rather slaughter oppression truth upon trying act central america today truth learned pain suffering many countries central america past decade begun fulfill promise revolutions cast yoke colonial power assumed station among independent states world promise seek keep alone quest throughout world today great social ferment comes realization men women need serfs slaves need live conditions gross deprivation need watch children die infancy childhood easily preventable diseases selfdetermination decent standard living life free threat political terror unimaginable dreams possible human achievements accomplishment requires great act social lesson many us central america learned great neighbor north united states america celebrating bicentennial constitution year relations united states historically without trials choose look future united states learned peace built triad institutions pluralistic culture free human creativity expression liberal polity men women share benefits responsibilities citizenship law economy individuals may prosper according talents initiative hard work learned true liberty means shared responsibility common good learned building blocks peace freedom institutions free press independent judiciary corporations entrepreneurs freely associate trade unions workers join solidarity protection rights religious bodies men women may worship god according dictates consciences plan peace central america associated built understandings peace central americathat true peace includes freedom security prosperity justice allis threatened many fronts threatened apathy threatened narrow selfinterest greed central america must build culture freedom well institutions freedom know brave spirits among us work essential task civic reconstruction would less frank ladies gentlemen acknowledge peace freedom justice central america also threatened present government neighbor nicaragua armed guerilla forces region like sandinista regime carry marxistleninist ideology often said latter part twentieth century communism spent force true sense today looks moscow havana hanoi addis ababa model humane future romantic allure communism attractive western third world intellectuals middle part century exhausted one greatest tragedies tragic century fact taken literally tens millions broken lives prove point one thinks victims otherwise might lived creative lives one begins comprehend ugliness scars forever borne phrase twentieth century another sense marxismleninism spent force instrument seizing holding political power happened nicaragua peoples revolution 1979 betrayed leninist leadership sandinista front must change nicaragua peace freedom prosperity justice central america thus take occasion nobel awards ceremony call people nicaragua neighbors stand betrayal stand claim rights president ortega pledged august guatemala summit central american presidents let religious liberty uncensored press free trade unions legally sanctioned opposition political parties truly open process presidential legislative elections nicaragua let end political prisoners revolutionary tribunals block committees enforce political conformity control food medicine divine mobs harass churchmen nicaraguans stand claim rights reason human dignity rights enshrined un charter universal declaration human rights american convention human rights rights government solemnly publicly pledged also call upon free peoples world stand beside brothers sisters nicaragua wish claim basic human rights sandinista regime dependent support forces located beyond troubled region dependent economic military support soviet bloc also dependent moral support political power exercised men women free world seem understand nature sandinista front comprehend historic pathos central american country east germans design internal security service bulgarians build new airport runway central america enough imperialism imperialism threatened located washington moscow havana ladies gentlemen honor peacemaker task done peace without freedom central america peace without democracy central america many central americans know future kind world rests hands shall found wanting meeting responsibilities stand us peace freedom may yet able set example worthy prize tonight honor worlds democrats thank imagined george weigel george weigel distinguished senior fellow ethics public policy center washington dc holds eppcs william e simon chair catholic studies | 1,227 |
<p>If Irish singer Sinead O’Connor wishes to denounce her mother publicly as an abusive parent, that is her privilege. If Ms. O’Connor wishes to shred a photograph of Pope John Paul II on stage, as she did almost two decades ago, she is, one supposes, within the boundaries of “performance art.” If Ms. O’Connor wishes to “separate” the God she believes in from the Catholic Church in which she was raised, as she put it in a March 28 article in the “Outlook” section of the&#160;Washington Post, she is free to do so.</p>
<p>What Sinead O’Connor is not free to do is to misrepresent the teaching and law of the Catholic Church in the&#160;Post&#160;in order to buttress her claim that the Church is an “abusive organization” and that the Church threatens with excommunication those who would blow the whistle on clerical sexual abusers. That is utterly false. If Ms. O’Connor is aware of that falsehood, she has lied. What is more likely is that she picked up this arrant nonsense from those who are attempting to portray the Catholic Church as a global criminal conspiracy of sexual predators, in order to cripple the Church morally and financially and to drive it from the public square in shame.</p>
<p>The current maelstrom of controversy swirling around the Church and Pope Benedict XVI is replete with Big Lies. One of those Big Lies – that Benedict, as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, impeded sanctions against a diabolical Milwaukee priest who had abused 200 deaf children in his care ­- was&#160; <a href="http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=ZDkxYmUzMTQ1YWUyMzRkMzg4Y2RiN2UyOWIzNDVkNDM=" type="external">exploded</a>&#160;recently on NRO. Yet another Big Lie is that Benedict XVI is soft on abuse and, as Ms. O’Connor suggested, is more concerned with salvaging the reputations of senior clerics than in rooting out the evil of sexual abuse; the Pope’s&#160; <a href="http://article.nationalreview.com/428810/the-end-of-euphemism/george-weigel" type="external">sharp rebuke</a>&#160;of the Irish bishops and his frank condemnation of abusing priests and nuns in a March 20 letter to the Irish Church reveals that claim for the falsehood it is.</p>
<p>One of the Big Lies left over from the Long Lent of 2002 in the U.S. is that clerical sexual abuse and episcopal malfeasance and misgovernance were abetted by a 1962 Vatican document,&#160;Crimen sollicitationis&#160;(“The Crime of Soliciting”). That document, and a 2001 letter from then-cardinal Ratzinger to all the bishops of the world on specific abuse cases, have been cited for years as the smoking gun proving that the Vatican is engaged in an international conspiracy to protect child molesters (and its own reputation and exchequer). Ms. O’Connor, wittingly or not, bought this Big Lie in her&#160;Washington Post&#160;article. Explaining why it’s a Big Lie requires understanding how the Catholic Church understands the sacraments, including the Sacrament of Penance, often called “confession.”</p>
<p>As the Catholic Church understands them, the sacraments are holy things: rituals and words that connect the believer of 2010 with the Risen Christ and with his teaching and action on earth, more than two millennia ago. In confession, Catholics bring their sins before Christ, who acts in the person of a priest, in order to receive God’s merciful forgiveness. Confession can involve a detailed accounting of transgressions, which is one reason that, for centuries, the Church has protected the confidentiality of the Sacrament of Penance with absolute and inviolable secrecy. Catholics have been free to confess their sins without fear that the priest would ever speak a word of what he heard, and that confidence has been buttressed by the fact that any priest who reveals what he hears in confession is automatically excommunicated.</p>
<p>Which brings us to&#160;Crimen sollicitationis. The document was crafted to ensure that if a Catholic were solicited to commit a sexual sin by a priest while going to confession, he or she could denounce that priest without being exposed to public scandal. Sinead O’Connor (and many, many others who have been flogging this particular Big Lie) have it precisely backwards.&#160;Crimen sollicitationis&#160;was not written to protect sexually abusive priests from punishment; it was written to enable the Church to get to the truth about predatory priests without embarrassing their victims or breaking the seal of confession. In fact, the protections required by&#160;Crimen sollicitationis&#160;encouraged victims of abuse to come forward. By requiring secrecy of the bishop and priests who handled any complaint about a priest-confessor who was a sexual predator, the Church tried to protect the confidentiality of the confessional and the privacy of the victim, not to prevent the crime from being reported to the police by the victim, who was never under any obligation of secrecy. The appropriate analogy is not to some Mafia-like international criminal conspiracy, but to the secrecy of those newspapers that choose not to print the names of rape victims.</p>
<p>This 1962 instruction remained in force until 2001, when Cardinal Ratzinger, as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), issued a new document,&#160;De delictis gravioribus&#160;(“On more serious crimes”), which continued the effort to protect the confidentiality of confession and the privacy of Catholics abused by confessors while acknowledging that the Church had to respond effectively and consistently to accusations against priests (who, like everyone else, have a right to the presumption of innocence). Anyone with even minimal knowledge of how Ratzinger handled cases of clerical sexual abuse after they fell under the jurisdiction of CDF understands that Benedict XVI is committed to an honest accounting of priestly misconduct and to the ongoing reform of the life and ministry of priests.</p>
<p>So, to repeat: Both the 1962 and 2001 Vatican instructions were intended to protect the privacy of victims and the integrity of the sacraments, and to enable the Church to take serious action against priests who committed the horrible crime of sexual solicitation during confession; no one has ever been threatened with excommunication for blowing the whistle on a clerical sexual predator; and the procedures put in place at CDF in the early part of this decade – like the transfer of these cases to CDF itself – were intended to strengthen the Church’s capacity to deal with clerical sexual abuse, not cover it up. Moreover, the Vatican instructions of 1962 and 2001 were chiefly concerned with (mercifully rare) abuses of the Sacrament of Penance, not the sort of serial abuse of minors that has drawn our attention and disgust in recent years. To fault these documents for not solving a problem they were not written to address is to miss the serious effort made by the Church, largely under Ratzinger’s leadership, to purge the priesthood of sexual predators.</p>
<p>These are facts. They can be verified by any competent canon lawyer. Why the&#160;Washington Post&#160;chose Palm Sunday, while Benedict XVI was celebrating one of the most beautiful liturgies of the year in St. Peter’s Square, to publish an ignorant and malicious piece by Sinead O’Connor, whose contempt for the Church is well known, is not for us to judge. What we can say, as yet another fact, is that by doing so without any elementary fact-checking, the&#160;Post‘s editors have contributed to the further spread of a Big Lie.</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.&#160;The Rev. Jay Scott Newman, a canon lawyer, is pastor of St. Mary’s Church in Greenville, South Carolina.</p> | false | 1 | irish singer sinead oconnor wishes denounce mother publicly abusive parent privilege ms oconnor wishes shred photograph pope john paul ii stage almost two decades ago one supposes within boundaries performance art ms oconnor wishes separate god believes catholic church raised put march 28 article outlook section the160washington post free sinead oconnor free misrepresent teaching law catholic church the160post160in order buttress claim church abusive organization church threatens excommunication would blow whistle clerical sexual abusers utterly false ms oconnor aware falsehood lied likely picked arrant nonsense attempting portray catholic church global criminal conspiracy sexual predators order cripple church morally financially drive public square shame current maelstrom controversy swirling around church pope benedict xvi replete big lies one big lies benedict cardinal joseph ratzinger impeded sanctions diabolical milwaukee priest abused 200 deaf children care was160 exploded160recently nro yet another big lie benedict xvi soft abuse ms oconnor suggested concerned salvaging reputations senior clerics rooting evil sexual abuse popes160 sharp rebuke160of irish bishops frank condemnation abusing priests nuns march 20 letter irish church reveals claim falsehood one big lies left long lent 2002 us clerical sexual abuse episcopal malfeasance misgovernance abetted 1962 vatican document160crimen sollicitationis160the crime soliciting document 2001 letter thencardinal ratzinger bishops world specific abuse cases cited years smoking gun proving vatican engaged international conspiracy protect child molesters reputation exchequer ms oconnor wittingly bought big lie her160washington post160article explaining big lie requires understanding catholic church understands sacraments including sacrament penance often called confession catholic church understands sacraments holy things rituals words connect believer 2010 risen christ teaching action earth two millennia ago confession catholics bring sins christ acts person priest order receive gods merciful forgiveness confession involve detailed accounting transgressions one reason centuries church protected confidentiality sacrament penance absolute inviolable secrecy catholics free confess sins without fear priest would ever speak word heard confidence buttressed fact priest reveals hears confession automatically excommunicated brings us to160crimen sollicitationis document crafted ensure catholic solicited commit sexual sin priest going confession could denounce priest without exposed public scandal sinead oconnor many many others flogging particular big lie precisely backwards160crimen sollicitationis160was written protect sexually abusive priests punishment written enable church get truth predatory priests without embarrassing victims breaking seal confession fact protections required by160crimen sollicitationis160encouraged victims abuse come forward requiring secrecy bishop priests handled complaint priestconfessor sexual predator church tried protect confidentiality confessional privacy victim prevent crime reported police victim never obligation secrecy appropriate analogy mafialike international criminal conspiracy secrecy newspapers choose print names rape victims 1962 instruction remained force 2001 cardinal ratzinger prefect congregation doctrine faith cdf issued new document160de delictis gravioribus160on serious crimes continued effort protect confidentiality confession privacy catholics abused confessors acknowledging church respond effectively consistently accusations priests like everyone else right presumption innocence anyone even minimal knowledge ratzinger handled cases clerical sexual abuse fell jurisdiction cdf understands benedict xvi committed honest accounting priestly misconduct ongoing reform life ministry priests repeat 1962 2001 vatican instructions intended protect privacy victims integrity sacraments enable church take serious action priests committed horrible crime sexual solicitation confession one ever threatened excommunication blowing whistle clerical sexual predator procedures put place cdf early part decade like transfer cases cdf intended strengthen churchs capacity deal clerical sexual abuse cover moreover vatican instructions 1962 2001 chiefly concerned mercifully rare abuses sacrament penance sort serial abuse minors drawn attention disgust recent years fault documents solving problem written address miss serious effort made church largely ratzingers leadership purge priesthood sexual predators facts verified competent canon lawyer the160washington post160chose palm sunday benedict xvi celebrating one beautiful liturgies year st peters square publish ignorant malicious piece sinead oconnor whose contempt church well known us judge say yet another fact without elementary factchecking the160posts editors contributed spread big lie george weigel distinguished senior fellow washingtons ethics public policy center holds william e simon chair catholic studies160the rev jay scott newman canon lawyer pastor st marys church greenville south carolina | 641 |
<p>Exposing the sordid corruption of police and government officials through their incriminating involvement in a child sexual assault case, “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/angels-wear-white/" type="external">Angels Wear White</a>” could give parents of young daughters a cold sweat. Chinese director-producer <a href="http://variety.com/t/vivian-qu/" type="external">Vivian Qu</a>’s depiction of the protagonists’ fates can be unflinchingly cruel at times, but the bleak tone is soothed by grace notes such as the protagonists’ fragile beauty and the desolate poetry of its seaside setting.</p>
<p>One of the increasingly rare mainland films to tackle social injustice without skirting around issues that would fall foul of state censorship, the film appears to stake its chances solely in the international arthouse market. The femme-centric topic and its status as the only Chinese entry to Venice’s main competition should give it a boost.</p>
<p>Qu, who produced Diao Yinan’s Berlinale Golden Bear winner “Black Coal, Thin Ice,” made her own directorial debut “Trap Street” in Venice Critics’ Week. Compared to that film, “Angels” displays marked maturity in plot development, which unspools with rising complexity and tension.</p>
<p>Opening in a backwater seaside resort in the southern city of Xiamen, the establishing shot of the local beach zooms to the disembodied parts of a statue. An upskirt view of towering plaster thighs perched on plaster heels alludes to the film’s theme of female objectification and violation, but subversively, it’s seen through the curious eyes of female protagonist Xiaomi, AKA Mia ( <a href="http://variety.com/t/wen-qi/" type="external">Wen Qi</a>). When the statue’s identity is finally revealed in the last scenes, the irony is bitterly resonant.</p>
<p>Xiaomi works as a cleaner in a love motel, but on the one night she subs for co-worker Lili (Peng Jing) at the front desk, Liu, a high-ranking district commissioner, checks in with two pre-teen girls in tow. Through surveillance TV, Xiaomi sees him force himself into their room. Instinctively, she records everything with her iPhone.</p>
<p>What happened that night quickly comes to light after a medical examination. The script is tactfully understated about the seedy details, and maintains a certain ambiguity over the innocence of the two girls, Xiaowen (Zhou Meijun) and Xinxin (Zhang Xinyue). More shocking are their parents’ reactions: The phsyical punishment and psychological abuse Xiaowen’s divorced mother (Liu Weiwei) heaps on her own daughter in one scene are so monstrous it’s excruciating to watch. She’s internalized society’s double-standard, which assumes a woman is to blame for being “seductive” when she’s preyed on by men. Equally distasteful are Xinxin’s bourgeois parents, who are easily bought off from pressing charges.</p>
<p>Qu demonstrates an unsentimental and lucid understanding of the social factors that push people into selfish behavior, such as the fact that Xiaowen’s father (Geng Le) who was Commissioner Liu’s subordinate, had made his boss “godfather” of his daughter to curry favor. Things are even tougher for Xiaomi, who, as a migrant worker, is driven to take big risks to raise money for a fake ID so she can work legally. So, when Attorney Hao (Shi Ke), who fights an unhill battle to convict Liu, tries to appeal to Xiaomi as a fellow female to help vindicate the girls, her response indicates that a hardscrabble existence leaves no room for empathy.</p>
<p>Given the unchecked entitlement of certain government officials, the thuggish methods Liu employs to cover-up comes as no surprise but the suggestions of collusion between police, cadres and hoods are still quite bold — and though the ending is low-key, it hits like a dull pain in the stomach. Represented as a shadowy figure who can still “summon wind and rain” even if he’s locked up, Liu personifies the so-called banality of evil, and barely appears on screen.</p>
<p>Engaging female dynamics result in strong, convincing performances, especially as their relations eschew platitudes on sisterhood or exploitative images of victimization. Fifteen-year-old Taiwan-born, mainland-raised actress Wen Qi evinces a jaded maturity beyond her years, scuttling quietly like a mouse wary of being caught, her large, expressive eyes full of mistrust and lips pursed with determination to survive. A look at her winsome performance as a TV child star, and memorable turns as a rebellious teenager in Yang Shupeng’s “Blood of Youth” and as a flirtatious debutant in Yang Ya-che “The Bad, The Beautiful, The Corrupted” confirms her tremendous range and potential. As Xiaowen, young actress Zhou also possesses unnerving precociousness, especially her ability to express bottled up rage against the adult world while still yearning for love and attention.</p>
<p>As in “Trap Street,” production aesthetics in “Angels” (whose Chinese title means “Carnival”) reflect Qu’s background in Chinese independent cinema, notably the slightly washed-out texture, but Benoit Dervaux’s agile camerawork creates both a sense of uncertainty and prying intimacy through a proliferation of closeups and mid-shots. Ace Chinese editor Yang Hongyu keeps the momentum without rushing scenes of dramatic import. The laidback seaside town offers a deceptively serene veneer for the seamy things going on in the dark.</p>
<p>Reviewed online, Taipei, Aug. 18, 2017. (In Venice, Toronto film festivals.) Running time: 107 MIN. (Original title: “Jia Nian Hua”)</p>
<p>(China-France) A Placebo Land Films, Perfect Pictures, Media Group, Hangzhou Puhua Chuansheng Cultural Investment Partner, Shanghai Moyi Cultural Communications presentation of a 22 Hours Films production, in association with Mandrake Films, Wild Bunch, with the support of SDC, Visions sud est. (International sales: Wild Bunch, Paris.) Producers: Sean Cheng, Alain de la Mata. Executive producers: Ying Hua Yue Lina, Gao Cao Guoxiong, Zhou Ling.</p>
<p>Director, writer: Vivian Qu. Camera (color, HD): Benoit Dervaux. Editor: Yang Hongyu. Music: Wen Zi.</p>
<p>Wen Qi, Zhou Meijun, Shi Ke, Liu Weiwei, Geng Le, Peng Jing, Wang Yuexin, Li Mengnan. (Mandarin dialogue)</p> | false | 1 | exposing sordid corruption police government officials incriminating involvement child sexual assault case angels wear white could give parents young daughters cold sweat chinese directorproducer vivian qus depiction protagonists fates unflinchingly cruel times bleak tone soothed grace notes protagonists fragile beauty desolate poetry seaside setting one increasingly rare mainland films tackle social injustice without skirting around issues would fall foul state censorship film appears stake chances solely international arthouse market femmecentric topic status chinese entry venices main competition give boost qu produced diao yinans berlinale golden bear winner black coal thin ice made directorial debut trap street venice critics week compared film angels displays marked maturity plot development unspools rising complexity tension opening backwater seaside resort southern city xiamen establishing shot local beach zooms disembodied parts statue upskirt view towering plaster thighs perched plaster heels alludes films theme female objectification violation subversively seen curious eyes female protagonist xiaomi aka mia wen qi statues identity finally revealed last scenes irony bitterly resonant xiaomi works cleaner love motel one night subs coworker lili peng jing front desk liu highranking district commissioner checks two preteen girls tow surveillance tv xiaomi sees force room instinctively records everything iphone happened night quickly comes light medical examination script tactfully understated seedy details maintains certain ambiguity innocence two girls xiaowen zhou meijun xinxin zhang xinyue shocking parents reactions phsyical punishment psychological abuse xiaowens divorced mother liu weiwei heaps daughter one scene monstrous excruciating watch shes internalized societys doublestandard assumes woman blame seductive shes preyed men equally distasteful xinxins bourgeois parents easily bought pressing charges qu demonstrates unsentimental lucid understanding social factors push people selfish behavior fact xiaowens father geng le commissioner lius subordinate made boss godfather daughter curry favor things even tougher xiaomi migrant worker driven take big risks raise money fake id work legally attorney hao shi ke fights unhill battle convict liu tries appeal xiaomi fellow female help vindicate girls response indicates hardscrabble existence leaves room empathy given unchecked entitlement certain government officials thuggish methods liu employs coverup comes surprise suggestions collusion police cadres hoods still quite bold though ending lowkey hits like dull pain stomach represented shadowy figure still summon wind rain even hes locked liu personifies socalled banality evil barely appears screen engaging female dynamics result strong convincing performances especially relations eschew platitudes sisterhood exploitative images victimization fifteenyearold taiwanborn mainlandraised actress wen qi evinces jaded maturity beyond years scuttling quietly like mouse wary caught large expressive eyes full mistrust lips pursed determination survive look winsome performance tv child star memorable turns rebellious teenager yang shupengs blood youth flirtatious debutant yang yache bad beautiful corrupted confirms tremendous range potential xiaowen young actress zhou also possesses unnerving precociousness especially ability express bottled rage adult world still yearning love attention trap street production aesthetics angels whose chinese title means carnival reflect qus background chinese independent cinema notably slightly washedout texture benoit dervauxs agile camerawork creates sense uncertainty prying intimacy proliferation closeups midshots ace chinese editor yang hongyu keeps momentum without rushing scenes dramatic import laidback seaside town offers deceptively serene veneer seamy things going dark reviewed online taipei aug 18 2017 venice toronto film festivals running time 107 min original title jia nian hua chinafrance placebo land films perfect pictures media group hangzhou puhua chuansheng cultural investment partner shanghai moyi cultural communications presentation 22 hours films production association mandrake films wild bunch support sdc visions sud est international sales wild bunch paris producers sean cheng alain de la mata executive producers ying hua yue lina gao cao guoxiong zhou ling director writer vivian qu camera color hd benoit dervaux editor yang hongyu music wen zi wen qi zhou meijun shi ke liu weiwei geng le peng jing wang yuexin li mengnan mandarin dialogue | 616 |
<p>For fiscal hawks of all political stripes, the last two years have been awfully frustrating. Budget politics has been front and center almost constantly, yet we have made almost no progress toward reducing our deficits and debt.</p>
<p>Ever since Republicans won control of the House of Representatives in the 2010 elections, they have sought to resist and reverse the flood of spending that had characterized President Obama’s first two years in office and to lay out an ambitious long-term path toward solvency. And because entitlement spending is at the heart of the trouble, they have even defied decades of conventional political wisdom by embracing structural reforms of Medicare and Medicaid. Democrats, meanwhile, have been arguing for higher taxes, at least for the wealthy, to help narrow the budget gap.</p>
<p>The divided Congress, and especially the willfully negligent Senate (which has not passed a budget since 2009), has meant that the resulting fiscal debate has not occurred through the normal legislative process but rather through a series of dramatic showdowns forced by a variety of predetermined deadlines. The failure to enact regular budgets has created the need for temporary continuing resolutions, forcing some spending conversations under the threat of a government shutdown. The near-breaching of the statutory debt ceiling in 2011 required congressional action to enable further borrowing, which Republicans turned into an occasion for budget negotiations. The congressional “supercommittee” created in those negotiations to reduce the deficit kept the fiscal debate alive through 2011 but then failed to reach agreement and raised the specter of automatic cuts in domestic and defense spending. And that specter, combined with the simultaneous expiration of the Bush tax rates, then made for the most dramatic showdown yet–the “fiscal cliff” that threatened to raise everyone’s taxes, and which Congress averted with a New Year’s deal to raise income tax rates only on the wealthy (and payroll tax rates on all workers) and to put off the automatic spending cuts until March, when they would coincide with yet another debt-ceiling debate.</p>
<p>Each of these showdowns has involved frenzied last-minute negotiations to avert some supposed catastrophe, each has seemed to be on the verge of failure until just before the deadline, and each has then concluded with an agreement to somehow reduce the deficit. But each of those agreements has been disappointing in roughly the same way: After beginning with talk of a “grand bargain” to simultaneously and substantially reduce spending and increase revenue in ways that would significantly improve the long-term budget picture, it has ended with some very small agreement to move the needle very slightly in the short term.</p>
<p>According to the Congressional Budget Office, the debt-ceiling agreement in 2011 reduced total projected federal spending over the subsequent decade from $43.6 trillion to $42.6 trillion (or 2.3 percent) and the fiscal cliff agreement this month increased total projected federal revenue over the decade from $36.5 trillion to $37.1 trillion (or 1.6 percent). Every little bit counts, to be sure, but this is a very little bit. CBO’s longer-term projections, which see deficits and debt exploding over the coming few decades, have basically not been changed by these agreements, above all because our entitlement system has been left nearly untouched by two years of budget politics.</p>
<p>This dearth of meaningful progress frustrates the champions of a grand bargain because the outlines of such a bargain seem so obvious. The Democrats want to raise revenue and the Republicans want to reform entitlements. Those goals would seem to be easily reconciled–so why not strike a deal that does a lot of both at once? There is nothing about higher taxes that should stand in the way of entitlement reforms, and vice versa. Why can’t each party get what it wants in return for the other getting the same? Isn’t that what deal-making is all about?</p>
<p>The failure to strike this perfectly evident bargain has left many commentators and budget wonks despairing of our political system. Surely nothing but sheer irrationality–whether it is to be found in the design of our constitutional mechanisms or in the individuals elected to populate them–could explain the self-destructive unwillingness to meet in the middle and avert a disastrous debt crisis.</p>
<p>But this disparaging view is unfair to both parties. In fact, there is a deeper disagreement at the heart of our fiscal debate. It is true that Republicans want lower spending (especially on entitlements) while Democrats want higher taxes (especially on wealthy people). But why is this what each party wants? In each case, the reason has to do with a vision of government, and of American life. The partisans standing in the way of a grand bargain are, at least implicitly, better attuned to the implications of the coming fiscal crunch than the centrist critics who just want to split the difference.</p>
<p>Our fiscal dilemma is, to oversimplify a little, an entitlement-spending problem. The network of programs and benefits created by the Great Society, but above all (by far) the Medicare and Medicaid programs, are growing much more quickly than the economy and federal revenue, and so are becoming unsustainable. They have already sent our debt up to levels seen only in the immediate wake of World War II, and in the coming years will send it far higher than it has ever reached in our history–limiting the potential prosperity of the next generation and running the risk of a sudden and disastrous crisis.</p>
<p>Staying on this course is not an option, and two sorts of approaches away from it have emerged in our politics. One would preserve the structure of our entitlement programs more or less as it is and continually expand the government’s scope and revenue base to sustain them, and the other would preserve the government’s role and size more or less as it is (relative to the economy) but reform our entitlement programs to conform to those dimensions.</p>
<p>It is crucial to see that both of these approaches are basically defensive in nature: The left is trying to avoid a fundamental transformation of the structure of our entitlement programs, since liberals believe the structure of those programs is key to their legitimacy and purpose, and so key to sustaining a just society. The right is trying to avoid a fundamental transformation of the relationship of government and society in American life, since conservatives believe the structure of that relationship is essential to American freedom and prosperity. The left would rather see American life altered (with a significantly larger government, a smaller and less active civil society, and a more consolidated but less dynamic economy) than see our welfare-state institutions reformed. The right would rather see our entitlement system altered (with lumbering universal entitlement programs turned into means-tested and market-based safety-net systems for the elderly and the poor) than see the character of our society transformed.</p>
<p>Of course, neither side simply dismisses the other’s concerns. Conservatives think their reformed government would raise more revenue than today’s because it would enable the economy to grow more robustly. Liberals think their reinforced welfare state would cost less than today’s projections suggest because it would be better consolidated and so more effectively managed. But in these ways, too, their basic aims and their basic ideas about American society, government, and economics are at odds.</p>
<p>Thus, Democrats want more revenue so that the entitlement system doesn’t have to be reformed, while Republicans want to reform the entitlement system so that the government doesn’t have to take up more of the economy. This means that doing a good deal of each at the same time would not give both parties what they want–it would give both parties what they are trying to avoid.</p>
<p>A grand bargain with far highe r taxes in return for a thoroughly transformed entitlement system would give each party the means it is after but at the cost of the end it is after. That would be a foolish bargain for both of them. They would rather do nothing, and so in fact they have done nearly nothing–reaching agreements to put off deadlines and avert self-inflicted pain but otherwise not changing the basic fiscal circumstances much. These tiny steps are worth taking, but they do not address the underlying problem. Since our deficits and debt grow larger in the meantime, there will always need to be another deadline set, and another crisis scheduled, but it is hard to see why those should turn out much differently, at least as long as either party has the electoral power to stop the other.</p>
<p>At some point, in other words, the fiscal question dividing the parties will be decided by voters. It will likely not happen in some dramatic fashion with one decisive election fought over the future of America, but in the normal and gradual course of our politics. It may even happen by accident–after an election fought mostly on other issues that gives one party or another enough control of the elected branches to advance its fiscal reforms. Until then, both parties will likely continue their defensive efforts, and seek whatever modest incremental steps are possible in an era of divided government.</p>
<p>For Republicans, the challenge in the next four years (at least) will be to distinguish such constructive steps toward entitlement reform from blunt and counterproductive cuts that only weaken their hand in the long run. The right has actually been remarkably forthright about its policy goals–laying out, in the budget resolutions passed by the House of Representatives in 2011 and 2012, a set of ambitious reforms that point to a vision of government beyond the liberal welfare state. Although liberals have sought to depict it as radical, that vision entails a federal government of roughly its postwar size and functions, an economy growing at roughly its postwar pace, and an energetic and flourishing civil society. That is the America we have known, but keeping it will require bold reforms of government programs that capitalize on the efficiency of the market economy.</p>
<p>That vision, however, has taken the form of a post-Obama agenda for congressional Republicans. Many of them took the results of the 2010 congressional elections to suggest that the public had recoiled from the president’s ambitions, and so that his time in office was nearing an end. They spent the last two years getting ready for what would follow. But the president was reelected, and essentially none of the ambitious proposals of the Ryan budget can be adopted as they stand while Obama is in office. This has left Republicans in recent months in the peculiar position of being unable to list their demands in budget talks. Even as they are attacked for threatening entitlement benefits, they cannot name the incremental entitlement reforms they would like.</p>
<p>Their task now is to use the broader vision laid out in the Ryan budget as a standard by which to distinguish good from bad incremental steps, and so to propose discrete, politically plausible reforms that not only reduce spending but lay the groundwork for the sorts of larger reforms they believe are needed in the long run. Many potential spending cuts–including many entitlement cuts, like the provider cuts in Medicare favored by some Democrats–would not meet this test, and should not be pursued. Those that do meet it would need to involve changes in the character of the entitlement system–making it more means-tested, more consumer-oriented, and more market-based. Some would do so modestly enough to be acceptable to some Democrats, and so to play a role in the coming fiscal struggles. Republicans have not yet developed their menu of such steps. This needs to be done swiftly, and its results must be presented to the public in the context of preserving the key functions of the entitlement programs while preserving American prosperity and freedom.</p>
<p>The Democrats’ challenge is more serious, and has been made more stark in the wake of the fiscal cliff deal. They are truly in a reactionary mode, defending the existing entitlement system in essentially every detail and seeking ways to fund it. But the trajectory of our fiscal troubles suggests this may simply not be achievable. Over the last 40 years, federal spending (excluding interest payments) has averaged roughly 18.8 percent of GDP. The CBO projects that, on our current path, it will average roughly 24.2 percent over the next 40 years. The enormous increase in revenue required to support such an expansion is orders of magnitude greater than anything the Democrats have ever suggested to the public. Having just obtained, with great effort and controversy, the tax increase on the wealthy that has been nearly the entirety of their fiscal agenda for years, can they really go back and tell voters that they actually need to increase revenue by about 15 times as much merely to close the coming decade’s deficit and that keeping our debt in check after that will require taxes to grow more and more every year?</p>
<p>Unable even to hint to voters what their vision of American government would require, the Democrats are unlikely to achieve it. And they cannot view incremental steps as building toward an opportunity to enact major future reforms, since their tax agenda likely cannot be made palatable in anything but tiny portions. They can never offer their fiscal vision in a liberal equivalent of a Ryan budget proposal. All they can expect are little increments that add up to little, which will make it difficult not only to add onto the edifice of the liberal welfare state but even to sustain it.</p>
<p>The left has not even begun to contend with this problem intellectually, let alone politically. And the right has barely launched the effort to translate its agenda into bite-sized pieces suitable for budget talks in the Obama years. Both have much work to do, but neither is likely to see a genuinely grand bargain as a plausible way to advance its priorities at this point.</p>
<p>That is not a failure of nerve, or a mark of the dysfunction of our political system. It is yet another odious consequence of the ill-conceived structure of the liberal welfare state, and of the fiscal calamity with which it now presents us–and it is a fact of our politics that will shape the remainder of President Obama’s years in office. Those years may well see legislative achievements on an assortment of issues, from immigration to patent law to education. But on the critical fiscal problems confronting the country, they are likely to see mostly dramatic, deadline-driven showdowns that result in much consternation but very little progress.</p>
<p>Yuval Levin is a contributing editor to The Weekly Standard, Hertog fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, and editor of National Affairs.</p> | false | 1 | fiscal hawks political stripes last two years awfully frustrating budget politics front center almost constantly yet made almost progress toward reducing deficits debt ever since republicans control house representatives 2010 elections sought resist reverse flood spending characterized president obamas first two years office lay ambitious longterm path toward solvency entitlement spending heart trouble even defied decades conventional political wisdom embracing structural reforms medicare medicaid democrats meanwhile arguing higher taxes least wealthy help narrow budget gap divided congress especially willfully negligent senate passed budget since 2009 meant resulting fiscal debate occurred normal legislative process rather series dramatic showdowns forced variety predetermined deadlines failure enact regular budgets created need temporary continuing resolutions forcing spending conversations threat government shutdown nearbreaching statutory debt ceiling 2011 required congressional action enable borrowing republicans turned occasion budget negotiations congressional supercommittee created negotiations reduce deficit kept fiscal debate alive 2011 failed reach agreement raised specter automatic cuts domestic defense spending specter combined simultaneous expiration bush tax rates made dramatic showdown yetthe fiscal cliff threatened raise everyones taxes congress averted new years deal raise income tax rates wealthy payroll tax rates workers put automatic spending cuts march would coincide yet another debtceiling debate showdowns involved frenzied lastminute negotiations avert supposed catastrophe seemed verge failure deadline concluded agreement somehow reduce deficit agreements disappointing roughly way beginning talk grand bargain simultaneously substantially reduce spending increase revenue ways would significantly improve longterm budget picture ended small agreement move needle slightly short term according congressional budget office debtceiling agreement 2011 reduced total projected federal spending subsequent decade 436 trillion 426 trillion 23 percent fiscal cliff agreement month increased total projected federal revenue decade 365 trillion 371 trillion 16 percent every little bit counts sure little bit cbos longerterm projections see deficits debt exploding coming decades basically changed agreements entitlement system left nearly untouched two years budget politics dearth meaningful progress frustrates champions grand bargain outlines bargain seem obvious democrats want raise revenue republicans want reform entitlements goals would seem easily reconciledso strike deal lot nothing higher taxes stand way entitlement reforms vice versa cant party get wants return getting isnt dealmaking failure strike perfectly evident bargain left many commentators budget wonks despairing political system surely nothing sheer irrationalitywhether found design constitutional mechanisms individuals elected populate themcould explain selfdestructive unwillingness meet middle avert disastrous debt crisis disparaging view unfair parties fact deeper disagreement heart fiscal debate true republicans want lower spending especially entitlements democrats want higher taxes especially wealthy people party wants case reason vision government american life partisans standing way grand bargain least implicitly better attuned implications coming fiscal crunch centrist critics want split difference fiscal dilemma oversimplify little entitlementspending problem network programs benefits created great society far medicare medicaid programs growing much quickly economy federal revenue becoming unsustainable already sent debt levels seen immediate wake world war ii coming years send far higher ever reached historylimiting potential prosperity next generation running risk sudden disastrous crisis staying course option two sorts approaches away emerged politics one would preserve structure entitlement programs less continually expand governments scope revenue base sustain would preserve governments role size less relative economy reform entitlement programs conform dimensions crucial see approaches basically defensive nature left trying avoid fundamental transformation structure entitlement programs since liberals believe structure programs key legitimacy purpose key sustaining society right trying avoid fundamental transformation relationship government society american life since conservatives believe structure relationship essential american freedom prosperity left would rather see american life altered significantly larger government smaller less active civil society consolidated less dynamic economy see welfarestate institutions reformed right would rather see entitlement system altered lumbering universal entitlement programs turned meanstested marketbased safetynet systems elderly poor see character society transformed course neither side simply dismisses others concerns conservatives think reformed government would raise revenue todays would enable economy grow robustly liberals think reinforced welfare state would cost less todays projections suggest would better consolidated effectively managed ways basic aims basic ideas american society government economics odds thus democrats want revenue entitlement system doesnt reformed republicans want reform entitlement system government doesnt take economy means good deal time would give parties wantit would give parties trying avoid grand bargain far highe r taxes return thoroughly transformed entitlement system would give party means cost end would foolish bargain would rather nothing fact done nearly nothingreaching agreements put deadlines avert selfinflicted pain otherwise changing basic fiscal circumstances much tiny steps worth taking address underlying problem since deficits debt grow larger meantime always need another deadline set another crisis scheduled hard see turn much differently least long either party electoral power stop point words fiscal question dividing parties decided voters likely happen dramatic fashion one decisive election fought future america normal gradual course politics may even happen accidentafter election fought mostly issues gives one party another enough control elected branches advance fiscal reforms parties likely continue defensive efforts seek whatever modest incremental steps possible era divided government republicans challenge next four years least distinguish constructive steps toward entitlement reform blunt counterproductive cuts weaken hand long run right actually remarkably forthright policy goalslaying budget resolutions passed house representatives 2011 2012 set ambitious reforms point vision government beyond liberal welfare state although liberals sought depict radical vision entails federal government roughly postwar size functions economy growing roughly postwar pace energetic flourishing civil society america known keeping require bold reforms government programs capitalize efficiency market economy vision however taken form postobama agenda congressional republicans many took results 2010 congressional elections suggest public recoiled presidents ambitions time office nearing end spent last two years getting ready would follow president reelected essentially none ambitious proposals ryan budget adopted stand obama office left republicans recent months peculiar position unable list demands budget talks even attacked threatening entitlement benefits name incremental entitlement reforms would like task use broader vision laid ryan budget standard distinguish good bad incremental steps propose discrete politically plausible reforms reduce spending lay groundwork sorts larger reforms believe needed long run many potential spending cutsincluding many entitlement cuts like provider cuts medicare favored democratswould meet test pursued meet would need involve changes character entitlement systemmaking meanstested consumeroriented marketbased would modestly enough acceptable democrats play role coming fiscal struggles republicans yet developed menu steps needs done swiftly results must presented public context preserving key functions entitlement programs preserving american prosperity freedom democrats challenge serious made stark wake fiscal cliff deal truly reactionary mode defending existing entitlement system essentially every detail seeking ways fund trajectory fiscal troubles suggests may simply achievable last 40 years federal spending excluding interest payments averaged roughly 188 percent gdp cbo projects current path average roughly 242 percent next 40 years enormous increase revenue required support expansion orders magnitude greater anything democrats ever suggested public obtained great effort controversy tax increase wealthy nearly entirety fiscal agenda years really go back tell voters actually need increase revenue 15 times much merely close coming decades deficit keeping debt check require taxes grow every year unable even hint voters vision american government would require democrats unlikely achieve view incremental steps building toward opportunity enact major future reforms since tax agenda likely made palatable anything tiny portions never offer fiscal vision liberal equivalent ryan budget proposal expect little increments add little make difficult add onto edifice liberal welfare state even sustain left even begun contend problem intellectually let alone politically right barely launched effort translate agenda bitesized pieces suitable budget talks obama years much work neither likely see genuinely grand bargain plausible way advance priorities point failure nerve mark dysfunction political system yet another odious consequence illconceived structure liberal welfare state fiscal calamity presents usand fact politics shape remainder president obamas years office years may well see legislative achievements assortment issues immigration patent law education critical fiscal problems confronting country likely see mostly dramatic deadlinedriven showdowns result much consternation little progress yuval levin contributing editor weekly standard hertog fellow ethics public policy center editor national affairs | 1,304 |
<p>TAMPA BAY BUCCANEERS (4-6) AT ATLANTA FALCONS (6-4)</p>
<p>KICKOFF: Sunday, 1 p.m. ET, Mercedes-Benz Stadium. TV: Fox, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Dick-Stockton/" type="external">Dick Stockton</a>, Mark Schlereth, Shannon Spake (field reporter).</p>
<p>SERIES HISTORY: 48th regular-season meeting. Bucs lead series, 24-23, having won three of the past four games. Since the NFC South was formed in 2002, Atlanta has a 15-14 edge.</p>
<p>KEYS TO THE GAME: Last week against Miami, Tampa Bay gave up pass pays of 61, 49 and 45 yards. The Buccaneers’ defense cannot afford to surrender that kind of yardage to the high-powered Falcons offense.</p>
<p>With running back <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Devonta-Freeman/" type="external">Devonta Freeman</a> still in the concussion protocol and likely to miss another game, the Falcons must continue to target wide receiver <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Julio-Jones/" type="external">Julio Jones</a>. If Atlanta stretches the field, running back <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Tevin-Coleman/" type="external">Tevin Coleman</a> could find more open lanes.</p>
<p>Jones was targeted 30 times in the past three weeks — catching 17 passes for 246 yards — but Atlanta’s leading receiver hasn’t caught a touchdown pass since Oct. 22 against New England.</p>
<p>The Falcons have played their way back into the crowded NFC playoff picture, but with games against the 8-2 Vikings and 8-2 Saints coming up, this one is critical if they’re going to stay there.</p>
<p>Committing to getting the ball to wide receiver <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Mike_Evans/" type="external">Mike Evans</a> helped the Buccaneers last week.</p>
<p>Coming off a one-catch, 13-yard performance, Evans caught five for 92 in Tampa Bay’s 30-20 win in Miami.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Ryan_Fitzpatrick/" type="external">Ryan Fitzpatrick</a>, who was 22-for-37 for 275 yards and two touchdowns last week, will benefit from a second week of practice with the first team, in place of <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jameis-Winston/" type="external">Jameis Winston</a>, who has been ruled out with a shoulder injury.</p>
<p>MATCHUPS TO WATCH:</p>
<p>–Falcons WR Julio Jones vs. Bucs CB Brent Grimes. Grimes has two interceptions. He’s quick to diagnose the play and tries to make plays on the ball. Jones has just one touchdown reception this season, but he leads the Falcons in receptions (54) and yards (786).</p>
<p>–Bucs WR Mike Evans vs. Falcons CB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Desmond-Trufant/" type="external">Desmond Trufant</a>. Evans leads the Bucs in receptions (45) and yards (624) and has four touchdowns. He caught five passes for 92 yards last week against Miami after serving his one-game suspension for shoving Saints cornerback <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Marshon-Lattimore/" type="external">Marshon Lattimore</a>. Trufant returned a <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Russell_Wilson/" type="external">Russell Wilson</a> interception 43 yards against the Seahawks. The Falcons are playing more man-to-man defense, but the Bucs are not expecting Trufant to match up with Evans.</p>
<p>PLAYER SPOTLIGHT: Falcons RB Terron Ward. The Falcons are preparing as if they will be without running back Devonta Freeman for a second consecutive game. He’s in the league’s concussion protocol and missed the Seattle game. Running backs Tevin Coleman and Terron Ward filled in against the Seahawks. Coleman rushed 20 times for 43 yards, while Ward had 31 yards on six carries. Look for Ward to get some more of the work against the Bucs.</p>
<p>FAST FACTS: Tampa Bay QB Ryan Fitzpatrick has won his past two starts. He passed for 275 yards and two touchdowns last week. He has seven touchdowns vs. three interceptions in his past four games. … RB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Doug_Martin/" type="external">Doug Martin</a> has 196 scrimmage yards and a rushing touchdown in his past two games vs. Atlanta. In four career games at Atlanta, he has 388 scrimmage yards and a rushing touchdown. … WR Mike Evans has 483 receiving yards (96.6 per game) and five touchdowns in his past five games against the Falcons. He has six touchdowns in his past eight games within the NFC South. … Rookie TE <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/OJ-Howard/" type="external">O.J. Howard</a> has three touchdowns in his past three road games. He ranks third among NFL rookies with four receiving touchdowns. … TE Cameron Brate had touchdown catch in the last meeting between the teams. Since 2016, he ranks second among NFL TEs with 12 touchdown catches. … DT <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Gerald-McCoy/" type="external">Gerald McCoy</a> had a sack last week. He has five sacks and a forced fumble in his past five games against Atlanta. … LB Lavonte David has four forced fumbles and three fumble recoveries in his past six games. Since 2013, he is the only NFL player with 700 tackles (720) and 15 forced fumbles (16). … LB Kwon Alexander led the Bucs with eight tackles and had an interception in Week 11. He has two sacks, two forced fumbles and a fumble recovery in four career games vs. Atlanta. … CB Brent Grimes had 13 interceptions and in six seasons with the Falcons. (2007-12). … Atlanta QB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Matt_Ryan/" type="external">Matt Ryan</a> has 14 touchdowns vs. one interception in his past seven home games against Tampa Bay. He aims for his third straight 300-yard game against the Bucs. He has thrown touchdown passes in 28 consecutive games, the longest active streak. Since 2016, he is tied for the NFL lead with 53 touchdown passes and ranks third with 7,511 yards. … RB Tevin Coleman aims for his fourth game in a row with a touchdown. He had 117 yards from scrimmage (95 receiving) in his last home game vs. Tampa Bay. … WR Julio Jones ranks second in the NFC with 786 receiving yards. He has 521 yards (104.2 per game) and six touchdowns in five career home games against the Buccaneers. … WR <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Mohamed-Sanu/" type="external">Mohamed Sanu</a> has a touchdown catch in three of his past four games. He had 80 receiving yards and a touchdown in the last home meeting. … TE <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Austin-Hooper/" type="external">Austin Hooper</a> had a touchdown catch in last meeting. … LB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Vic-Beasley/" type="external">Vic Beasley</a> Jr. has seven sacks and three forced fumbles in his past nine home games. … DT Grady Jarrett has two sacks in his past three games vs. Tampa Bay. … DE <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Adrian-Clayborn/" type="external">Adrian Clayborn</a> returned a fumble 10 yards for a touchdown in Week 11, his second career touchdown. … CB Desmond Trufant has two interceptions in his past three games against the Bucs. He had an interception last week, too.</p>
<p>PREDICTION: The Falcons likely saved their season by beating Dallas and Seattle the past two weeks. And, while Matt Ryan has yet to return to his 2016 form, he should be able to outduel the Bucs’ Ryan Fitzpatrick.</p>
<p>OUR PICK: Falcons, 26-17.</p>
<p>–Ched Whitney</p> | false | 1 | tampa bay buccaneers 46 atlanta falcons 64 kickoff sunday 1 pm et mercedesbenz stadium tv fox dick stockton mark schlereth shannon spake field reporter series history 48th regularseason meeting bucs lead series 2423 three past four games since nfc south formed 2002 atlanta 1514 edge keys game last week miami tampa bay gave pass pays 61 49 45 yards buccaneers defense afford surrender kind yardage highpowered falcons offense running back devonta freeman still concussion protocol likely miss another game falcons must continue target wide receiver julio jones atlanta stretches field running back tevin coleman could find open lanes jones targeted 30 times past three weeks catching 17 passes 246 yards atlantas leading receiver hasnt caught touchdown pass since oct 22 new england falcons played way back crowded nfc playoff picture games 82 vikings 82 saints coming one critical theyre going stay committing getting ball wide receiver mike evans helped buccaneers last week coming onecatch 13yard performance evans caught five 92 tampa bays 3020 win miami ryan fitzpatrick 22for37 275 yards two touchdowns last week benefit second week practice first team place jameis winston ruled shoulder injury matchups watch falcons wr julio jones vs bucs cb brent grimes grimes two interceptions hes quick diagnose play tries make plays ball jones one touchdown reception season leads falcons receptions 54 yards 786 bucs wr mike evans vs falcons cb desmond trufant evans leads bucs receptions 45 yards 624 four touchdowns caught five passes 92 yards last week miami serving onegame suspension shoving saints cornerback marshon lattimore trufant returned russell wilson interception 43 yards seahawks falcons playing mantoman defense bucs expecting trufant match evans player spotlight falcons rb terron ward falcons preparing without running back devonta freeman second consecutive game hes leagues concussion protocol missed seattle game running backs tevin coleman terron ward filled seahawks coleman rushed 20 times 43 yards ward 31 yards six carries look ward get work bucs fast facts tampa bay qb ryan fitzpatrick past two starts passed 275 yards two touchdowns last week seven touchdowns vs three interceptions past four games rb doug martin 196 scrimmage yards rushing touchdown past two games vs atlanta four career games atlanta 388 scrimmage yards rushing touchdown wr mike evans 483 receiving yards 966 per game five touchdowns past five games falcons six touchdowns past eight games within nfc south rookie te oj howard three touchdowns past three road games ranks third among nfl rookies four receiving touchdowns te cameron brate touchdown catch last meeting teams since 2016 ranks second among nfl tes 12 touchdown catches dt gerald mccoy sack last week five sacks forced fumble past five games atlanta lb lavonte david four forced fumbles three fumble recoveries past six games since 2013 nfl player 700 tackles 720 15 forced fumbles 16 lb kwon alexander led bucs eight tackles interception week 11 two sacks two forced fumbles fumble recovery four career games vs atlanta cb brent grimes 13 interceptions six seasons falcons 200712 atlanta qb matt ryan 14 touchdowns vs one interception past seven home games tampa bay aims third straight 300yard game bucs thrown touchdown passes 28 consecutive games longest active streak since 2016 tied nfl lead 53 touchdown passes ranks third 7511 yards rb tevin coleman aims fourth game row touchdown 117 yards scrimmage 95 receiving last home game vs tampa bay wr julio jones ranks second nfc 786 receiving yards 521 yards 1042 per game six touchdowns five career home games buccaneers wr mohamed sanu touchdown catch three past four games 80 receiving yards touchdown last home meeting te austin hooper touchdown catch last meeting lb vic beasley jr seven sacks three forced fumbles past nine home games dt grady jarrett two sacks past three games vs tampa bay de adrian clayborn returned fumble 10 yards touchdown week 11 second career touchdown cb desmond trufant two interceptions past three games bucs interception last week prediction falcons likely saved season beating dallas seattle past two weeks matt ryan yet return 2016 form able outduel bucs ryan fitzpatrick pick falcons 2617 ched whitney | 672 |
<p />
<p>Anyone who looks carefully behind the veil of words cannot find democracy in America.&#160;For years I have been writing that the US government is no longer accountable to law or to the people (see, for example, my book,&#160;How America Was Lost&#160;).&#160; The Constitution has been set aside, and the executive branch is degenerating into Caesarism.</p>
<p>&lt;img class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-2007" src="https://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/paul-craig-roberts-300x168.jpg" alt="Paul Craig Roberts" width="300" height="168" /&gt; Government is used to impose agendas that result from the symbiotic relationship between the neoconservative ideology of US world hegemony and the economic interests of powerful private interest groups, such as Wall Street, the military/security complex, the Israel Lobby, agribusiness, and extractive industries (energy, mining, and timber). Dollar imperialism, threats, bribes, and wars are means by which US hegemony is extended.&#160; These agendas are pursued without the knowledge or approval of the American people and in spite of their opposition.</p>
<p>Professor Martin Gilens at Princeton University and Professor Benjamin Page of Northwestern University have examined American governance and have concluded&#160;that the US is an oligarchy ruled by powerful rich private interest groups and that the US government has only a superficial resemblance to a democracy.&#160; Their analysis is forthcoming in publication in the journal,&#160;Perspectives on Politics.</p>
<p>[adrotate banner=”52″]Their conclusions are striking:</p>
<p>“The central point that emerges from our research is that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on US government policy, while mass-based interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence.”</p>
<p>“When a majority of citizens disagrees with economic elites and/or with organized interests, they generally lose.”</p>
<p>“In the United States, our findings indicate that the majority does not rule—at least not in the causal sense of actually determining policy outcomes.”</p>
<p>“The preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.”</p>
<p>A number of factors have contributed to the demise of democracy and accountable government in the US. One factor is the concentration of the US media in a few hands.&#160;During the last years of the Clinton regime, a formerly diverse media with significant independence was concentrated in five mega-corporations. The value of these corporations consists largely of their federal broadcast licenses.&#160; To insure the renewal of these licenses, the media avoids challenging the government on significant issues.</p>
<p>Another factor is the offshoring of US industrial and manufacturing jobs. This development destroyed the manufacturing and industrial unions, which were the backbone of the Democratic Party’s financial support.&#160;Now the Democrats have to appeal to the same interest groups as the Republicans—Wall Street, the military/security complex, and the polluting industries that despoil the environment.&#160; As both political parties are now financed by the same private interests, both political parties serve the same masters. There is no longer any countervailing power.&#160; The Obama regime is simply a continuation of the George W. Bush regime.</p>
<p>Two recent rulings by the Republican majority on the US Supreme Court are another decisive factor. The court ruled that it is merely an exercise of free speech for oligarchs to purchase the US government (Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission and McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission). A corrupt Supreme Court has invented a “constitutional right” for corporations and oligarchs to use their vast financial resources to form a government of their choosing.</p>
<p>Private interest groups in the US are so powerful that they can purchase immunity from law. On March 27, a retiring Securities and Exchange Commission prosecutor, James Kidney, said that his prosecutions of financial criminals at Goldman Sachs and other giant US banks were blocked by SEC political appointees who “were focused on getting high-paying jobs after their government service.”</p>
<p>In a recent test to ascertain the responsiveness of members of Congress to moneyed interests in comparison to voters, two letters were sent to congressional offices. One letter asked for the representative to meet with community groups in his district.&#160; The other letter asked for the representative to meet with a group of active donors.&#160; The latter letter received by far the most responses from members of Congress.</p>
<p>In the US and Europe there is constant propaganda about “gangster state Russia.”&#160;&#160;According to this propaganda, President Putin is a tool of oligarchs who use Putin to rule Russia and loot the people.&#160; In my opinion, this propaganda originates in the Washington-funded NGOs that constitute a US fifth column inside Russia. The purpose of the propaganda is to destroy Putin’s legitimacy and that of his government in hopes of bringing to power a Washington-compliant government in Moscow.</p>
<p>My impression is that the Russian government has curtailed activities of some of the oligarchs who used the privatization era to seize control of resources, but that the government’s actions are consistent with the rule of law.&#160; In contrast, in the US oligarchs control the law and use it to acquire immunity from law.</p>
<p>The real gangster state is the US. Every institution is corrupt. Regulators sell protection from law for well-paying jobs in the industries that they are supposed to regulate. The Supreme Court not only permits money to purchase the government but also sells out&#160;the Constitution to the police state. The Supreme Court has just refused to hear the case against indefinite detention of US citizens in the absence of due process.&#160; This is an unambiguously unconstitutional law, yet the Supreme Court <a href="http://rt.com/usa/156172-scotus-ndaa-hedges-obama/" type="external">refuses to even hear the case</a>, thus granting unchecked police power to the gangster state.</p>
<p>Another defining characteristic of a gangster state is the criminalization of dissent and truth tellers. Washington has done everything in its power to criminalize Julian Assange and Edward Snowden for revealing the US government’s illegal, unconstitutional, and criminal actions.&#160; Washington reeks of hypocrisy.&#160; On April 26, the State Department announced its third annual Free The Press campaign, a propaganda exercise directed at foreign countries that are not Washington’s puppets.&#160; The very same day the Justice Department told <a href="https://pressfreedomfoundation.org/blog/2014/04/state-dept-launches-free-press-campaign-while-doj-supreme-court-force-reporter" type="external">the Supreme Court to reject the protection US journalists have under the Constitution</a> against being forced to reveal their confidential sources so that James Risen can be imprisoned for reporting a government misdeed.</p>
<p>In the 21st century, Washington has squandered trillions of dollars on wars that have destroyed countries and killed, maimed, and displaced millions of people in seven or eight countries.&#160; Declaring its war crimes to be a “war on terror,” Washington has used the state of war that it created to destroy US civil liberty.</p>
<p>In the 21st century it is difficult to find a significant statement made by Washington that is not a lie. Obamacare is a lie. Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction is a lie.&#160; Assad’s use of chemical weapons is a lie. Iranian nukes are a lie. Russia’s invasion and annexation of Crimea is a lie. No fly zones are a lie. Russian aggression against Georgia is a lie. 9/11, the basis for Washington’s destruction of civil liberty and illegal military attacks, is itself a lie.&#160; The fantastic story that a few Saudi Arabians without government or intelligence agency backing outwitted the entire national security apparatus of the Western world is unbelievable. It is simply not credible that every institution of the national security state simultaneously failed.&#160; That Washington would tell such a fantastic lie shows that Washington has no respect for the intelligence of the American people and no respect for the integrity of the American media.&#160; It shows also that Washington has no respect for the intelligence and integrity of its European and Asian allies.</p>
<p>Washington won’t even tell the truth about little things in comparison–jobs, unemployment, inflation, GDP growth, economic recovery.&#160; Washington rigs the markets in order to cover up its sacrifice of the economy for the benefit of a few special interests.</p>
<p>In the name of “privatization,” Washington hands over public assets and government responsibilities to rapacious private interests.</p>
<p>The conclusion is inescapable that the US is a gangster state.&#160; Indeed, the US is worse than a mere gangster state. The US is a shameless exploitative tyranny.</p> | false | 1 | anyone looks carefully behind veil words find democracy america160for years writing us government longer accountable law people see example book160how america lost160160 constitution set aside executive branch degenerating caesarism ltimg classalignleft sizemedium wpimage2007 srchttpswwwforeignpolicyjournalcomwpcontentuploads200909paulcraigroberts300x168jpg altpaul craig roberts width300 height168 gt government used impose agendas result symbiotic relationship neoconservative ideology us world hegemony economic interests powerful private interest groups wall street militarysecurity complex israel lobby agribusiness extractive industries energy mining timber dollar imperialism threats bribes wars means us hegemony extended160 agendas pursued without knowledge approval american people spite opposition professor martin gilens princeton university professor benjamin page northwestern university examined american governance concluded160that us oligarchy ruled powerful rich private interest groups us government superficial resemblance democracy160 analysis forthcoming publication journal160perspectives politics adrotate banner52their conclusions striking central point emerges research economic elites organized groups representing business interests substantial independent impacts us government policy massbased interest groups average citizens little independent influence majority citizens disagrees economic elites andor organized interests generally lose united states findings indicate majority ruleat least causal sense actually determining policy outcomes preferences average american appear minuscule nearzero statistically nonsignificant impact upon public policy number factors contributed demise democracy accountable government us one factor concentration us media hands160during last years clinton regime formerly diverse media significant independence concentrated five megacorporations value corporations consists largely federal broadcast licenses160 insure renewal licenses media avoids challenging government significant issues another factor offshoring us industrial manufacturing jobs development destroyed manufacturing industrial unions backbone democratic partys financial support160now democrats appeal interest groups republicanswall street militarysecurity complex polluting industries despoil environment160 political parties financed private interests political parties serve masters longer countervailing power160 obama regime simply continuation george w bush regime two recent rulings republican majority us supreme court another decisive factor court ruled merely exercise free speech oligarchs purchase us government citizens united v federal election commission mccutcheon v federal election commission corrupt supreme court invented constitutional right corporations oligarchs use vast financial resources form government choosing private interest groups us powerful purchase immunity law march 27 retiring securities exchange commission prosecutor james kidney said prosecutions financial criminals goldman sachs giant us banks blocked sec political appointees focused getting highpaying jobs government service recent test ascertain responsiveness members congress moneyed interests comparison voters two letters sent congressional offices one letter asked representative meet community groups district160 letter asked representative meet group active donors160 latter letter received far responses members congress us europe constant propaganda gangster state russia160160according propaganda president putin tool oligarchs use putin rule russia loot people160 opinion propaganda originates washingtonfunded ngos constitute us fifth column inside russia purpose propaganda destroy putins legitimacy government hopes bringing power washingtoncompliant government moscow impression russian government curtailed activities oligarchs used privatization era seize control resources governments actions consistent rule law160 contrast us oligarchs control law use acquire immunity law real gangster state us every institution corrupt regulators sell protection law wellpaying jobs industries supposed regulate supreme court permits money purchase government also sells out160the constitution police state supreme court refused hear case indefinite detention us citizens absence due process160 unambiguously unconstitutional law yet supreme court refuses even hear case thus granting unchecked police power gangster state another defining characteristic gangster state criminalization dissent truth tellers washington done everything power criminalize julian assange edward snowden revealing us governments illegal unconstitutional criminal actions160 washington reeks hypocrisy160 april 26 state department announced third annual free press campaign propaganda exercise directed foreign countries washingtons puppets160 day justice department told supreme court reject protection us journalists constitution forced reveal confidential sources james risen imprisoned reporting government misdeed 21st century washington squandered trillions dollars wars destroyed countries killed maimed displaced millions people seven eight countries160 declaring war crimes war terror washington used state war created destroy us civil liberty 21st century difficult find significant statement made washington lie obamacare lie saddam husseins weapons mass destruction lie160 assads use chemical weapons lie iranian nukes lie russias invasion annexation crimea lie fly zones lie russian aggression georgia lie 911 basis washingtons destruction civil liberty illegal military attacks lie160 fantastic story saudi arabians without government intelligence agency backing outwitted entire national security apparatus western world unbelievable simply credible every institution national security state simultaneously failed160 washington would tell fantastic lie shows washington respect intelligence american people respect integrity american media160 shows also washington respect intelligence integrity european asian allies washington wont even tell truth little things comparisonjobs unemployment inflation gdp growth economic recovery160 washington rigs markets order cover sacrifice economy benefit special interests name privatization washington hands public assets government responsibilities rapacious private interests conclusion inescapable us gangster state160 indeed us worse mere gangster state us shameless exploitative tyranny | 763 |
<p>By Paresh Dave</p>
<p>(Reuters) – If history is a guide, Uber Technologies new Chief Executive Dara Khosrowshahi is likely to dangle data sharing and a promise to pay fines and fees when he sits down with London officials to negotiate the ride service’s future in one of its most important markets.</p>
<p>From the Philippines to Portland, Oregon, the strategy has worked time and time again for the San Francisco company.</p>
<p>London transportation officials last month deemed Uber [UBER.UL] unfit to operate because of lax corporate responsibility. The move threatens an Uber stronghold at a time when Khosrowshahi is trying to salvage the company’s reputation after a series of scandals.</p>
<p>Police have complained that Uber was not disclosing or taking too long to report serious crimes tied to its rides, and London mayor Sadiq Khan backed the decision to pull Uber’s license.</p>
<p>Khosrowshahi already offered a contrite public response, which is unusual for Uber, in an open-letter apology to Londoners “for the mistakes we’ve made.” He’s also armed with local support: more than 840,000 Londoners have signed an Uber petition urging city to reconsider its decision.</p>
<p>Khosrowshahi is scheduled to meet on Tuesday with Transport for London Commissioner Mike Brown.</p>
<p>A deal would be a big victory for the new Uber leader, and securing a surcharge or new data on drivers could be a win for Khan, Uber’s highest profile critic and chair of the regulator.</p>
<p>Uber has been willing to pay fines and institute fees in local disputes around the world. But when pressed, it has also shut down in several markets to protest measures that it says slow the service for customers or hinder driver recruitment. As recently as last week, Uber said it would pull out of Quebec rather than agree to 35 hours of training for drivers.</p>
<p>Uber declined to comment on London bargaining tactics. It has said it wants to work with the city “to make things right.”</p>
<p>There is no certainty of a deal, and neither side has portrayed the Tuesday meeting as a negotiations. But with the stake so high – 3.5 million customers won over by price and convenience have made it Uber’s biggest European market – a deal for both sides makes sense.</p>
<p>“The mayor just wants to get something to show constituents upset with Uber some action,” said Bruce Shaller, a former New York City transport official who has authored a book on ride-hailing apps. “Transport for London would look unreasonable to let Uber walk away.”</p>
<p>DATA DEALS</p>
<p>Uber is often described as a “big data” company that thrives because it can match customer needs to driver availability, predicting where cars will be needed and dynamically tailoring fares based on expected demand.</p>
<p>Though it has been loathe to share information for privacy and business reasons, awarding limited data access to cities has solved several standoffs.</p>
<p>When New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio tried to limit the number of Uber cars in the city to clear up traffic, the company released data that helped show congestion would persist and agreed to give the city ongoing data such as the location and time of pickups.</p>
<p>Uber also launched a personal and public campaign in New York against the mayor, similar to the London petition but with criticism aimed directly at de Blasio. De Blasio dropped the proposal.</p>
<p>Portland, Oregon let Uber back into the city in 2015 after a similar promise of trip data – and a fee of 50 cents per ride to pay for oversight. The information helps the city check compliance with requirements such as 24-hour, citywide service.</p>
<p>“We’ve been able to use data from the company and the resources from the rides’ fees to create a regulatory scheme that is robust,” said Brendan Finn, chief of staff to Portland Commissioner Dan Saltzman, who played the role of swing vote and wasn’t otherwise an Uber backer.</p>
<p>Uber has paid fines to other regulators for access: a one-month suspension in the Philippines was lifted early, once Uber paid almost $10 million to the government and drivers in August. Last year, Uber agreed to a $7.6 million fine in California to avoid suspension over a delay in turning over data sought for an analysis on the neighborhoods the company served.</p>
<p>Still, Uber has drawn lines when the convenience and affordability that has helped its offering stand out is threatened. The company suspended operations in places such as Macau, Bulgaria, Denmark and Hungary that are all mandating terms the company has called financially unbearable for itself and its drivers.</p>
<p>And talks with Australia’s Northern Territory province have been bogged down over a proposed registration fee of around $500 for each driver and a small per-ride fee, which Uber said were not affordable.</p>
<p>In Quebec, the company has provided 20 hours of training for new drivers. When the province said it wanted 35, in line with training for taxi operators, Uber said it would pull out in mid-October.</p>
<p>“They are more than happy with regulation,” a former Uber public policy official speaking on the condition of anonymity said of the company. “But it has to enable the market for ride sharing, and it has to exist for a public policy reason.”</p> | false | 1 | paresh dave reuters history guide uber technologies new chief executive dara khosrowshahi likely dangle data sharing promise pay fines fees sits london officials negotiate ride services future one important markets philippines portland oregon strategy worked time time san francisco company london transportation officials last month deemed uber uberul unfit operate lax corporate responsibility move threatens uber stronghold time khosrowshahi trying salvage companys reputation series scandals police complained uber disclosing taking long report serious crimes tied rides london mayor sadiq khan backed decision pull ubers license khosrowshahi already offered contrite public response unusual uber openletter apology londoners mistakes weve made hes also armed local support 840000 londoners signed uber petition urging city reconsider decision khosrowshahi scheduled meet tuesday transport london commissioner mike brown deal would big victory new uber leader securing surcharge new data drivers could win khan ubers highest profile critic chair regulator uber willing pay fines institute fees local disputes around world pressed also shut several markets protest measures says slow service customers hinder driver recruitment recently last week uber said would pull quebec rather agree 35 hours training drivers uber declined comment london bargaining tactics said wants work city make things right certainty deal neither side portrayed tuesday meeting negotiations stake high 35 million customers price convenience made ubers biggest european market deal sides makes sense mayor wants get something show constituents upset uber action said bruce shaller former new york city transport official authored book ridehailing apps transport london would look unreasonable let uber walk away data deals uber often described big data company thrives match customer needs driver availability predicting cars needed dynamically tailoring fares based expected demand though loathe share information privacy business reasons awarding limited data access cities solved several standoffs new york city mayor bill de blasio tried limit number uber cars city clear traffic company released data helped show congestion would persist agreed give city ongoing data location time pickups uber also launched personal public campaign new york mayor similar london petition criticism aimed directly de blasio de blasio dropped proposal portland oregon let uber back city 2015 similar promise trip data fee 50 cents per ride pay oversight information helps city check compliance requirements 24hour citywide service weve able use data company resources rides fees create regulatory scheme robust said brendan finn chief staff portland commissioner dan saltzman played role swing vote wasnt otherwise uber backer uber paid fines regulators access onemonth suspension philippines lifted early uber paid almost 10 million government drivers august last year uber agreed 76 million fine california avoid suspension delay turning data sought analysis neighborhoods company served still uber drawn lines convenience affordability helped offering stand threatened company suspended operations places macau bulgaria denmark hungary mandating terms company called financially unbearable drivers talks australias northern territory province bogged proposed registration fee around 500 driver small perride fee uber said affordable quebec company provided 20 hours training new drivers province said wanted 35 line training taxi operators uber said would pull midoctober happy regulation former uber public policy official speaking condition anonymity said company enable market ride sharing exist public policy reason | 515 |
<p>Disney’s $52.4 billion deal to scoop up most of 21st Century Fox marks the beginning of an historic realignment of Hollywood’s Big Six studios. It may also lead to an industry-shaking redistribution of executive and creative talent.</p>
<p>Rarely has such a large number of high-level executives suddenly become free agents, from Stacey Snider and Emma Watts on the 20th Century Fox film side to TV heavyweights John Landgraf, Dana Walden, and Gary Newman — not to mention 21st Century Fox president Peter Rice, who oversees all TV.</p>
<p>Beyond the boldface names, there are ranks of seasoned executives at Fox and Disney/ABC who are nervous about their future, after hearing Disney’s promise of delivering $2 billion in cost savings within two years of the deal’s closing. But this flood is also hitting at a time when Netflix, Amazon, Apple, Facebook and other upstarts are beefing up their operations as they launch the push into the content business that drove Disney’s interest bolstering its engines by buying out Fox. The dispatch of a slew of Fox-trained executives could wind up adding fuel to the Great Disruption from digital startups with checkbooks that dwarf traditional TV outlets.</p>
<p>Nonetheless, the agita about job security in Burbank and Century City has been heightened by the lack of specifics about management plans in Disney’s Dec. 14 announcement of the agreement to acquire 20th Century Fox’s film and TV operations, the FX Networks cable group, National Geographic, and 22 regional sports channels, among other assets. Fox’s 30% stake in Hulu is also crucial in the deal as it will give Disney majority control of the streaming service just in time for the company’s dive into the stand-alone streaming content biz.</p>
<p>Iger has sketched out a broad vision of Disney focusing on three distinct content apps, an ESPN-branded sports service, a Disney-branded offering of family-friendly fare from its Marvel, Pixar, and LucasFilm brands, and Hulu as the home for adult-oriented fare from FX, ABC, 20th Century Fox film, and Fox Searchlight.</p>
<p>“We certainly are intent on creating a larger, more unified television production studio for the company,” Iger told Wall Street analysts on Thursday.</p>
<p>“The plan is to take the best of both companies and put them together, people and product. … It’s not going to be an ‘all of us’ and ‘none of them,’ they’ve got a very strong talent pool and a lot of great IP and the ability to create a lot of IP,” Iger said. “So our approach is going to be essentially to field the best team with the best product out there.”</p>
<p>But in terms of specifics, Iger has only said that even 21st Century Fox CEO James Murdoch has to wait for discussions on his future to be held down the line. Disney and Fox are bracing for a regulatory review of the deal that could last as long as 18 months. A year-plus is a long time for executives to be in limbo, which means the job hunt for many began last Thursday. And that dynamic will likely force Iger to make some timely calls on executives at both shops with employment contracts that expire in the coming months.</p>
<p>Walden, chairman-CEO of Fox Television Group, and 20th Century Fox chairman-CEO Snider are both known to have had discussions with Amazon about filling the top job at Amazon Studios left vacant after the departure of Roy Price in October, following sexual harassment allegations. Those conversations were underway before rumors of the <a href="http://variety.com/t/disney-fox-deal/" type="external">Disney-Fox deal</a> surfaced in early November. They may take on more urgency now.</p>
<p>Industry speculation has Landgraf’s fiefdom potentially enlarging to include programming for Hulu as well as FX Networks. Rice, Walden, and Newman are likely contenders for top studio management jobs at Disney, given their respective track records and experience. How the integration process might affect Disney/ABC TV Group chief Ben Sherwood and business operations president Bruce Rosenblum remains to be seen. Insiders on both sides reported bracing for a “free-for-all” of lobbying and jockeying in the coming weeks.</p>
<p>Iger has been effusive about the strength of Fox’s creative output and management bench in talking up the deal.</p>
<p>“When you think about the management that’s supervised the creation of an unbelievable array of great shows — including&#160;‘This is Us’&#160;and&#160;‘Modern Family’&#160;to name a few&#160;— and using that creative oversight and the relationships they have with creators to create directly for our service or our networks, we think that’s very powerful,” Iger told analysts.</p>
<p>The fate of Walden will surely have a big impact on Fox’s long-term relationship with its most prolific producer, Ryan Murphy. The uber-showrunner behind so many FX and Fox series franchises is in the midst of contract renewal negotiations on a massive overall deal with 20th Century Fox TV deal that expires at the end of July. Murphy is personally close with Walden, as well as FX’s John Landgraf. Where those executives end up will play a big role in where the steward of “American Horror Story,” “American Crime Story,” “Feud” and other shows takes his future business.</p>
<p>With so many players and positions to sort through, Iger’s holiday season to-do list just got a whole lot longer. Given his focus feeding “high-quality content” through Disney-owned pipelines around the world, Iger’s first call might well go to Murphy.</p> | false | 1 | disneys 524 billion deal scoop 21st century fox marks beginning historic realignment hollywoods big six studios may also lead industryshaking redistribution executive creative talent rarely large number highlevel executives suddenly become free agents stacey snider emma watts 20th century fox film side tv heavyweights john landgraf dana walden gary newman mention 21st century fox president peter rice oversees tv beyond boldface names ranks seasoned executives fox disneyabc nervous future hearing disneys promise delivering 2 billion cost savings within two years deals closing flood also hitting time netflix amazon apple facebook upstarts beefing operations launch push content business drove disneys interest bolstering engines buying fox dispatch slew foxtrained executives could wind adding fuel great disruption digital startups checkbooks dwarf traditional tv outlets nonetheless agita job security burbank century city heightened lack specifics management plans disneys dec 14 announcement agreement acquire 20th century foxs film tv operations fx networks cable group national geographic 22 regional sports channels among assets foxs 30 stake hulu also crucial deal give disney majority control streaming service time companys dive standalone streaming content biz iger sketched broad vision disney focusing three distinct content apps espnbranded sports service disneybranded offering familyfriendly fare marvel pixar lucasfilm brands hulu home adultoriented fare fx abc 20th century fox film fox searchlight certainly intent creating larger unified television production studio company iger told wall street analysts thursday plan take best companies put together people product going us none theyve got strong talent pool lot great ip ability create lot ip iger said approach going essentially field best team best product terms specifics iger said even 21st century fox ceo james murdoch wait discussions future held line disney fox bracing regulatory review deal could last long 18 months yearplus long time executives limbo means job hunt many began last thursday dynamic likely force iger make timely calls executives shops employment contracts expire coming months walden chairmanceo fox television group 20th century fox chairmanceo snider known discussions amazon filling top job amazon studios left vacant departure roy price october following sexual harassment allegations conversations underway rumors disneyfox deal surfaced early november may take urgency industry speculation landgrafs fiefdom potentially enlarging include programming hulu well fx networks rice walden newman likely contenders top studio management jobs disney given respective track records experience integration process might affect disneyabc tv group chief ben sherwood business operations president bruce rosenblum remains seen insiders sides reported bracing freeforall lobbying jockeying coming weeks iger effusive strength foxs creative output management bench talking deal think management thats supervised creation unbelievable array great shows including160this us160and160modern family160to name few160 using creative oversight relationships creators create directly service networks think thats powerful iger told analysts fate walden surely big impact foxs longterm relationship prolific producer ryan murphy ubershowrunner behind many fx fox series franchises midst contract renewal negotiations massive overall deal 20th century fox tv deal expires end july murphy personally close walden well fxs john landgraf executives end play big role steward american horror story american crime story feud shows takes future business many players positions sort igers holiday season todo list got whole lot longer given focus feeding highquality content disneyowned pipelines around world igers first call might well go murphy | 530 |
<p>SALT LAKE CITY — Rep. Jason Chaffetz has strolled to four easy re-election wins in his Republican-friendly Utah congressional district, but now he’s facing a surprising challenge from a Democratic political newcomer who raised nearly a half million dollars — by tapping into anger over Chaffetz’ recent comment suggesting people should spend their money on health insurance instead of iPhones.</p>
<p>Dr. Kathryn Allen has been transformed from a political unknown into a liberal hero for calling out Chaffetz on Twitter, giving her an early boost in name recognition ahead of the November 2018 election.</p>
<p>Bolstered by a Twitter shout-out from comedian Rosie O’Donnell and a mention on the Rachel Maddow show on MSNBC, Allen’s Crowdpac page donations spiked from about $18,000 the day Chaffetz uttered the comment to $467,000 as of Friday morning. The donations come from around the country and most are under $200, Allen said.</p>
<p>Chaffetz’ was asked on March 7 by CNN how lower-income Americans would get access to health insurance when the Affordable Care Act is replaced.</p>
<p>“Americans have choices,” he responded. “Maybe rather than getting that new iPhone that they just love, and they want to go spend hundreds of dollars on that, maybe they should invest in their own health care.”</p>
<p>The remarks triggered a firestorm of criticism on social media with people comparing how many iPhones they could buy if they didn’t have to pay medical bills in the tens of thousands of dollars. He later conceded on Fox News that his point about people being self-reliant didn’t come out as smoothly as it could have.</p>
<p>The comment infuriated Allen, a family physician who spent nearly three decades working at a clinic in one of Salt Lake City’s poorer suburbs.</p>
<p>“I found it absolutely tone deaf,” said Allen. “I have seen people have to decide whether to eat or go to the doctor.”</p>
<p />
<p />
<p>She had been planning to announce her candidacy in April, but said in an interview that Chaffetz provided her with a “golden moment” to do so earlier.</p>
<p>This week, Chaffetz said in a statement that he is “sympathetic to the tough choices people have to make in the face of rising health care prices” and insisted he’s working hard to fix what he called flaws in President Barack Obama’s health care law.</p>
<p>Spokeswomen for Chaffetz said he was not available for an interview and declined to answer questions about Allen.</p>
<p>Even if Allen manages to keep up the flow of campaign donations, her bid to unseat Chaffetz will be a longshot.</p>
<p>Half of the voters are registered Republicans in Chaffetz’ 3rd congressional district, which stretches from Salt Lake City’s southeastern suburbs to desert towns in southeastern Utah and includes heavily conservative Mormon areas.</p>
<p>Joseph Ney, an investment adviser in the district who considers himself a conservative, did not vote for Chaffetz in 2016 and had not heard of Allen but defended Chaffetz’ iPhone comments.</p>
<p>“People sometimes just need to choose how to allocate their assets. I don’t get to buy everything I want,” said Ney, who lives in Cottonwood Heights, an upper middle class Salt Lake City suburb.</p>
<p>Chaffetz defeated his last four Democratic opponents by at least 46 percentage points. But none of them raised as much as money as Allen or generated as much attention.</p>
<p>President Donald Trump’s election victory led Allen to consider running for office, and she decided to do so after attending a Chaffetz town hall in February. He was drowned out by boos and grilled by constituents livid with his refusal to investigate Trump’s alleged conflicts of interest and ties to Russia.</p>
<p>It’s the first run for public office for Allen, a lifelong Democrat who came from California to Utah in 1984 for a medical residency and stayed.</p>
<p>She admires European style social democratic governments, considers health care a right, wants public lands to remain under federal control and was known better in Utah before she announced her campaign for her singing in vocal groups — including the women’s choir “Darena” that performs Balkan music and appeared at Salt Lake City’s 2002 Winter Olympics.</p>
<p>Her supporters include Kimberly Clark, a Democrat from the rural coal town of Price, who interpreted Chaffetz’ remarks as implying the poor should live without smartphones.</p>
<p>“My cellphone is the only communication I have,” said Clark, who said she lives off disability payments and struggles to make her monthly payments for her house, car and insurance.</p>
<p>Chaffetz tried to turn the tables on Allen in a fundraising email this week to supporters, saying his next campaign will be different because Allen is backed by O’Donnell, an actress-comedian who has feuded with Trump and lambasted conservatives for years.</p>
<p>Chaffetz ended 2016 with $408,000 in cash, his most recent campaign finance report said. His office declined to say how much he has now. The next filing is due in mid-April.</p>
<p>To win, Allen must stake out positions that set her apart from Democrats like O’Donnell and Maddow, said Brigham Young University political science professor Jeremy Pope. The last Democrat in Congress for Utah, Jim Matheson, was a moderate who served from 2001-2015.</p>
<p>Allen knows some voters don’t like O’Donnell and Maddow but said a supportive tweet from O’Donnell to her 1 million followers was priceless in getting her name out to voters.</p>
<p>“I didn’t even know how to tweet two weeks ago,” said the 63-year-old Allen, who now has 20,000 followers.</p>
<p>RELATED</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">Utah’s Chaffetz confronts vocal criticism during crowded town hall</a></p>
<p /> | false | 1 | salt lake city rep jason chaffetz strolled four easy reelection wins republicanfriendly utah congressional district hes facing surprising challenge democratic political newcomer raised nearly half million dollars tapping anger chaffetz recent comment suggesting people spend money health insurance instead iphones dr kathryn allen transformed political unknown liberal hero calling chaffetz twitter giving early boost name recognition ahead november 2018 election bolstered twitter shoutout comedian rosie odonnell mention rachel maddow show msnbc allens crowdpac page donations spiked 18000 day chaffetz uttered comment 467000 friday morning donations come around country 200 allen said chaffetz asked march 7 cnn lowerincome americans would get access health insurance affordable care act replaced americans choices responded maybe rather getting new iphone love want go spend hundreds dollars maybe invest health care remarks triggered firestorm criticism social media people comparing many iphones could buy didnt pay medical bills tens thousands dollars later conceded fox news point people selfreliant didnt come smoothly could comment infuriated allen family physician spent nearly three decades working clinic one salt lake citys poorer suburbs found absolutely tone deaf said allen seen people decide whether eat go doctor planning announce candidacy april said interview chaffetz provided golden moment earlier week chaffetz said statement sympathetic tough choices people make face rising health care prices insisted hes working hard fix called flaws president barack obamas health care law spokeswomen chaffetz said available interview declined answer questions allen even allen manages keep flow campaign donations bid unseat chaffetz longshot half voters registered republicans chaffetz 3rd congressional district stretches salt lake citys southeastern suburbs desert towns southeastern utah includes heavily conservative mormon areas joseph ney investment adviser district considers conservative vote chaffetz 2016 heard allen defended chaffetz iphone comments people sometimes need choose allocate assets dont get buy everything want said ney lives cottonwood heights upper middle class salt lake city suburb chaffetz defeated last four democratic opponents least 46 percentage points none raised much money allen generated much attention president donald trumps election victory led allen consider running office decided attending chaffetz town hall february drowned boos grilled constituents livid refusal investigate trumps alleged conflicts interest ties russia first run public office allen lifelong democrat came california utah 1984 medical residency stayed admires european style social democratic governments considers health care right wants public lands remain federal control known better utah announced campaign singing vocal groups including womens choir darena performs balkan music appeared salt lake citys 2002 winter olympics supporters include kimberly clark democrat rural coal town price interpreted chaffetz remarks implying poor live without smartphones cellphone communication said clark said lives disability payments struggles make monthly payments house car insurance chaffetz tried turn tables allen fundraising email week supporters saying next campaign different allen backed odonnell actresscomedian feuded trump lambasted conservatives years chaffetz ended 2016 408000 cash recent campaign finance report said office declined say much next filing due midapril win allen must stake positions set apart democrats like odonnell maddow said brigham young university political science professor jeremy pope last democrat congress utah jim matheson moderate served 20012015 allen knows voters dont like odonnell maddow said supportive tweet odonnell 1 million followers priceless getting name voters didnt even know tweet two weeks ago said 63yearold allen 20000 followers related utahs chaffetz confronts vocal criticism crowded town hall | 544 |
<p>Dr. Phil McGraw wasn’t overweight or struggling with any chronic health condition when he began experiencing unexplained fatigue, exhaustion, and other symptoms.</p>
<p>“I was sleeping well, I felt like I was eating okay, I had no reason that I was just like hitting a wall,” he tells Newsmax Health. “It was like I just couldn’t keep going, and I didn’t understand why.”</p>
<p>To get to the bottom of his low energy, McGraw – who would later become the host of television’s No. 1 daytime talk show, Dr. Phil – decided to seek medical attention. To his surprise, he was told his fatigue was due to Type 2 diabetes, the most common form of the disease, which causes the body’s glucose levels to rise higher than normal.</p>
<p>Unlike people with Type 1 diabetes, whose bodies fail to produce enough insulin, Type 2 diabetics aren’t able to process the hormone well, leading to what is called insulin resistance. Over time, the pancreas fails to produce enough insulin to keep blood sugar levels normal, leading to a dangerous buildup of glucose.</p>
<p>The effects are both immediate and long-term: Right away, cells become starved for energy, which explains the chronic fatigue McGraw experienced before his diagnosis. But in the long run, high glucose levels that remain unchecked may lead to serious and even life-threatening health risks, damaging the kidneys, nerves, heart, or eyes.</p>
<p>At the time of his diagnosis, nearly 25 years ago, McGraw couldn’t merely search the Internet for information about his condition.</p>
<p>“I actually had to go to that big building with books in it. It’s called a library, I think,” he jokes. “I got books and articles and started studying it, reading about [Type 2 diabetes], and sure enough, I started finding out there were things I could do to manage this better.”</p>
<p>As a result of his research, and consultation with medical specialists, McGraw came up with a six-point plan, which he calls the “On It!” program, to manage his diabetes. He calls the program the next best thing to a cure for diabetes, but it requires a life-long commitment to managing your health in a proactive way.</p>
<p>“Sticking with it is so important because we don’t have a cure for this,” he says. “It’s going to be here for the rest of your life, and there’s nothing you can do but manage it.”</p>
<p>Treatment for Type 2 diabetes varies, depending on individual factors and a person’s constitution. Because the metabolic disorder is tied to obesity, lack of exercise, and poor eating habits, many diabetics can control their blood glucose levels by simply losing weight, improving their nutrition, and staying active.</p>
<p>Others may also need prescription medications, such as Metformin, or insulin in order to meet their target blood glucose levels.</p>
<p>Often, diabetics can start out treating their condition without drugs, experts say. But Type 2 tends to get worse over time, meaning many people may eventually need medication to better manage their disease effectively, no matter how healthy their diet or activity levels. McGraw has been taking Bydureon — a form of Byetta — for instance, since 2012.</p>
<p>Dr. Pamela R. Kushner, a board-certified family physician who specializes in preventive medical care and diabetes management, tells Newsmax Health it’s critical for diabetics to control their blood sugar so it doesn’t lead to heart disease or other serious, life-threatening conditions.</p>
<p>“Unfortunately, [Type 2 diabetes] is progressive in a lot of people, and it is particularly risky when not managed appropriately,” Kushner explains. “It can lead to cardiovascular complications, there can be vision changes, nerve damage, and even kidney disease; the quality of life of a person can tremendously deteriorate.</p>
<p>“But the good news is that this is a really unique possibility for patients to work with their healthcare professional in shared decision making. Patients really take an active role that will make a difference in how this condition is managed.”</p>
<p>McGraw’s experiences exemplify Kushner’s advice for diabetics to take charge and manage their own health. Working with pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca, he is working to publicize his a six-point plan for managing diabetes, based on sound medical advice and the healthy habits he has adopted in his own life.</p>
<p>The program centers on the following six strategies:</p>
<p>Move Forward: McGraw describes the first step in diabetes management as coming to terms with the diagnosis, and moving forward to combat it. “This is where you’ve got to get your mind right. You’ve got to accept the fact that this is a reality for you, and there’s no sense denying it, no sense in pretending it’s not there,” he says.</p>
<p>Get Educated: Step two involves learning as much possible about the disease, and the various options – diet, exercise, and/or medication – to address and treat the disorder to keep it from progressing. A good place to start: the OnItMovement.com Website.</p>
<p>Build Your Team: It’s critically important to consult a group of specialists and advocates – doctors, nutritionists, fitness experts, family members, friends, and perhaps others – to help you create a personalized diabetes management plan. McGraw tells Health Radar the quarterback of that team should be your primary care physician, but other players can also play critical supporting roles.</p>
<p>“Building a treatment team centers on your healthcare professional. Your physician is the core that gives you the information that you need so that you make informed decisions,” he says.</p>
<p>“[He or she] might put you on medication, or give you an exercise physiologist, or maybe you have a nutritionist. But [your team] also involves your wife, your husband, your friends — all your people that support you and are around you.”</p>
<p>Replace Bad Habits: McGraw says it’s not enough to simply break bad habits; you effectively maintain your health it’s important to embrace new, good habits – whether you have diabetes or not. “We have this, this misnomer that we ‘break habits.’ You don’t break habits — you replace a habit with a more constructive, new habit.”</p>
<p>For McGraw, that meant significantly changing his daily eating habits.</p>
<p>“For me, for example, it was feast or famine. I would go all day long, maybe seven or eight hours and not eat anything at all. And then I would just really gorge myself: I would eat anything that was either dead or seriously slowed down,” he jokes.</p>
<p>“That’s the worst thing in the world, for me as a Type 2 diabetic, as opposed to dividing up those same calories over small meals throughout the day: I had to replace that habit with a different habit of distributing those same calories throughout the day to keep myself more levelled.”</p>
<p>Making a Plan and Sticking with It: The last two steps of McGraw’s “On It” program speak to the need to be mindful about managing your diabetes by crafting a workable plan of attack, and staying with it. “Willpower is a myth,” he says, noting it’s important to create a plan that supports your goals and makes it easier to manage the disease through lasting lifestyle changes.</p>
<p>Having such a plan can help you cope with those days you feel down or overwhelmed.</p>
<p>“You’re not going to be able to do this emotionally every single day. Some days you’ll be gung-ho, fired up, thinking that you’ve got the emotional energy and strength to deal with your diabetes,” McGraw says. “But then you’ll also have days where you just don’t have it in you. Those days where you become distracted with work or family issues, those are the days you need to stick with it.</p>
<p>“If you have a bad day, tomorrow’s a new day.”</p>
<p>McGraw says the primary take-home message of the “On It!” program is that a diabetes diagnosis does not mean you can’t live a long and healthy life – as long as you take control of your health and be mindful about making good choices.</p>
<p>It’s a message that applies not just diabetics, but to everyone.</p>
<p>“The advice that I have [for Type 2 diabetics] is that you’ve got to be thoughtful about this,” McGraw says. “Recognize that this is going to be with you for years and years and years to come. So, make a plan, one that you can live with.”</p>
<p>The full version of this article appeared in Health Radar newsletter. To read more, <a href="https://w3.newsmax.com/Offers/Health/RDR/Radar-Renewal?promo_code=zhs3nmqq" type="external">click here</a>.</p> | false | 1 | dr phil mcgraw wasnt overweight struggling chronic health condition began experiencing unexplained fatigue exhaustion symptoms sleeping well felt like eating okay reason like hitting wall tells newsmax health like couldnt keep going didnt understand get bottom low energy mcgraw would later become host televisions 1 daytime talk show dr phil decided seek medical attention surprise told fatigue due type 2 diabetes common form disease causes bodys glucose levels rise higher normal unlike people type 1 diabetes whose bodies fail produce enough insulin type 2 diabetics arent able process hormone well leading called insulin resistance time pancreas fails produce enough insulin keep blood sugar levels normal leading dangerous buildup glucose effects immediate longterm right away cells become starved energy explains chronic fatigue mcgraw experienced diagnosis long run high glucose levels remain unchecked may lead serious even lifethreatening health risks damaging kidneys nerves heart eyes time diagnosis nearly 25 years ago mcgraw couldnt merely search internet information condition actually go big building books called library think jokes got books articles started studying reading type 2 diabetes sure enough started finding things could manage better result research consultation medical specialists mcgraw came sixpoint plan calls program manage diabetes calls program next best thing cure diabetes requires lifelong commitment managing health proactive way sticking important dont cure says going rest life theres nothing manage treatment type 2 diabetes varies depending individual factors persons constitution metabolic disorder tied obesity lack exercise poor eating habits many diabetics control blood glucose levels simply losing weight improving nutrition staying active others may also need prescription medications metformin insulin order meet target blood glucose levels often diabetics start treating condition without drugs experts say type 2 tends get worse time meaning many people may eventually need medication better manage disease effectively matter healthy diet activity levels mcgraw taking bydureon form byetta instance since 2012 dr pamela r kushner boardcertified family physician specializes preventive medical care diabetes management tells newsmax health critical diabetics control blood sugar doesnt lead heart disease serious lifethreatening conditions unfortunately type 2 diabetes progressive lot people particularly risky managed appropriately kushner explains lead cardiovascular complications vision changes nerve damage even kidney disease quality life person tremendously deteriorate good news really unique possibility patients work healthcare professional shared decision making patients really take active role make difference condition managed mcgraws experiences exemplify kushners advice diabetics take charge manage health working pharmaceutical company astrazeneca working publicize sixpoint plan managing diabetes based sound medical advice healthy habits adopted life program centers following six strategies move forward mcgraw describes first step diabetes management coming terms diagnosis moving forward combat youve got get mind right youve got accept fact reality theres sense denying sense pretending says get educated step two involves learning much possible disease various options diet exercise andor medication address treat disorder keep progressing good place start onitmovementcom website build team critically important consult group specialists advocates doctors nutritionists fitness experts family members friends perhaps others help create personalized diabetes management plan mcgraw tells health radar quarterback team primary care physician players also play critical supporting roles building treatment team centers healthcare professional physician core gives information need make informed decisions says might put medication give exercise physiologist maybe nutritionist team also involves wife husband friends people support around replace bad habits mcgraw says enough simply break bad habits effectively maintain health important embrace new good habits whether diabetes misnomer break habits dont break habits replace habit constructive new habit mcgraw meant significantly changing daily eating habits example feast famine would go day long maybe seven eight hours eat anything would really gorge would eat anything either dead seriously slowed jokes thats worst thing world type 2 diabetic opposed dividing calories small meals throughout day replace habit different habit distributing calories throughout day keep levelled making plan sticking last two steps mcgraws program speak need mindful managing diabetes crafting workable plan attack staying willpower myth says noting important create plan supports goals makes easier manage disease lasting lifestyle changes plan help cope days feel overwhelmed youre going able emotionally every single day days youll gungho fired thinking youve got emotional energy strength deal diabetes mcgraw says youll also days dont days become distracted work family issues days need stick bad day tomorrows new day mcgraw says primary takehome message program diabetes diagnosis mean cant live long healthy life long take control health mindful making good choices message applies diabetics everyone advice type 2 diabetics youve got thoughtful mcgraw says recognize going years years years come make plan one live full version article appeared health radar newsletter read click | 759 |
<p>GREEN BAY, Wis. — <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Green_Bay_Packers/" type="external">Green Bay Packers</a> quarterback <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Aaron_Rodgers/" type="external">Aaron Rodgers</a>, Master of the Free Play, beat the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Cincinnati-Bengals/" type="external">Cincinnati Bengals</a> 27-24 in overtime on Sunday.</p>
<p>On third-and-10, Rodgers coaxed defensive end <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Michael_Johnson/" type="external">Michael Johnson</a> offside in OT. Rodgers took advantage of the free play and went deep to <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Geronimo-Allison/" type="external">Geronimo Allison</a>, who caught the ball at the Bengals’ 44 and weaved his way through the secondary to the 7. One play later, <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Mason_Crosby/" type="external">Mason Crosby</a> booted a 27-yard field goal to give the Packers the victory.</p>
<p>Cincinnati, which got 212 passing yards and two touchdowns from <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Andy_Dalton/" type="external">Andy Dalton</a>, won the toss but went nowhere on a three-and-out possession.</p>
<p>Rodgers completed 28-of-42 passes for 313 yards and three touchdowns. The Packers rallied from a 21-7 deficit despite not having starting left tackle David Bakhtiari and receiver <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Randall-Cobb/" type="external">Randall Cobb</a>, both of whom were inactive, and then losing right tackle Bryan Bulaga.</p>
<p>Behind 24-17 with 3:46 remaining in regulation, Rodgers hit receiver Allison for gains of 17, 11 and 3 yards and receiver <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jordy_Nelson/" type="external">Jordy Nelson</a> for 10 yards to the Bengals’ 33 at the two-minute warning. Completions of 5 yards to running back <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Ty-Montgomery/" type="external">Ty Montgomery</a> and 6 yards to tight end <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Martellus_Bennett/" type="external">Martellus Bennett</a> moved it to the 22, which was followed by a timeout with 1:13 left. Rodgers then connected with receiver <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Davante-Adams/" type="external">Davante Adams</a> for a gain of 9.</p>
<p>After an incomplete pass, Montgomery converted the third-and-1 with a run of 6. An offside penalty on rookie defensive end <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Carl-Lawson/" type="external">Carl Lawson</a> made it first-and-goal at the 3. Rodgers rolled out to his right and fired a bullet to Nelson for the tying touchdown with 17 seconds remaining. Cornerback Dre Kirkpatrick almost broke up the pass.</p>
<p>The Packers trailed 21-7 at halftime, but dominated the third quarter. On the first play of the second half, Rodgers connected with tight end <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Lance-Kendricks/" type="external">Lance Kendricks</a>, who broke a tackle and gained 34. That seemed to jump-start the Packers after a listless first half. On third-and-goal from the 1, the Bengals sent a blitz. The Packers picked it up and Rodgers moved to his right. Kirkpatrick dropped coverage on receiver Nelson to come up on Rodgers. Rodgers then stopped and tossed the ball to Nelson, who was wide open in the end zone.</p>
<p>The Bengals had a chance to extend their lead, but safety Josh Jones sacked Dalton on third down and Randy Bullock was wide right from 48 yards.</p>
<p>On the ensuing possession, Green Bay cut the margin to 21-17. Rodgers’ play-action fake on third-and-1 led to a 23-yard gain by Nelson, which set up Mason Crosby’s 28-yard field goal on the third play of the fourth quarter.</p>
<p>The Bengals got a big stop with about 10 minutes to go when cornerback Josh Shaw broke up a third-and-5 pass to Bennett. The Packers failed to get a big stop on the ensuing possession. With the Bengals facing third-and-5 from their 14, rookie cornerback Kevin King was flagged for interference while defending star receiver <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/AJ-Green/" type="external">A.J. Green</a>. That prolonged a drive that took 5 minutes, 57 seconds off the clock and resulted in Bullock’s 46-yard field goal to make it 24-17.</p>
<p>After the Bengals failed to score touchdowns in season-opening home losses to Baltimore and Houston, head coach <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Marvin_Lewis/" type="external">Marvin Lewis</a> fired offensive coordinator Ken Zampese and replaced him with quarterbacks coach Bill Lazor. The Bengals promptly scored touchdowns on two of their first three possessions against Green Bay’s injury-depleted defense.</p>
<p>On the Bengals’ opening drive, Dalton hit Green for a 10-yard touchdown on third-and-8.</p>
<p>The Packers answered, benefitting from two calls. The first was a gain of 33 on pass interference against cornerback <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Adam_Jones/" type="external">Adam Jones</a>. It appeared Jones accidentally stepped on the foot of Kendricks. Three plays later, on first down from the Bengals’ 11, Rodgers fired a quick pass in the flat to Adams. Adams beat one defender at the line of scrimmage and then lunged for the end zone, with the ball popping out as he was hit by safety Shawn Williams near the goal line. The play initially was ruled a fumble, but was overturned on replay. On the next play, Rodgers’ play-action fake freed up Kendricks for the touchdown.</p>
<p>Cincinnati pulled back in front on Dalton’s 6-yard touchdown pass to running back <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Giovani-Bernard/" type="external">Giovani Bernard</a>. Bernard lined up as a receiver and motioned into the backfield. The Packers blew the coverage and Bernard tip-toed into the end zone. Bernard’s weaving, 25-yard run set up the score.</p>
<p>Moments later, cornerback William Jackson intercepted Rodgers and raced 75 yards for a touchdown to seemingly put the Bengals in control at 21-7. Jackson undercut an out to Nelson, caught Rodgers’ pass in stride and ran untouched up the right sideline.</p>
<p>Green Bay got booed back into the locker room, as it was outgained 192-78. Lawson had two of the Bengals’ five sacks.</p>
<p>NOTES: The game-time temperature was 89, making this the hottest home game for the Packers since at least 1959. The previous high was 85, when the Packers hosted New Orleans in Milwaukee in 1978. … Bengals CB William Jackson’s interception return for a touchdown was the first against Rodgers in 4,502 attempts. … The Packers had six starters on their inactive list, which included WR Randall Cobb, S Kentrell Brice, CB Davon House, OLB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Nick-Perry/" type="external">Nick Perry</a>, LT David Bakhtiari and DT Mike Daniels. … TE <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Tyler-Eifert/" type="external">Tyler Eifert</a> and RG Trey Hopkins were inactive for the Bengals. … WR Jordy Nelson made his 65th and 66th career touchdowns reception, tying and passing <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Sterling_Sharpe/" type="external">Sterling Sharpe</a> for second in Packers history behind <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Don_Hutson/" type="external">Don Hutson</a>‘s 99.</p> | false | 1 | green bay wis green bay packers quarterback aaron rodgers master free play beat cincinnati bengals 2724 overtime sunday thirdand10 rodgers coaxed defensive end michael johnson offside ot rodgers took advantage free play went deep geronimo allison caught ball bengals 44 weaved way secondary 7 one play later mason crosby booted 27yard field goal give packers victory cincinnati got 212 passing yards two touchdowns andy dalton toss went nowhere threeandout possession rodgers completed 28of42 passes 313 yards three touchdowns packers rallied 217 deficit despite starting left tackle david bakhtiari receiver randall cobb inactive losing right tackle bryan bulaga behind 2417 346 remaining regulation rodgers hit receiver allison gains 17 11 3 yards receiver jordy nelson 10 yards bengals 33 twominute warning completions 5 yards running back ty montgomery 6 yards tight end martellus bennett moved 22 followed timeout 113 left rodgers connected receiver davante adams gain 9 incomplete pass montgomery converted thirdand1 run 6 offside penalty rookie defensive end carl lawson made firstandgoal 3 rodgers rolled right fired bullet nelson tying touchdown 17 seconds remaining cornerback dre kirkpatrick almost broke pass packers trailed 217 halftime dominated third quarter first play second half rodgers connected tight end lance kendricks broke tackle gained 34 seemed jumpstart packers listless first half thirdandgoal 1 bengals sent blitz packers picked rodgers moved right kirkpatrick dropped coverage receiver nelson come rodgers rodgers stopped tossed ball nelson wide open end zone bengals chance extend lead safety josh jones sacked dalton third randy bullock wide right 48 yards ensuing possession green bay cut margin 2117 rodgers playaction fake thirdand1 led 23yard gain nelson set mason crosbys 28yard field goal third play fourth quarter bengals got big stop 10 minutes go cornerback josh shaw broke thirdand5 pass bennett packers failed get big stop ensuing possession bengals facing thirdand5 14 rookie cornerback kevin king flagged interference defending star receiver aj green prolonged drive took 5 minutes 57 seconds clock resulted bullocks 46yard field goal make 2417 bengals failed score touchdowns seasonopening home losses baltimore houston head coach marvin lewis fired offensive coordinator ken zampese replaced quarterbacks coach bill lazor bengals promptly scored touchdowns two first three possessions green bays injurydepleted defense bengals opening drive dalton hit green 10yard touchdown thirdand8 packers answered benefitting two calls first gain 33 pass interference cornerback adam jones appeared jones accidentally stepped foot kendricks three plays later first bengals 11 rodgers fired quick pass flat adams adams beat one defender line scrimmage lunged end zone ball popping hit safety shawn williams near goal line play initially ruled fumble overturned replay next play rodgers playaction fake freed kendricks touchdown cincinnati pulled back front daltons 6yard touchdown pass running back giovani bernard bernard lined receiver motioned backfield packers blew coverage bernard tiptoed end zone bernards weaving 25yard run set score moments later cornerback william jackson intercepted rodgers raced 75 yards touchdown seemingly put bengals control 217 jackson undercut nelson caught rodgers pass stride ran untouched right sideline green bay got booed back locker room outgained 19278 lawson two bengals five sacks notes gametime temperature 89 making hottest home game packers since least 1959 previous high 85 packers hosted new orleans milwaukee 1978 bengals cb william jacksons interception return touchdown first rodgers 4502 attempts packers six starters inactive list included wr randall cobb kentrell brice cb davon house olb nick perry lt david bakhtiari dt mike daniels te tyler eifert rg trey hopkins inactive bengals wr jordy nelson made 65th 66th career touchdowns reception tying passing sterling sharpe second packers history behind hutsons 99 | 585 |
<p>“ <a href="http://variety.com/t/i/" type="external">I</a>, <a href="http://variety.com/t/tonya/" type="external">Tonya</a>,” a <a href="http://variety.com/t/tonya-harding/" type="external">Tonya Harding</a> biopic starring <a href="http://variety.com/t/margot-robbie/" type="external">Margot Robbie</a> as the infamous figure skater the whole world decided it loved to hate, is a fresh, chancy, and wickedly enjoyable movie. It’s framed as a fake documentary (it opens with the characters beings interviewed 20 years later), and it has a tone of poker-faced goofball Americana that suggests a biopic made by the Coen brothers. The movie revels in the sheer woeful ghastly comic horror of what went on during the lead-up to the 1994 Winter Olympic Games in Lillehammer — the smashed knee of Nancy Kerrigan, the whole scheme to undermine her that was even more cracked.</p>
<p>For a while, you may make the mistake of thinking that “I, Tonya” is a joke:&#160;a blithe spoof of Tabloid Nation. It is that, yet it’s also built around something piercingly sharp and sincere: Margot Robbie’s canny, live-wire, deeply sympathetic performance. In case there was any doubt (some might say “Who knew?”), she’s a major actress. She plays Tonya as a trash princess who has nothing to cling to but her passion to skate, and has been so abused by life that it’s her karma to abuse it back.</p>
<p>That the film has chosen a person of such cheesy notoriety as its heroine may sound like the height of dramatic irony. But Tonya Harding was, and is, a figure of rather innocent dreams who became an outcast, and her story — her real story — has more layers than you think. Ever since the ’70s, American movies have been full of scoundrels, hoodlums, and sociopaths who do all kinds of outrageous and indefensible things, but just about all of them are men, and even their worst behavior gets held up to the light as a mirror of our own darkness. I’m thinking of characters like Johnny Boy in “Mean Streets,” Sonny in “Dog Day Afternoon,” Paul Snider in “Star 80,” or Dirk Diggler in “Boogie Nights.” “I, Tonya,” in its lightly impervious yet inquiring way, presents Tonya Harding as the female heir to all those holy paragons of disreputability. It’s about time we had a world-class feminine lowlife to root for, and this, at long last, is that movie.</p>
<p>It’s a serious blast, with a plot that zigs and zags (but only because it sticks to the facts), and a cast of characters who are so eccentrically scuzzy that maybe no one could have dreamed them up. When Tonya is three, she’s taken to a skating class in her hometown of Portland, Oregon, by her hard-bitten waitress of a mother, LaVona ( <a href="http://variety.com/t/allison-janney/" type="external">Allison Janney</a>), who is really a monster. She pushes the little girl out onto the ice, where Tonya is happy enough, but she won’t stop pushing, and the terror of it is that every thought she has is a punitive whiplash of negative energy.</p>
<p>Allison Janney, with cropped hair and big glasses, her face a scowl of displeasure as she blows out smoke from thin brown cigarettes, keeps spewing rapid-fire lines of toxic obscenity and ire like “I’m a gardener who wants to be a flower. How f—-ed am I?” She makes you chuckle — often — yet just because her performance is funny doesn’t meant that it’s not serious. Janney enters the soul of the kind of parent who’s a drive-by destroyer, molding her child, almost by design, into someone who will never believe in herself.</p>
<p>It’s parenting as a form of repressed vengeance, yet LaVona, from the start, shapes Tonya in one defining way. Figure skating, as a training academy for girls, is designed to be a princess contest — it’s not just about skating, it’s about projecting an image that goes back to the “good girl” tropes of the ’40s and ’50s. LaVona has a pathology about not fitting in. She doesn’t want to pay for upscale frilly costumes, but really, she’s too much of a poison pill to play by the rules that others set; she’d rather set herself, and her daughter, apart. It’s a projection of her misanthropy, but the result is that Tanya, an only child who like trucks and chopping wood, grows up to be a heavy-metal figure skater from white-trash hell.</p>
<p>When Robbie takes over the role, she looks a little sleeker than the real Tonya Harding, who has a scrunchy neurotic grin, but she nails Tonya’s skittery insecurity, and the freedom she feels on the ice. Robbie did portions of her own skating, and the scenes are thrillingly staged and shot. In one, Tonya comes out in a purple costume with a white swirl that looks like something off a customized sports car, and she’s her own thing — a badass rock ‘n’ roll sprite. Her grand feat, of course, is the triple axel: an awesomely extended spin through the air that no other female figure skater would even attempt. When she’s up there, she’s flying — she transcends her identity as an outsider/victim.</p>
<p>Part of the film’s drama — almost its morality — is that Tonya, though a highly successful skater who starts to compete in national championships, gets lower scores than she deserves, and the judges, at several points, come out and admit that it’s about factors besides skating — what they call “presentation.” But that’s just code for conventionality, for wanting to sell a homogenized image of America on the Olympics level. It has nothing to do with what any of this is supposed to be about — skating — and that lends Tonya a streak of rebel realness.</p>
<p>That’s the good side of her contempt for respectability. The bad side is that she falls for Jeff Gillooly (Sebastian Stan), a loser in a sardine mustache who’s nice enough to Tonya — when he isn’t punching her in the face. Their relationship isn’t portrayed as one of those hellacious ones in which the abuser keeps the abused under his thumb by threatening her. Tonya, no matter how much she gets slapped around, simply won’t cut him loose; she marries him, and leaves him, and keeps coming back to him. The movie is sharp enough to suggest that she feels the echo of her mother’s hatred in every slap, and she can’t give that up. She’s addicted to what she thinks she deserves.</p>
<p>The director, Craig Gillespie, made “Lars and the Real Girl” (which I despised), but here, working from a script by Steven Rogers, he works in quick blithe scenes that sketch in a community, from Tonya’s soft-hearted figure-skating teacher, Diane Rawlinson (Julianna Nicholson), to Jeff’s pal Shawn Eckhardt (Paul Walter Hauser), a pop conspiracy theorist who is so gently out-to-lunch that you can hear him, in his stoned conversation, pioneering the rudiments of fake-news culture. As the Olympics approach, it’s Shawn who Jeff taps for a scheme to send letters to Nancy Kerrigan in order to intimidate her. When the orders are passed to someone even lower down on the boob chain, it comes out as: Whack Nancy in the knee! There’s no meaning to what the film calls “the incident.” It just…happens.</p>
<p>Tonya Harding had almost nothing to do with it, yet she paid the price. She had more than 15 minutes of infamy. She saw her life reduced to a punchline — and once the whole thing went through the courts, she was banned from skating forever. (I doubt that’s even legal: It’s just…vengeful.) One of the most piquant moments of “I, Tonya” comes during Tonya’s interview as part of the “documentary,” in which she confesses that she grew up being abused, then found an abusive husband, then found the ultimate abusers: all of us. She became our punching bag. But “I, Tonya” returns her to being what she always was: a great skater, and a human being with a dream of downscale flash that wouldn’t quit until it was pried away from her by the world.</p> | false | 1 | tonya tonya harding biopic starring margot robbie infamous figure skater whole world decided loved hate fresh chancy wickedly enjoyable movie framed fake documentary opens characters beings interviewed 20 years later tone pokerfaced goofball americana suggests biopic made coen brothers movie revels sheer woeful ghastly comic horror went leadup 1994 winter olympic games lillehammer smashed knee nancy kerrigan whole scheme undermine even cracked may make mistake thinking tonya joke160a blithe spoof tabloid nation yet also built around something piercingly sharp sincere margot robbies canny livewire deeply sympathetic performance case doubt might say knew shes major actress plays tonya trash princess nothing cling passion skate abused life karma abuse back film chosen person cheesy notoriety heroine may sound like height dramatic irony tonya harding figure rather innocent dreams became outcast story real story layers think ever since 70s american movies full scoundrels hoodlums sociopaths kinds outrageous indefensible things men even worst behavior gets held light mirror darkness im thinking characters like johnny boy mean streets sonny dog day afternoon paul snider star 80 dirk diggler boogie nights tonya lightly impervious yet inquiring way presents tonya harding female heir holy paragons disreputability time worldclass feminine lowlife root long last movie serious blast plot zigs zags sticks facts cast characters eccentrically scuzzy maybe one could dreamed tonya three shes taken skating class hometown portland oregon hardbitten waitress mother lavona allison janney really monster pushes little girl onto ice tonya happy enough wont stop pushing terror every thought punitive whiplash negative energy allison janney cropped hair big glasses face scowl displeasure blows smoke thin brown cigarettes keeps spewing rapidfire lines toxic obscenity ire like im gardener wants flower fed makes chuckle often yet performance funny doesnt meant serious janney enters soul kind parent whos driveby destroyer molding child almost design someone never believe parenting form repressed vengeance yet lavona start shapes tonya one defining way figure skating training academy girls designed princess contest skating projecting image goes back good girl tropes 40s 50s lavona pathology fitting doesnt want pay upscale frilly costumes really shes much poison pill play rules others set shed rather set daughter apart projection misanthropy result tanya child like trucks chopping wood grows heavymetal figure skater whitetrash hell robbie takes role looks little sleeker real tonya harding scrunchy neurotic grin nails tonyas skittery insecurity freedom feels ice robbie portions skating scenes thrillingly staged shot one tonya comes purple costume white swirl looks like something customized sports car shes thing badass rock n roll sprite grand feat course triple axel awesomely extended spin air female figure skater would even attempt shes shes flying transcends identity outsidervictim part films drama almost morality tonya though highly successful skater starts compete national championships gets lower scores deserves judges several points come admit factors besides skating call presentation thats code conventionality wanting sell homogenized image america olympics level nothing supposed skating lends tonya streak rebel realness thats good side contempt respectability bad side falls jeff gillooly sebastian stan loser sardine mustache whos nice enough tonya isnt punching face relationship isnt portrayed one hellacious ones abuser keeps abused thumb threatening tonya matter much gets slapped around simply wont cut loose marries leaves keeps coming back movie sharp enough suggest feels echo mothers hatred every slap cant give shes addicted thinks deserves director craig gillespie made lars real girl despised working script steven rogers works quick blithe scenes sketch community tonyas softhearted figureskating teacher diane rawlinson julianna nicholson jeffs pal shawn eckhardt paul walter hauser pop conspiracy theorist gently outtolunch hear stoned conversation pioneering rudiments fakenews culture olympics approach shawn jeff taps scheme send letters nancy kerrigan order intimidate orders passed someone even lower boob chain comes whack nancy knee theres meaning film calls incident justhappens tonya harding almost nothing yet paid price 15 minutes infamy saw life reduced punchline whole thing went courts banned skating forever doubt thats even legal justvengeful one piquant moments tonya comes tonyas interview part documentary confesses grew abused found abusive husband found ultimate abusers us became punching bag tonya returns always great skater human dream downscale flash wouldnt quit pried away world | 679 |
<p>Pope Benedict XVI’s first papal incursion into the United States is, basically, a trip to the United Nations with a pastoral visit wrapped around it. For the life of the Catholic Church in America, however, what the Pope says in his homilies in Washington and New York, and in his meetings with Catholic bishops, educators, priests, Religious, seminarians and young people will likely have more of an immediate impact than what he says from the green marble rostrum of the General Assembly. And what the Catholic Church in America most needs to hear from Benedict XVI is a word of encouragement.</p>
<p>In the last decade of the pontificate of John Paul II, and throughout the brief papacy of Benedict XVI, an interesting new default position has been established in the corporate mind of the Vatican: the United States is the “un-Europe”. In other words, this Pope, like his predecessor, recognises that the Church in the US is the most vital and vibrant local church in what we used to call the “First World”. Moreover, Benedict, like John Paul, clearly understands that the US is not a post-Christian society, and that the Church in America retains a capacity to influence&#160; public debate that can only be dreamed of in most countries of Western Europe. (To take but one obvious example: the difference between the public effectiveness of the pro-life/pro-family movement in the United States and in, say, Spain is dramatic.)</p>
<p>Knowing all this, Benedict, like John Paul, will not be a papal scold, but will thank the Catholic Church in America for what it is doing, while urging it to do more and do better.</p>
<p>Which is precisely what Catholics in America need to hear. For American Catholics are given to a lot of self-criticism. To be sure, a good dose of self-criticism was required in the wake of what came to light in 2002: a pattern of sexual abuse and episcopal malfeasance that peaked from the late Sixties to the early Eighties. “The abuse crisis”, however, is not the only storyline in American Catholicism, despite media preoccupations. A papal reminder of that would be a very good thing.</p>
<p>American Catholics also need to hear from the Pope about the challenges before them. One is episcopal leadership. During the crisis year of 2002 and afterwards, Catholics rallied to the support of the good priests they knew – who were, after all, 97 per cent (at least) of the American presbyterate – and one senses no lingering anger at priests. There is, however, residual anger at bishops who failed to act, who protected abusive clergy, who have put their diocese under financial pressure and who have not been called to account. American Christianity has always been congregationally focused: the local parish is the Catholic version of the Protestant congregationalism that is a fundamental cultural pattern in American society.</p>
<p>So the danger for the Church, in the absence of stronger, more evangelically effective episcopal leadership, is a strange phenomenon I call “congregational ultramontanism”: a Catholicism in which people love their pastor, love the Pope and ignore the diocese and its bishop. This is not, to put it gently, the vision of Vatican II, but it is a real and present danger if the American episcopate is not significantly strengthened, intellectually and pastorally. A pope who challenges the American episcopate to jettison the currently prevailing rules of the episcopal gentlemen’s club and recover the patristic habit of fraternal correction would be widely applauded by the most knowledgeable and active Catholics in the US.</p>
<p>Another major challenge is high-school catechetics. Catholics in America don’t know how to catechise teenagers, and thus it should be no surprise that this is where a lot of leakage from the Church begins. Catholic primary schools have been doing a better job of catechising children over the past decade. It’s the years from age 14 to 18 that risk becoming the-years-the-locust-ate in American Catholicism. The Church could learn a few lessons from Evangelical Christians about creating a Christian culture – perhaps better, counterculture – in which adolescents can flourish, without being treated as children or expected to be adults. Some of this work has begun in various Catholic renewal movements, but the general picture is a grim one, and a strong papal nudge would be helpful in addressing it.</p>
<p>Then there is the challenge of maintaining the financial viability of Catholic elementary schools in America’s blighted inner-city areas, the great majority of which receive no support from the state. In too many cities across the country, Catholic schools are the only schools that really work for poor and at-risk children. Yet a recent study by the Washington-based Thomas B. Fordham Institute showed that some 300,000 students had been unable to attend inner-city Catholic schools since 1990 because the Catholic schools they might have attended were shut because parishes or dioceses couldn’t afford them.</p>
<p>This is bad for the Church, for the poor and for society as a whole. The same Fordham Institute study illustrated one possible model of response: the Diocese of Wichita, Kansas, which by challenging its people to an 8 per cent tithe, raised enough money to offer a tuition-free education to all Catholic children and a minimal-cost education to non-Catholics. A strong papal endorsement of the Catholic school system and a challenge to increased generosity in supporting it would thus be useful.</p>
<p>Finally, there is the question of the Catholic identity of America’s Catholic institutions of higher learning. This network is one of the marvels of contemporary Catholicism, and American Catholics need to be reminded of that; but they should also be challenged to understand that (to take symbolic reference points) if Georgetown simply becomes Duke or Harvard on the Potomac, both Georgetown and the wider American intellectual culture will suffer. By challenging the soggy tenets of postmodernism, Catholic institutions of higher learning bring ginger into American intellectual life; they should do it more often, and a professor-pope is well positioned to suggest precisely that.</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 | pope benedict xvis first papal incursion united states basically trip united nations pastoral visit wrapped around life catholic church america however pope says homilies washington new york meetings catholic bishops educators priests religious seminarians young people likely immediate impact says green marble rostrum general assembly catholic church america needs hear benedict xvi word encouragement last decade pontificate john paul ii throughout brief papacy benedict xvi interesting new default position established corporate mind vatican united states uneurope words pope like predecessor recognises church us vital vibrant local church used call first world moreover benedict like john paul clearly understands us postchristian society church america retains capacity influence160 public debate dreamed countries western europe take one obvious example difference public effectiveness prolifeprofamily movement united states say spain dramatic knowing benedict like john paul papal scold thank catholic church america urging better precisely catholics america need hear american catholics given lot selfcriticism sure good dose selfcriticism required wake came light 2002 pattern sexual abuse episcopal malfeasance peaked late sixties early eighties abuse crisis however storyline american catholicism despite media preoccupations papal reminder would good thing american catholics also need hear pope challenges one episcopal leadership crisis year 2002 afterwards catholics rallied support good priests knew 97 per cent least american presbyterate one senses lingering anger priests however residual anger bishops failed act protected abusive clergy put diocese financial pressure called account american christianity always congregationally focused local parish catholic version protestant congregationalism fundamental cultural pattern american society danger church absence stronger evangelically effective episcopal leadership strange phenomenon call congregational ultramontanism catholicism people love pastor love pope ignore diocese bishop put gently vision vatican ii real present danger american episcopate significantly strengthened intellectually pastorally pope challenges american episcopate jettison currently prevailing rules episcopal gentlemens club recover patristic habit fraternal correction would widely applauded knowledgeable active catholics us another major challenge highschool catechetics catholics america dont know catechise teenagers thus surprise lot leakage church begins catholic primary schools better job catechising children past decade years age 14 18 risk becoming theyearsthelocustate american catholicism church could learn lessons evangelical christians creating christian culture perhaps better counterculture adolescents flourish without treated children expected adults work begun various catholic renewal movements general picture grim one strong papal nudge would helpful addressing challenge maintaining financial viability catholic elementary schools americas blighted innercity areas great majority receive support state many cities across country catholic schools schools really work poor atrisk children yet recent study washingtonbased thomas b fordham institute showed 300000 students unable attend innercity catholic schools since 1990 catholic schools might attended shut parishes dioceses couldnt afford bad church poor society whole fordham institute study illustrated one possible model response diocese wichita kansas challenging people 8 per cent tithe raised enough money offer tuitionfree education catholic children minimalcost education noncatholics strong papal endorsement catholic school system challenge increased generosity supporting would thus useful finally question catholic identity americas catholic institutions higher learning network one marvels contemporary catholicism american catholics need reminded also challenged understand take symbolic reference points georgetown simply becomes duke harvard potomac georgetown wider american intellectual culture suffer challenging soggy tenets postmodernism catholic institutions higher learning bring ginger american intellectual life often professorpope well positioned suggest precisely george weigel distinguished senior fellow ethics public policy center washington dc holds eppcs william e simon chair catholic studies | 549 |
<p>By Sarah N. Lynch</p>
<p>WASHINGTON (Reuters) – In August 2016, just two months before the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission discovered its corporate filing system had been hacked, the SEC’s internal watchdog, Carl Hoecker, received a plea for help from his new forensics investigative unit.</p>
<p>In a three-page memo that was shared with U.S. Congressional staff and seen by Reuters, the head of the forensics unit complained of “serious deficiencies” in equipment, inadequate cyber defense training, and a lack of communication with the SEC’s Office of Information Technology (OIT).</p>
<p>The forensics unit’s staff were told to use equipment due for disposal when they asked for supplies and ended up repurposing computer hard drives instead. Their hardware budget for the fiscal 2017 year at $100,000 was about half a million dollars short of what was needed, the memo said.</p>
<p>“Even though the (Digital Forensics and Investigations Unit) has been in existence for over one year, there is no strategic vision and no clear objectives,” it read.</p>
<p>The concerns in the memo, however, were never addressed, according to sources familiar with the matter, and the Office of the Inspector General (OIG), run by Hoecker, was not notified of the October 2016 breach of the SEC’s corporate filing system known as EGDAR until many months later.</p>
<p>In August 2017, nearly a year after the hack, the inspector general’s office was asked to review the incident after SEC Chairman Jay Clayton learned about it, according to sources.</p>
<p>Clayton will face questions about the security breach when he testifies before the U.S. House Financial Services Committee on Wednesday.</p>
<p>He has asked the inspector general’s office to launch a review into the intrusion. What role, if any, that the digital forensics unit will play in that review remains unclear.</p>
<p>Raphael Kozolchyk, a spokesman for the Office of the Inspector General, did not respond to more than half a dozen requests from Reuters for comment. Hoecker did not respond to an email seeking comment.</p>
<p>Christopher Carofine, a spokesman for the SEC, declined to comment.</p>
<p>The SEC has been criticized for the length of time it took to disclose the hack and the delay in uncovering its extent. Its cyber defenses and practices have been questioned in the past, including by auditors inside Hoecker’s office.</p>
<p>Hoecker created the forensics unit in 2015. Besides assisting with computer forensics on internal criminal and civil probes, the office was also charged with helping to identify “threats to the SEC’s sensitive information systems” and to provide “cyber security capability,” he told Congress in two public reports in 2015 and 2016.</p>
<p>The 2016 memo, however, raises questions about the inspector general’s handling of its own forensics unit and whether it could have been in a better position to respond to and investigate the problem when it was first detected in October 2016.</p>
<p>“With the recent breach, the SEC and the SEC OIG need to make sure they didn’t overlook any warnings or calls for improvements that might have prevented a breach,” Republican Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa told Reuters in a statement.</p>
<p>“An agency that protects the integrity of public securities has to be up to speed on threats and how to prevent them.”</p>
<p>ENFORCEMENT MUSCLE</p>
<p>The SEC’s Inspector General’s Office is an independent internal watchdog that is tasked with policing waste, fraud and abuse and is staffed with investigators and auditors.</p>
<p>While the inspector generals at some of the larger government agencies are nominated by the President, the SEC’s inspector general is hired by and answers to the agency’s commissioners.</p>
<p>Under Hoecker, the SEC’s Inspector General’s Office has undergone a major restructuring.</p>
<p>Prior to his arrival in 2013, the office’s investigative staff did not have any criminal law enforcement powers and focused primarily on administrative probes involving SEC employees.</p>
<p>But Hoecker decided to take advantage of a provision in federal law that allows inspector generals’ offices to have law enforcement powers. He hired special agents who can carry firearms, conduct criminal investigations, make arrests and execute search warrants.</p>
<p>The Digital Forensics and Investigations Unit was part of Hoecker’s plan to have more enforcement muscle so that his office could conduct criminal investigations into hacking and provide forensic support on investigations.</p>
<p>As part of that vision, the forensics unit proposed conducting a full review of the SEC’s computer network, and wanted to develop a reporting system with the Office of Information Technology to help keep track of all cyber incidents, according to government documents shared with congressional staff.</p>
<p>Despite that proposal, the inspector general’s office has not received real-time notifications of cyber incidents, according to sources, a public 2017 audit of the SEC’s information security program, and internal government documents seen by Reuters.</p>
<p>“It is not uncommon to have a big push to do a cyber security initiative and then have the organization be uncomfortable with the nature and type of initiative people are starting,” said Beau Woods, a cyber security expert with the Atlantic Council.</p>
<p>“It sounds like there is either a communications gap, or a leadership gap, or both, where the right information is not getting to the right people.”</p>
<p>The inspector general’s investigators have done few, if any, probes related to cyber intrusions and most of their investigations, ranging from time and attendance fraud by SEC staffers to ethics violations, have not led to criminal charges despite the efforts to step up the office’s enforcement powers.</p>
<p>From January 2013 through April 2017, of the 71 cases referred for criminal prosecution to U.S. Attorneys offices, a total of 50, or about 71 percent, were declined, according to statistics obtained by Reuters through a Freedom of Information Act request.</p> | false | 1 | sarah n lynch washington reuters august 2016 two months us securities exchange commission discovered corporate filing system hacked secs internal watchdog carl hoecker received plea help new forensics investigative unit threepage memo shared us congressional staff seen reuters head forensics unit complained serious deficiencies equipment inadequate cyber defense training lack communication secs office information technology oit forensics units staff told use equipment due disposal asked supplies ended repurposing computer hard drives instead hardware budget fiscal 2017 year 100000 half million dollars short needed memo said even though digital forensics investigations unit existence one year strategic vision clear objectives read concerns memo however never addressed according sources familiar matter office inspector general oig run hoecker notified october 2016 breach secs corporate filing system known egdar many months later august 2017 nearly year hack inspector generals office asked review incident sec chairman jay clayton learned according sources clayton face questions security breach testifies us house financial services committee wednesday asked inspector generals office launch review intrusion role digital forensics unit play review remains unclear raphael kozolchyk spokesman office inspector general respond half dozen requests reuters comment hoecker respond email seeking comment christopher carofine spokesman sec declined comment sec criticized length time took disclose hack delay uncovering extent cyber defenses practices questioned past including auditors inside hoeckers office hoecker created forensics unit 2015 besides assisting computer forensics internal criminal civil probes office also charged helping identify threats secs sensitive information systems provide cyber security capability told congress two public reports 2015 2016 2016 memo however raises questions inspector generals handling forensics unit whether could better position respond investigate problem first detected october 2016 recent breach sec sec oig need make sure didnt overlook warnings calls improvements might prevented breach republican senator charles grassley iowa told reuters statement agency protects integrity public securities speed threats prevent enforcement muscle secs inspector generals office independent internal watchdog tasked policing waste fraud abuse staffed investigators auditors inspector generals larger government agencies nominated president secs inspector general hired answers agencys commissioners hoecker secs inspector generals office undergone major restructuring prior arrival 2013 offices investigative staff criminal law enforcement powers focused primarily administrative probes involving sec employees hoecker decided take advantage provision federal law allows inspector generals offices law enforcement powers hired special agents carry firearms conduct criminal investigations make arrests execute search warrants digital forensics investigations unit part hoeckers plan enforcement muscle office could conduct criminal investigations hacking provide forensic support investigations part vision forensics unit proposed conducting full review secs computer network wanted develop reporting system office information technology help keep track cyber incidents according government documents shared congressional staff despite proposal inspector generals office received realtime notifications cyber incidents according sources public 2017 audit secs information security program internal government documents seen reuters uncommon big push cyber security initiative organization uncomfortable nature type initiative people starting said beau woods cyber security expert atlantic council sounds like either communications gap leadership gap right information getting right people inspector generals investigators done probes related cyber intrusions investigations ranging time attendance fraud sec staffers ethics violations led criminal charges despite efforts step offices enforcement powers january 2013 april 2017 71 cases referred criminal prosecution us attorneys offices total 50 71 percent declined according statistics obtained reuters freedom information act request | 541 |
<p><a href="http://variety.com/t/google/" type="external">Google</a>’s new $399 <a href="http://variety.com/t/google-home/" type="external">Google Home</a> Max speaker, which <a href="http://variety.com/2017/digital/news/google-home-max-shipping-1202636084/" type="external">started to ship earlier this week</a>, is the company’s first real foray into the world of home audio.&#160;With the Max, <a href="http://variety.com/2017/digital/news/goole-arcorfe-facebook-ar-studio-releases-1202637553/" type="external">Google</a> is aiming for the living room. Or perhaps the den, next to&#160;that turntable that you’ve been meaning to hook up again.</p>
<p>Reviewing a product like the <a href="http://variety.com/t/google-home-max/" type="external">Google Home Max</a> is no easy feat, especially because it wants to be both a smart speaker and a home audio product for music lovers. I had a chance to play with a review unit of the device for a few days this week, and test both. Here are my first impressions.</p>
<p>First things first: The <a href="http://variety.com/2017/digital/news/google-home-multi-touch-1202633958/" type="external">Google Home</a> Max is definitely max-sized, measuring roughly 13 by 7.5 by 6 inches, and weighing close to 12 lbs. It packs two tweeters and two woofers for stereo sound, and comes with a total of six built-in microphones: two pairs of two on the encasing, and two hidden behind the cloth mesh grille.</p>
<p>I’ve been told by Google that much like the original Google Home, the Max also uses just two mics at a time for voice control, but up to four for what the company calls smart sound (more on that below). And apparently, there’s a lot of mic switching going on, based on the orientation of the speaker.</p>
<p>Speaking of which: The Google Home Max can be placed either horizontally or upright, with the latter automatically prompting a switch to mono sound. Changing the orientation also switches the status LEDs, which are hidden behind the cloth mesh grille, and the function of the touch pad, which can be used to control the volume as well as tap to play/pause.</p>
<p>The Google Home Max ships in white and black, or chalk and charcoal, as Google likes to call it. The design is definitely minimal and pleasing, especially as Google omitted any obvious branding, safe for a small G logo on the back. The Max will blend in — until you turn it up, that is.</p>
<p>This speaker is a full-featured member of the Google Home family. As such, you can not only use it to query the Google Assistant, and ask it for weather, news, or traffic, but to add things to your shopping list. It can also help with translations, tell bedtime stories to your kids, or get the whole family moving for a game of freeze dance.</p>
<p>In addition to those assistant smarts, Google Home speakers also seamlessly integrate with Chromecast or Chromecast&#160;Audio devices as well as other devices using Google’s Cast technology. This means that you can tell your Google Home Max to watch a YouTube video on TV, provided you have the right device connected to the screen.</p>
<p>To be fair, all of this can also be done with a $49 Google Home Mini. However, the Max does have a bit of extra tech built in that you won’t find anywhere else — at least until competitors come out with similar functionality.</p>
<p><a href="http://variety.com/2017/digital/news/google-home-max-smart-sound-1202581708/" type="external">Google has added what it called smart sound to the speaker,</a> and is using the device’s integrated microphones to monitor the acoustics of the room in real-time while it plays music. This is meant to help it automatically adjusts to each room’s acoustic qualities. I’ve been told by Google that this process happens in just two or three seconds, and there is no way to turn smart sound off — which means that you can’t really demo smart sound as a party trick.</p>
<p>After some instructions from the Google Home team, I was able to catch the Max in the act as it was adjusting to me moving it from the middle of the room to a tight corner — and it definitely does make a difference. But what’s more important, I did schlep the speaker into many different rooms of my house, including a small half-bathroom that has the acoustic qualities of a large shoe box. The Max sounded pretty great everywhere, which I took as another sign that smart sound is working.</p>
<p>Speaking of which: I do have to preface the following by saying that I’m not, by any means, an audiophile. I haven’t even owned a proper stereo system for more than a decade, and have instead made use of a variety of cobbled-together solutions, mostly involving relatively inexpensive active speakers. And most of the time, when I really want to listen to music, I go for my Sennheiser headphones.</p>
<p>That being said, the Google Home Max sounded great to my ears. Mid- and high-range frequencies sound clear and not too sharp, but it helps to turn the volume up a bit to really open up the whole spectrum. The device’s strength is definitely its booming bass, which packs a real punch, but comes without any notable distortion even at high volumes. And you really crank it up quite a bit.</p>
<p>Much like connected speaker pioneer Sonos, Google isn’t sharing any specs on the loudness of the Max. The company did say that the device is 20 times more powerful than the original Google Home. I didn’t have 20 Google Homes at hand to test that, but I can confirm that it can get very, very loud. Chances are, you will barely ever play music at 100%, and even 75% should be enough to throw a good-sized party. But even when fully cranked up, there is very little distortion.</p>
<p>Thankfully, the speaker can also differentiate between music and assistance. This means that you can listen to music really loud, only to have Google respond in an appropriate volume if you ask for the weather in-between tracks.</p>
<p>Obviously, a single speaker can’t match true stereo from two well-placed separate speakers, but the Max did do a pretty good job at reproducing painting a full stereo soundstage. And if you really wanted to, and had the money to spare, you could always buy two, and pair them up together for full stereo sound.</p>
<p>There’s one thing that’s notable about the Google assistant on the Google Home Max: It doesn’t necessarily sound all that much better than on a regular Google Home. The same is true for playback of news and talk radio. With streams often optimized for lower-quality speakers without a lot of bass, the Home Max sometimes feels a little overqualified for these kinds of services. Hopefully, we’ll see more HD audio streams of radio programs coming online as smart home listening moves from cheap devices to better-sounding speakers.</p>
<p>One other notable feature about the Google Home Max is the line-in port that makes it possible to hook up external audio sources, including turntables, tape decks, and other sources of audio nostalgia. There is some rudimentary voice control for line-in sources — you can mute them or change their volume — and anyone owning two Google Home max speakers can also listen to those vinyl records in true stereo.</p>
<p>However, the device can’t yet send music to other Chromecast-equipped speakers around the house for whole-home audio. That’s a feature that’s available on the Sonos Play:5, and it’s sorely missing from the Max. Google told me that it plans to add the&#160;ability to cast line-in audio to multi-room groups later in 2018.</p>
<p>Finally, I found the Google Assistant to be not the best DJ. Asking it for a genre, or more popular fare, works great. But veer into the more obscure, and Google confidently keeps playing the wrong thing. That’s funny, but only for the first few times. Luckily, the Max also functions as a Chromecast receiver, so you can just select the music yourself on your phone and then play it on the speaker.</p>
<p>The good news is that a lot of these shortcomings are software-based. This means that the Google Home Max will only get better over time. And even at launch, it’s already a very nice speaker, albeit one with a significant price tag.</p>
<p>Whether the device is worth $399 of your money really depends on how much you will use Google’s assistant. And even if you do like being able to control music with your voice, there are other solutions available. For instance, it’s possible to buy great-sounding speakers for less, add a Google Home Mini for voice input and a Chromecast Audio to stream music.</p>
<p>But if you are in the market for a great-sounding all-in-one, then the Google Home Max is a solid choice. And as companies like Apple are preparing to launch their own&#160; smart speakers for music lovers, the Max is definitely the one to beat.</p> | false | 1 | googles new 399 google home max speaker started ship earlier week companys first real foray world home audio160with max google aiming living room perhaps den next to160that turntable youve meaning hook reviewing product like google home max easy feat especially wants smart speaker home audio product music lovers chance play review unit device days week test first impressions first things first google home max definitely maxsized measuring roughly 13 75 6 inches weighing close 12 lbs packs two tweeters two woofers stereo sound comes total six builtin microphones two pairs two encasing two hidden behind cloth mesh grille ive told google much like original google home max also uses two mics time voice control four company calls smart sound apparently theres lot mic switching going based orientation speaker speaking google home max placed either horizontally upright latter automatically prompting switch mono sound changing orientation also switches status leds hidden behind cloth mesh grille function touch pad used control volume well tap playpause google home max ships white black chalk charcoal google likes call design definitely minimal pleasing especially google omitted obvious branding safe small g logo back max blend turn speaker fullfeatured member google home family use query google assistant ask weather news traffic add things shopping list also help translations tell bedtime stories kids get whole family moving game freeze dance addition assistant smarts google home speakers also seamlessly integrate chromecast chromecast160audio devices well devices using googles cast technology means tell google home max watch youtube video tv provided right device connected screen fair also done 49 google home mini however max bit extra tech built wont find anywhere else least competitors come similar functionality google added called smart sound speaker using devices integrated microphones monitor acoustics room realtime plays music meant help automatically adjusts rooms acoustic qualities ive told google process happens two three seconds way turn smart sound means cant really demo smart sound party trick instructions google home team able catch max act adjusting moving middle room tight corner definitely make difference whats important schlep speaker many different rooms house including small halfbathroom acoustic qualities large shoe box max sounded pretty great everywhere took another sign smart sound working speaking preface following saying im means audiophile havent even owned proper stereo system decade instead made use variety cobbledtogether solutions mostly involving relatively inexpensive active speakers time really want listen music go sennheiser headphones said google home max sounded great ears mid highrange frequencies sound clear sharp helps turn volume bit really open whole spectrum devices strength definitely booming bass packs real punch comes without notable distortion even high volumes really crank quite bit much like connected speaker pioneer sonos google isnt sharing specs loudness max company say device 20 times powerful original google home didnt 20 google homes hand test confirm get loud chances barely ever play music 100 even 75 enough throw goodsized party even fully cranked little distortion thankfully speaker also differentiate music assistance means listen music really loud google respond appropriate volume ask weather inbetween tracks obviously single speaker cant match true stereo two wellplaced separate speakers max pretty good job reproducing painting full stereo soundstage really wanted money spare could always buy two pair together full stereo sound theres one thing thats notable google assistant google home max doesnt necessarily sound much better regular google home true playback news talk radio streams often optimized lowerquality speakers without lot bass home max sometimes feels little overqualified kinds services hopefully well see hd audio streams radio programs coming online smart home listening moves cheap devices bettersounding speakers one notable feature google home max linein port makes possible hook external audio sources including turntables tape decks sources audio nostalgia rudimentary voice control linein sources mute change volume anyone owning two google home max speakers also listen vinyl records true stereo however device cant yet send music chromecastequipped speakers around house wholehome audio thats feature thats available sonos play5 sorely missing max google told plans add the160ability cast linein audio multiroom groups later 2018 finally found google assistant best dj asking genre popular fare works great veer obscure google confidently keeps playing wrong thing thats funny first times luckily max also functions chromecast receiver select music phone play speaker good news lot shortcomings softwarebased means google home max get better time even launch already nice speaker albeit one significant price tag whether device worth 399 money really depends much use googles assistant even like able control music voice solutions available instance possible buy greatsounding speakers less add google home mini voice input chromecast audio stream music market greatsounding allinone google home max solid choice companies like apple preparing launch own160 smart speakers music lovers max definitely one beat | 782 |
<p>I grew up on the mat. Tae Kwon Do, Kung Fu, Kickboxing, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and eventually, professional mixed martial arts shaped who I've become as a woman.</p>
<p>It's a lifestyle that's led me to different gyms, many instructors and countless friends along the way. Although I retired from pro MMA in 2012, I've continued to train for fun because martial arts will always be a part of what makes me...me.</p>
<p>Watch highlights from Marianna's professional fights.</p>
<p>Two years ago, I met a young fighter named <a href="https://www.facebook.com/coral.car.9?ref=br_rs" type="external">Coral Carnicella</a> at the grand opening of <a href="http://floridakickboxingacademy.com/" type="external">Florida Kickboxing Academy,</a>a gym that my longtime friend and pro fighter <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewp0GOufkaM" type="external">Asa Ten Pow</a> opened in West Palm Beach. Coral was 17 at the time and I quickly took to her because her passion for the sport of Muay Thai was so intense - it immediately impressed me.</p>
<p>The Loxahatchee, Florida native was fearless, determined, bold and the hardest worker in the room at all times. We developed a bond over the sport we both loved.</p>
<p>I became like a big sister/mentor to her and also served as her main sparring partner as she prepared for fight after fight in the amateur Muay Thai national competition circuit.</p>
<p>Being 14 years older than her, and having competed at the highest level of pro fighting, I had a lot of knowledge that I was glad to pass down as she began her quest to be the best in this brutal, male-dominated sport.</p>
<p>Muay Thai is a sport that tests every ounce of your mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual fortitude.</p>
<p />
<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muay_Thai" type="external">Muay Thai</a> is referred to as the "art of eight limbs. " Fighters use punches, kicks, knees and elbow strikes to hurt their opponents and ultimately try to finish them by knock out. It's a national sport in Thailand and although it's not as popular here in the U.S. quite yet, it's due to gain some popularity after it will become part of the <a href="http://www.bbc.com/sport/olympics/38230253" type="external">Olympics in 2024</a>. As of now, the biggest exposure of Muay Thai is it being discussed during <a href="http://www.ufc.com/" type="external">UFC fights</a>, as it's just one art form that's used under the mixed martial arts fighting rules.</p>
<p>At the time we met, Coral had a few fights under her belt in the amateur juniors division, but was ready to enter in the adult category - willingly stepping up in competition to fight grown women. She was working harder than I had ever seen anyone work in the gym and doing everything right at home. She was training 3-5 hours a day, running 3-8 miles every morning, making all the dietary sacrifices (eating mostly dry chicken and vegetables,) and not hanging out with friends. She was training like a pro athlete in their prime. Being a fighter is extremely hard...I know from experience. But Coral was getting more from the sport than she was putting in. I asked her why she put herself through this? After all, she was straight-A student in high school and could have chosen any career path.</p>
<p>She said, she fell in love with the process, the preparation, and the outcome that solely based on her own work ethic. Each fight provided a different challenge and it's own obstacles. She admits that the gym has always felt like a second home. "Muay Thai has given me the ability to be true to who I am and it's given me the ability to protect myself if someone questions who I am."</p>
<p>Her hard work was paying off fight-after-fight and in a two-year span since entering in the adult division--she's remained undefeated. The obsession with the sport was constantly growing inside of her. Being around fighters my whole life, I hadn't quite seen someone with that amount of passion. It helped that she was the only girl on the FKA (Florida Kickboxing Academy) fight team. It made her elevate her training to keep up with the guys around her. Pro fighter Asa Ten Pow, who took over as her main trainer after Coral's first coach retired, said he's never coached a girl before Coral walked into the gym.</p>
<p>"Coral is my first girl that I've trained and it's been challenging at first, dealing with a lot of emotions in the beginning that I wasn't used to --with the males. I don't treat her any differently being that she is a girl. This sport, there is no need to be treated differently, it's not a gender sport...You get punched in the mouth, you get punched in the mouth. She earns respect because she comes in and works hard." Since joining the team she's had as much or even more success in the ring as her male teammates who are constantly pushing her on the mat, during conditioning exercises and in sparring sessions.</p>
<p>Coral went from an unranked junior fighter to a nationally recognized five time adult world amateur champion. She refused to take time off after each win and was in the gym the next day working towards her next fight (even if she didn't have one scheduled.) "Currently, Coral is one of the No. 1 ranked amateurs in America. She's won significant titles in major tournaments and sanctioning bodies. At the young age of 18, she's already fought over 20 times. With all her winning this past year she was invited to join the USA Muay Thai team in 2018. That's the highest honor you can have as an amateur fighter," coach Asa Ten Pow explained.</p>
<p>In October, I approached Coral about doing a mini documentary about her journey in the sport. An honest, gripping look into what it's really like to be a young, female fighter in a sport that's flying under the radar right now. It was perfect timing...as the interviews began...her coach got a call about a fight in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. It would be her first "no gear" rules fight --meaning fighters weren't allowed to wear headgear or shin guards like most amateur fights make mandatory. Her opponent was highly ranked and it was rumored she'd be going pro after this fight with Coral. Even I was nervous for this one.</p>
<p>Coral knocked it out of the park...literally in the first round. The swift combo of jab, cross, left high kick, left her highly ranked opponent laid out on the canvas. It was the sweetest of all her victories and the culmination of a lot of built up stress leading up to this big fight. She was the underdog and traveled to her much older opponent's backyard and put on the best performance of her life. We were all left speechless.</p>
<p>Coral's martial arts journey started when she was 10, but would have started even sooner if her parents would have taken her requests seriously. "We really don't know what made Coral want to do kickboxing. It was something that she's always asked us to do and we laughed it off. We didn't think she was serious but she just kept persisting," her mom Norma Jean Carnicella shared.</p>
<p>Cheerleading was her sport before she found martial arts but it was never her passion. She only found her true competitive side when she stepped foot in the Muay Thai gym. Her parents weren't surprised when she fell in love with it because she'd been talking about it for so long. I asked her mom if she worries about her only girl ,Coral has two brothers, choosing such a dangerous sport to compete in. (My mom, for instance, was mortified and never got used to the fact that her daughter was partaking in the most violent sport on the planet.) But luckily for Coral, her family was on board.</p>
<p>Her dad Jim, a former wrestler, told me he's thrilled that his baby girl can protect herself and loves watching her compete in the ring. "It's a joy for me. I love to see her out there doing what she loves to do," he said a few hours before Coral got into the ring at that Myrtle Beach fight. The whole family made the trip to see her compete in the biggest fight of her life. The family of five, is extremely close and are always in the stands supporting Coral...all but Jim. He's in his daughter's corner during the fight (along with Coach Asa.)</p>
<p>That focus keeps Coral off social media for the most part. She has accounts but rarely posts because frankly, she doesn't see the point in it all. The girl just wants her fights to do the talking. It's a controversial topic, female fighters using social media, sex appeal and various forms of self promotion, to gain popularity. But it's a topic that Coral was adamant about during one of our sit down interviews.</p>
<p>Coral on social media, self promotion (extended scene):</p>
<p>Coral chooses to laser her focus on the physical and mental game of the fight business instead of self-promotion. Getting in the ring is nerve-wracking, scary, and biggest adrenaline rush anyone could ever feel. The physical training is tough enough but the mental preparation just as important. Every fighter's got their own way of dealing with that anticipation.</p>
<p>After the first round knockout in Myrtle Beach, we all went out to dinner as Coral reflected on what just happened in the ring. The last 24-hours of her life were an emotional roller coaster filled with the highest highs and the biggest uncertainties. She made weight and had to manage her nerves for 36 long hours before stepping foot in the ring. "It's such an amazing feeling. You're standing in that opposite corner and you're looking at her laying there and your thinking all my hard work just paid off. I don't have an ounce of guilt. I worked harder than her and I'm cherishing the moment," she smiled.</p>
<p>Coral's cherished that moment 17 times in her young career (only feeling the disappointment of defeat three times.) She describes the feeling of getting in the ring as an out of body experience... A true feeling of living in the moment.</p>
<p>The feeling of getting your arm raised after a fight can be described as the ultimate high. A culmination of a grueling preparation process that fighters put themselves through constantly. Contrary to popular belief, only a small amount of fighters turn this passion into a professional career. Amateur fighters are hobbyists that don't make any money; they actually spend money to compete in tournaments around the country. The ones who do turn pro, don't do so with the hopes of becoming rich or famous. Muay Thai just isn't at the level of other professional sports when it comes to money or acclaim. Muay Thai fighters in America do it for the love of the game, the glory of victory. That's the pay off.</p>
<p>Coral's coach Asa, a pro muay thai fighter himself, admits that it's a very hard life. "It becomes a very lonely sport because we don't get the recognition that most athletes get. A lot of people don't understand why we decide to put our bodies on the line for something that there's no financial gain for. In reality you do it out of love and you keep sculpting your abilities in the ring. That's the beauty in it. That's the real gain from Muay Thai."</p>
<p>Some Muay Thai fighters even turn to similar sports (like MMA) because the chances of making a little bit of money are much greater. I asked Coral if she would consider getting into the octagon for an MMA fight in the future and she said she wouldn't rule the possibility out, but is 100% focused on Muay Thai. Making money from the sport is the farthest thing on her mind.</p>
<p>In 2016, Cheerleading and art of Muay Thai <a href="http://www.bbc.com/sport/olympics/38230253" type="external">received provisional recognition</a> as Olympic sports. The two sports received $25,000 in annual funding from the International Olympic Committee and will eventually apply to become part of the Olympic games. If Coral continues to progress at this pace, she'll be standing on that 1st place podium at the 2024 Olympics in Paris.</p>
<p>Coral dual-enrolled in college while still in high school. When she got her high school diploma she was only six credits short of receiving her AA, which she completed last month with a perfect 4.0 GPA. She is now in EMT school and is working towards becoming a firefighter.</p> | false | 1 | grew mat tae kwon kung fu kickboxing brazilian jiu jitsu eventually professional mixed martial arts shaped ive become woman lifestyle thats led different gyms many instructors countless friends along way although retired pro mma 2012 ive continued train fun martial arts always part makes meme watch highlights mariannas professional fights two years ago met young fighter named coral carnicella grand opening florida kickboxing academya gym longtime friend pro fighter asa ten pow opened west palm beach coral 17 time quickly took passion sport muay thai intense immediately impressed loxahatchee florida native fearless determined bold hardest worker room times developed bond sport loved became like big sistermentor also served main sparring partner prepared fight fight amateur muay thai national competition circuit 14 years older competed highest level pro fighting lot knowledge glad pass began quest best brutal maledominated sport muay thai sport tests every ounce mental physical emotional spiritual fortitude muay thai referred art eight limbs fighters use punches kicks knees elbow strikes hurt opponents ultimately try finish knock national sport thailand although popular us quite yet due gain popularity become part olympics 2024 biggest exposure muay thai discussed ufc fights one art form thats used mixed martial arts fighting rules time met coral fights belt amateur juniors division ready enter adult category willingly stepping competition fight grown women working harder ever seen anyone work gym everything right home training 35 hours day running 38 miles every morning making dietary sacrifices eating mostly dry chicken vegetables hanging friends training like pro athlete prime fighter extremely hardi know experience coral getting sport putting asked put straighta student high school could chosen career path said fell love process preparation outcome solely based work ethic fight provided different challenge obstacles admits gym always felt like second home muay thai given ability true given ability protect someone questions hard work paying fightafterfight twoyear span since entering adult divisionshes remained undefeated obsession sport constantly growing inside around fighters whole life hadnt quite seen someone amount passion helped girl fka florida kickboxing academy fight team made elevate training keep guys around pro fighter asa ten pow took main trainer corals first coach retired said hes never coached girl coral walked gym coral first girl ive trained challenging first dealing lot emotions beginning wasnt used males dont treat differently girl sport need treated differently gender sportyou get punched mouth get punched mouth earns respect comes works hard since joining team shes much even success ring male teammates constantly pushing mat conditioning exercises sparring sessions coral went unranked junior fighter nationally recognized five time adult world amateur champion refused take time win gym next day working towards next fight even didnt one scheduled currently coral one 1 ranked amateurs america shes significant titles major tournaments sanctioning bodies young age 18 shes already fought 20 times winning past year invited join usa muay thai team 2018 thats highest honor amateur fighter coach asa ten pow explained october approached coral mini documentary journey sport honest gripping look really like young female fighter sport thats flying radar right perfect timingas interviews beganher coach got call fight myrtle beach south carolina would first gear rules fight meaning fighters werent allowed wear headgear shin guards like amateur fights make mandatory opponent highly ranked rumored shed going pro fight coral even nervous one coral knocked parkliterally first round swift combo jab cross left high kick left highly ranked opponent laid canvas sweetest victories culmination lot built stress leading big fight underdog traveled much older opponents backyard put best performance life left speechless corals martial arts journey started 10 would started even sooner parents would taken requests seriously really dont know made coral want kickboxing something shes always asked us laughed didnt think serious kept persisting mom norma jean carnicella shared cheerleading sport found martial arts never passion found true competitive side stepped foot muay thai gym parents werent surprised fell love shed talking long asked mom worries girl coral two brothers choosing dangerous sport compete mom instance mortified never got used fact daughter partaking violent sport planet luckily coral family board dad jim former wrestler told hes thrilled baby girl protect loves watching compete ring joy love see loves said hours coral got ring myrtle beach fight whole family made trip see compete biggest fight life family five extremely close always stands supporting coralall jim hes daughters corner fight along coach asa focus keeps coral social media part accounts rarely posts frankly doesnt see point girl wants fights talking controversial topic female fighters using social media sex appeal various forms self promotion gain popularity topic coral adamant one sit interviews coral social media self promotion extended scene coral chooses laser focus physical mental game fight business instead selfpromotion getting ring nervewracking scary biggest adrenaline rush anyone could ever feel physical training tough enough mental preparation important every fighters got way dealing anticipation first round knockout myrtle beach went dinner coral reflected happened ring last 24hours life emotional roller coaster filled highest highs biggest uncertainties made weight manage nerves 36 long hours stepping foot ring amazing feeling youre standing opposite corner youre looking laying thinking hard work paid dont ounce guilt worked harder im cherishing moment smiled corals cherished moment 17 times young career feeling disappointment defeat three times describes feeling getting ring body experience true feeling living moment feeling getting arm raised fight described ultimate high culmination grueling preparation process fighters put constantly contrary popular belief small amount fighters turn passion professional career amateur fighters hobbyists dont make money actually spend money compete tournaments around country ones turn pro dont hopes becoming rich famous muay thai isnt level professional sports comes money acclaim muay thai fighters america love game glory victory thats pay corals coach asa pro muay thai fighter admits hard life becomes lonely sport dont get recognition athletes get lot people dont understand decide put bodies line something theres financial gain reality love keep sculpting abilities ring thats beauty thats real gain muay thai muay thai fighters even turn similar sports like mma chances making little bit money much greater asked coral would consider getting octagon mma fight future said wouldnt rule possibility 100 focused muay thai making money sport farthest thing mind 2016 cheerleading art muay thai received provisional recognition olympic sports two sports received 25000 annual funding international olympic committee eventually apply become part olympic games coral continues progress pace shell standing 1st place podium 2024 olympics paris coral dualenrolled college still high school got high school diploma six credits short receiving aa completed last month perfect 40 gpa emt school working towards becoming firefighter | 1,094 |
<p>PHILADELPHIA — The <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Philadelphia-Eagles/" type="external">Philadelphia Eagles</a> clinched a first-round playoff bye Sunday with their 34-29 win over the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/New_York_Giants/" type="external">New York Giants</a>. This week, they can clinch home-field advantage through the playoffs with a win over the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Oakland-Raiders/" type="external">Oakland Raiders</a> (6-8) or a loss by the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Minnesota-Vikings/" type="external">Minnesota Vikings</a> (11-3), who are the only other team still in the running for home-field advantage in the postseason.</p>
<p>Since the Vikings play the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Green_Bay_Packers/" type="external">Green Bay Packers</a> on Saturday night and the Eagles don’t play the Raiders until Christmas (Monday) night, a loss by the Vikings could make both of the Eagles’ final two games absolutely meaningless.</p>
<p>Asked whether he would rest many of his starters Monday night if the Vikings lose, Eagles head coach <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Doug-Pederson/" type="external">Doug Pederson</a> wasn’t ready to go there.</p>
<p>“I’ve begun thinking (about resting players), but my focus is on winning the game on Monday night,” Pederson said. “Because that to me is the most important thing.</p>
<p>“Once we get to next week (the regular-season finale against the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Dallas-Cowboys/" type="external">Dallas Cowboys</a>), we’ll figure out next week. But my mindset this week is all about the Raiders and Monday Night Football. That’s the focus for me.”</p>
<p>So, you are going to play your starters against the Raiders regardless of whether the game is meaningful to your playoff situation?</p>
<p>“I’m not going to cross that bridge because you’re asking a question I don’t know the answer to yet,” he said.</p>
<p>If the Vikings lose Saturday night, it’s likely that Pederson still would play his starters a good portion of the game. The Dallas game would be an entirely different story.</p>
<p>“You just make the best decisions for your <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/John_Walker/" type="external">football</a> team,” Pederson said. “If that means resting a guy, you rest a guy. Or two or three.</p>
<p>“But you also have to maintain the edge with these players. You have to maintain that confidence and dominating swagger. You have to keep that alive.</p>
<p>“I’m going to be smart about the decisions we have to make moving forward and getting guys rest if possible; the guys that need it.”</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>With <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Carson-Wentz/" type="external">Carson Wentz</a> on injured reserve, the Eagles are carrying only two quarterbacks: starter Nick Foles and backup Nate Sudfeld.</p>
<p>Pederson was asked why the Eagles didn’t consider bringing in a veteran backup after Wentz went down rather than going with Sudfeld, who has never appeared in an NFL regular-season game.</p>
<p>“Probably the biggest reason is the time invested,” he said. “If you bring a guy in off the street this late in the season, you’re talking about spending time with that player just trying to get him up to speed on our offense. We’ve already spent time with Nate and developed him and worked with him.”</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>Nick Foles’ first start in place of Carson Wentz was rock solid. Sure, it came against one of the league’s worst pass defenses — the Giants are 29th in opponent passer rating (100.3), 32nd in touchdown passes allowed (30), 31st in sacks (22), 28th in yards allowed per attempt (7.8) and tied for 26th in interceptions (8). But it was a perfect confidence-builder for him. He threw four touchdown passes to four different receivers. He didn’t have an interception. He completed nine of 12 passes in the red zone, including all four of his TD throws. He was 6-for-10 on third down, converting two third-and-longs on the Eagles’ final scoring drive. He made good decisions. He got the ball out quickly. He eluded rushers. He executed two nice screen plays — a 19-yarder by <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Alshon-Jeffery/" type="external">Alshon Jeffery</a> on a second-and-10, and a 32-yarder to running back <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jay-Ajayi/" type="external">Jay Ajayi</a> on first down that set up a score.</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>The Eagles became the first team in 26 years Sunday to block a punt, field goal and extra point in the same game. Linebacker Kamu Grugier-Hill blocked Brad Wing’s punt to set up an Eagles touchdown. Safety <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Malcolm-Jenkins/" type="external">Malcolm Jenkins</a>‘ block of Aldrick Rosas’ 48-yard field-goal attempt prevented the Giants from taking a fourth-quarter lead.</p>
<p>“All week we knew we could do things here and pick them apart there,” Grugier-Hill said. “We went in with a really good plan and executed it.”</p>
<p>NOTES: CB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Patrick_Robinson/" type="external">Patrick Robinson</a> suffered a concussion trying to make a tackle in the second half Sunday against the Giants. He is in concussion protocol. … CB Rasul Douglas was inactive Sunday for the first time since Week 1. The Eagles needed to make room on their game-day roster for special teams ace Bryan Braman, who was signed by the team last week. … TE <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Zach-Ertz/" type="external">Zach Ertz</a>, who missed last week’s game with a concussion, had six catches for 56 yards and a touchdown Sunday against the Giants. … LG Stefen Wisniewski sat out Sunday’s game with a high-ankle sprain. While it’s possible that he may play this week against the Raiders, it’s more likely that the Eagles will rest him until the playoffs. … RB <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/LeGarrette_Blount/" type="external">LeGarrette Blount</a>, who played only 15 snaps last week against the Rams, played just 17 snaps Sunday against the Giants. He had seven carries for 21 yards.</p>
<p>REPORT CARD VS. GIANTS</p>
<p>—PASSING OFFENSE: A – Not a bad first start for Nick Foles. Four touchdown passes, all of them in the red zone. No interceptions. Foles knows his limitations as far as mobility, so he doesn’t hold on to the ball. He was sacked only once, when <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Olivier-Vernon/" type="external">Olivier Vernon</a> beat LT Halapoulivaati Vaitai. After that, both Vaitai and fill-in LG Chance Warmack did a good job.</p>
<p>—RUSHING OFFENSE: B-minus – Eagles didn’t have a rushing touchdown for the fourth straight game and had just five rushing first downs for the second straight week. Jay Ajayi had a 22-yard run on a third-quarter TD drive and finished with 49 yards on 12 carries.</p>
<p>—PASS DEFENSE: D – The Eagles had a tough day against <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Eli_Manning/" type="external">Eli Manning</a> and the Giants’ wounded receiving corps. Manning threw for 434 yards and three touchdowns. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Ronald-Darby/" type="external">Ronald Darby</a> had a second-quarter interception and Corey Graham made a nice game-saving play in the end zone on a throw to tight end <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Evan-Engram/" type="external">Evan Engram</a>. But there weren’t many other highlights. Manning was 10-for-15 on third down with eight first downs and two of his three touchdowns.</p>
<p>—RUSH DEFENSE: B-plus – The Giants rushed for 52 yards on 12 first-half carries. But the Eagles shut them down in the second half, holding them to 2.1 yards per carry. The Giants finished with just four rushing first downs. Keep in mind, though, they came into the game with the league’s fifth least productive ground game.</p>
<p>—SPECIAL TEAMS: A-plus – Dave Fipp’s units have struggled at times this season, but Sunday was a very good day. Malcolm Jenkins blocked a fourth-quarter Aldrick Rosas field-goal attempt. Kamu Grugier-Hill blocked a second-quarter punt that set up an early TD. <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Derek-Barnett/" type="external">Derek Barnett</a> blocked an extra-point attempt. And the kickoff coverage unit never allowed the Giants to start a drive beyond their own 25.</p>
<p>—COACHING: B – Doug Pederson did a good job of setting up Nick Foles for success in his first start since Carson Wentz went down. Defensive coordinator <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Jim_Schwartz/" type="external">Jim Schwartz</a> didn’t seem to have any answers for stopping Eli Manning.</p> | false | 1 | philadelphia philadelphia eagles clinched firstround playoff bye sunday 3429 win new york giants week clinch homefield advantage playoffs win oakland raiders 68 loss minnesota vikings 113 team still running homefield advantage postseason since vikings play green bay packers saturday night eagles dont play raiders christmas monday night loss vikings could make eagles final two games absolutely meaningless asked whether would rest many starters monday night vikings lose eagles head coach doug pederson wasnt ready go ive begun thinking resting players focus winning game monday night pederson said important thing get next week regularseason finale dallas cowboys well figure next week mindset week raiders monday night football thats focus going play starters raiders regardless whether game meaningful playoff situation im going cross bridge youre asking question dont know answer yet said vikings lose saturday night likely pederson still would play starters good portion game dallas game would entirely different story make best decisions football team pederson said means resting guy rest guy two three also maintain edge players maintain confidence dominating swagger keep alive im going smart decisions make moving forward getting guys rest possible guys need carson wentz injured reserve eagles carrying two quarterbacks starter nick foles backup nate sudfeld pederson asked eagles didnt consider bringing veteran backup wentz went rather going sudfeld never appeared nfl regularseason game probably biggest reason time invested said bring guy street late season youre talking spending time player trying get speed offense weve already spent time nate developed worked nick foles first start place carson wentz rock solid sure came one leagues worst pass defenses giants 29th opponent passer rating 1003 32nd touchdown passes allowed 30 31st sacks 22 28th yards allowed per attempt 78 tied 26th interceptions 8 perfect confidencebuilder threw four touchdown passes four different receivers didnt interception completed nine 12 passes red zone including four td throws 6for10 third converting two thirdandlongs eagles final scoring drive made good decisions got ball quickly eluded rushers executed two nice screen plays 19yarder alshon jeffery secondand10 32yarder running back jay ajayi first set score eagles became first team 26 years sunday block punt field goal extra point game linebacker kamu grugierhill blocked brad wings punt set eagles touchdown safety malcolm jenkins block aldrick rosas 48yard fieldgoal attempt prevented giants taking fourthquarter lead week knew could things pick apart grugierhill said went really good plan executed notes cb patrick robinson suffered concussion trying make tackle second half sunday giants concussion protocol cb rasul douglas inactive sunday first time since week 1 eagles needed make room gameday roster special teams ace bryan braman signed team last week te zach ertz missed last weeks game concussion six catches 56 yards touchdown sunday giants lg stefen wisniewski sat sundays game highankle sprain possible may play week raiders likely eagles rest playoffs rb legarrette blount played 15 snaps last week rams played 17 snaps sunday giants seven carries 21 yards report card vs giants passing offense bad first start nick foles four touchdown passes red zone interceptions foles knows limitations far mobility doesnt hold ball sacked olivier vernon beat lt halapoulivaati vaitai vaitai fillin lg chance warmack good job rushing offense bminus eagles didnt rushing touchdown fourth straight game five rushing first downs second straight week jay ajayi 22yard run thirdquarter td drive finished 49 yards 12 carries pass defense eagles tough day eli manning giants wounded receiving corps manning threw 434 yards three touchdowns ronald darby secondquarter interception corey graham made nice gamesaving play end zone throw tight end evan engram werent many highlights manning 10for15 third eight first downs two three touchdowns rush defense bplus giants rushed 52 yards 12 firsthalf carries eagles shut second half holding 21 yards per carry giants finished four rushing first downs keep mind though came game leagues fifth least productive ground game special teams aplus dave fipps units struggled times season sunday good day malcolm jenkins blocked fourthquarter aldrick rosas fieldgoal attempt kamu grugierhill blocked secondquarter punt set early td derek barnett blocked extrapoint attempt kickoff coverage unit never allowed giants start drive beyond 25 coaching b doug pederson good job setting nick foles success first start since carson wentz went defensive coordinator jim schwartz didnt seem answers stopping eli manning | 700 |
<p>The Washington Post, in a <a href="http://blog.washingtonpost.com/44/2008/07/obamas-symbolic-importance.html" type="external">July 30, 2008 story</a>, reported the following:</p>
<p>In his closed door meeting with House Democrats Tuesday night, presumptive Democratic nominee Barack Obama delivered a real zinger, according to a witness, suggesting that he was beginning to believe his own hype.</p>
<p>Obama was waxing lyrical about last week’s trip to Europe, when he concluded, according to the meeting attendee, “this is the moment, as Nancy [Pelosi] noted, that the world is waiting for.”</p>
<p>The 200,000 souls who thronged to his speech in Berlin came not just for him, he told the enthralled audience of congressional representatives. “I have become a symbol of the possibility of America returning to our best traditions,” he said, according to the source.</p>
<p>Democrats seem rather less enthralled with Mr. Obama these days. In retrospect, Obama’s ascension to the presidency wasn’t quite the moment the world was waiting for. Increasingly that’s the judgment of Democrats.&#160;This year, in fact, Democrats have leveled unusually sharp and damaging charges against the president.</p>
<p>Well into the sixth year of his presidency, then, it’s worth considering not what Republicans but what members of Mr. Obama’s own party, and in some cases former members of his own administration, are saying about him.</p>
<p>* * * *</p>
<p>“But these last two years I think [Obama] kind of lost his way. You know, it’s been a mixed message, a little ambivalence in trying to approach these issues and try to clarify what the role of this country is all about… There’s a little question mark to, is the United States going to stick this out? Is the United States going to be there when we need them?” – <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2014/10/06/leon-panetta-memoir-worthy-fights/16737615/" type="external">Leon Panetta</a>, secretary of defense and director of the Central Intelligence Agency under President Obama, October 6, 2014.</p>
<p>* * * *</p>
<p>“My fear, as I voiced to the President and others, was that if the country split apart or slid back into the violence that we’d seen in the years immediately following the U.S. invasion, it could become a new haven for terrorists to plot attacks against the U.S. Iraq’s stability was not only in Iraq’s interest but also in ours. I privately and publicly advocated for a residual force that could provide training and security for Iraq’s military…. Those on our side viewed the White House as so eager to rid itself of Iraq that it was willing to withdraw rather than lock in arrangements that would preserve our influence and interests.” — <a href="http://time.com/3453840/leon-panetta-iraqi-troop/" type="external">Panetta</a>, October 1, 2014 (published excerpts from his book&#160;Worthy Fights).</p>
<p>* * * *</p>
<p>“The reality is, they’re not gonna be able to be successful against ISIS strictly from the air, or strictly depending on the Iraqi forces, or the Peshmerga, or the Sunni tribes acting on their own. So there will be boots on the ground if there’s to be any hope of success in the strategy. And I think that by continuing to repeat that [the U.S. won’t put boots on the ground], the president, in effect, traps himself.” — <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/news/robert-gates-isis-boots-on-the-ground-needed/" type="external">Robert Gates</a>, secretary of defense under President Obama, September 17, 2014.</p>
<p>* * * *</p>
<p>“With all the talk of coming home, of nation building at home, the perception has grown increasingly around the world that the U.S. is pulling back from the global responsibilities that it has shouldered for many decades. I believe Russia and China, among others, see that void and are moving to see what advantage they can take of it.”– <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/21/robert-gates-china-russia_n_5361462.html" type="external">Gates</a>, May 21, 2014.</p>
<p>* * * *</p>
<p>“Great nations need organizing principles, and ‘Don’t do stupid stuff’ is not an organizing principle.”– <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/08/hillary-clinton-failure-to-help-syrian-rebels-led-to-the-rise-of-isis/375832/" type="external">Hillary Clinton</a>, secretary of state under President Obama, distancing herself from how President Obama described his foreign policy doctrine, August 10, 2014.</p>
<p>* * * *</p>
<p>“First of all, [the United States under Obama] waited too long. We let the Islamic state build up its money, capability and strength and weapons while it was still in Syria. Then when [ISIS] moved into Iraq, the Sunni Muslims didn’t object to their being there and about a third of the territory in Iraq was abandoned.” – <a href="http://www.star-telegram.com/2014/10/07/6182968/carter-unhappy-with-obamas-policies.html?rh=1" type="external">Jimmy Carter</a>, 39th president of the United States, October 7, 2014.</p>
<p>* * * *</p>
<p>“For now [Obama] has been reduced to … an isolated political figure who is viewed as a liability to Democrats in the very states where voters by the thousands had once stood to cheer him…. As November nears, Mr. Obama and his loyalists are being forced to reconcile that it is not only Democrats in conservative-leaning states, like Senator Mark Pryor of Arkansas, who are avoiding him…. Even the slightest injection of the Obama brand into this election seems perilous for Democrats.” – <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/08/us/politics/in-this-election-obamas-party-benches-him.html" type="external">“In This Election, Obama’s Party Benches Him”</a>, New York Times, October 7, 2014.</p>
<p>* * * *</p>
<p>“What Democrats told me today is that President Obama, however much they love him, he is an albatross around their necks right now. His poll numbers are so bad, people not feeling good about the state of the economy even if there economic indicators that things are getting better. Wages are stagnant.” – <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2014/10/08/tapper_democrats_tell_me_obama_is_an_albatross_around_their_necks.html" type="external">Jake Tapper</a>, chief Washington correspondent and anchor for CNN, October 8, 2014.</p>
<p>* * * *</p>
<p>“One prominent party strategist said Obama ‘should take a flamethrower to his office. He needs dramatic change — it’s not even a debatable point,’ the strategist said. ‘The general consensus that the president is surrounded by people who do him more harm than good because they are more focused on pleasing him than they are challenging him or proposing a different course.’ Obama has endured a brutal two years since his reelection, with a legislative agenda stalled and his approval ratings in the dumps. On the midterm campaign trail, he’s mostly been persona non grata, with Democratic candidates wishing he’d stay away.” – <a href="http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/220450-dems-want-white-house-shakeup" type="external">“Dems want White House shakeup”</a>, The Hill, October 12, 2014.</p>
<p>* * * *</p>
<p>“I respect the sanctity of the ballot box.” – <a href="http://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/politics/elections/kentucky/2014/10/09/grimes-say-voted-obama/16995769/" type="external">Alison Lundergan Grimes</a>, Democratic Senate candidate, refusing to say if she voted for President Barack Obama in 2008 or 2012, October 10, 2014.</p>
<p>* * * *</p>
<p>“It was a mistake.” – <a href="http://www.politico.com/blogs/politico-live/2014/10/axelrod-obama-ballot-line-a-mistake-196592.html" type="external">David Axelrod</a>, former White House senior adviser, responding to President Obama’s statement, “I’m not on the ballot this fall … but make no mistake, these policies are on the ballot — every single one of them.” October 5, 2014.</p>
<p>* * * *</p>
<p>“It is safe to say that Obama has been a huge disappointment. I really don’t think there’s any comparison between him and Bill Clinton. I don’t think we’re even talking about the same universe.” — <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2014/10/02/kirsten_powers_it_is_safe_to_say_obama_has_been_a_huge_disappointment.html" type="external">Kirsten Powers</a>, Democratic political commentator, October 2, 2014.</p>
<p>* * * *</p>
<p>“This administration has been disconnected from the government it’s supposed to be running. They seem to view the federal workforce as hostile territory. They don’t engage with it…. They don’t have a strong system of getting info from the agencies to the president. They keep getting surprised by stuff. And the surprise is almost worse than anything else. It conveys the sense that the White House doesn’t know what its own government is doing.” – <a href="http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-mcmanus-column-competence-20141005-column.html" type="external">Elaine Kamarck</a>, senior policy advisor to Vice President Al Gore, October 5, 2014.</p>
<p>* * * *</p>
<p>“Even those loyal to Mr. Obama say that his quest for excellence can bleed into cockiness and that he tends to overestimate his capabilities…. ‘I think that I’m a better speechwriter than my speechwriters,’ Mr. Obama told Patrick Gaspard, his political director, at the start of the 2008 campaign, according to The New Yorker. ‘I know more about policies on any particular issue than my policy directors. And I’ll tell you right now that I’m going to think I’m a better political director than my political director.’” – <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/03/us/politics/obama-plays-to-win-in-politics-and-everything-else.html?pagewanted=all&amp;_r=1&amp;" type="external">“The Competitor in Chief”</a>, New York Times, September 2, 2012.</p>
<p>— Peter Wehner is a Senior Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center</p> | false | 1 | washington post july 30 2008 story reported following closed door meeting house democrats tuesday night presumptive democratic nominee barack obama delivered real zinger according witness suggesting beginning believe hype obama waxing lyrical last weeks trip europe concluded according meeting attendee moment nancy pelosi noted world waiting 200000 souls thronged speech berlin came told enthralled audience congressional representatives become symbol possibility america returning best traditions said according source democrats seem rather less enthralled mr obama days retrospect obamas ascension presidency wasnt quite moment world waiting increasingly thats judgment democrats160this year fact democrats leveled unusually sharp damaging charges president well sixth year presidency worth considering republicans members mr obamas party cases former members administration saying last two years think obama kind lost way know mixed message little ambivalence trying approach issues try clarify role country theres little question mark united states going stick united states going need leon panetta secretary defense director central intelligence agency president obama october 6 2014 fear voiced president others country split apart slid back violence wed seen years immediately following us invasion could become new terrorists plot attacks us iraqs stability iraqs interest also privately publicly advocated residual force could provide training security iraqs military side viewed white house eager rid iraq willing withdraw rather lock arrangements would preserve influence interests panetta october 1 2014 published excerpts book160worthy fights reality theyre gon na able successful isis strictly air strictly depending iraqi forces peshmerga sunni tribes acting boots ground theres hope success strategy think continuing repeat us wont put boots ground president effect traps robert gates secretary defense president obama september 17 2014 talk coming home nation building home perception grown increasingly around world us pulling back global responsibilities shouldered many decades believe russia china among others see void moving see advantage take gates may 21 2014 great nations need organizing principles dont stupid stuff organizing principle hillary clinton secretary state president obama distancing president obama described foreign policy doctrine august 10 2014 first united states obama waited long let islamic state build money capability strength weapons still syria isis moved iraq sunni muslims didnt object third territory iraq abandoned jimmy carter 39th president united states october 7 2014 obama reduced isolated political figure viewed liability democrats states voters thousands stood cheer november nears mr obama loyalists forced reconcile democrats conservativeleaning states like senator mark pryor arkansas avoiding even slightest injection obama brand election seems perilous democrats election obamas party benches new york times october 7 2014 democrats told today president obama however much love albatross around necks right poll numbers bad people feeling good state economy even economic indicators things getting better wages stagnant jake tapper chief washington correspondent anchor cnn october 8 2014 one prominent party strategist said obama take flamethrower office needs dramatic change even debatable point strategist said general consensus president surrounded people harm good focused pleasing challenging proposing different course obama endured brutal two years since reelection legislative agenda stalled approval ratings dumps midterm campaign trail hes mostly persona non grata democratic candidates wishing hed stay away dems want white house shakeup hill october 12 2014 respect sanctity ballot box alison lundergan grimes democratic senate candidate refusing say voted president barack obama 2008 2012 october 10 2014 mistake david axelrod former white house senior adviser responding president obamas statement im ballot fall make mistake policies ballot every single one october 5 2014 safe say obama huge disappointment really dont think theres comparison bill clinton dont think even talking universe kirsten powers democratic political commentator october 2 2014 administration disconnected government supposed running seem view federal workforce hostile territory dont engage dont strong system getting info agencies president keep getting surprised stuff surprise almost worse anything else conveys sense white house doesnt know government elaine kamarck senior policy advisor vice president al gore october 5 2014 even loyal mr obama say quest excellence bleed cockiness tends overestimate capabilities think im better speechwriter speechwriters mr obama told patrick gaspard political director start 2008 campaign according new yorker know policies particular issue policy directors ill tell right im going think im better political director political director competitor chief new york times september 2 2012 peter wehner senior fellow ethics public policy center | 696 |
<p>Between the rise of safe spaces, trigger warnings, speaker disinvitations, and the often illiberal conduct of campus demonstrators over the past few years, it’s clear that the core constitutional value of free speech is now under siege at our colleges and universities. The fraying of commitment to freedom of speech on the part of college educated millennials, as well as many faculty and administrators, has reached the point where it threatens not only liberal education, but the very survival of the liberty of thought and expression in America at large.</p>
<p>To address this problem, Arizona’s Goldwater Institute and I have collaborated to devise comprehensive state-level legislation designed to restore freedom of speech to the American academy. The resulting model state-level legislation, made public this week along with a <a href="https://goldwater-media.s3.amazonaws.com/cms_page_media/2017/1/30/_Campus%20Free%20Speech%20Paper.pdf" type="external">white paper explaining its provisions</a>, constitutes what is very possibly the most comprehensive effort ever undertaken to restore and protect freedom of thought and expression on America’s college campuses.</p>
<p>The model Campus Free Speech Act would instruct the governing body of a state university system—generally called the board of trustees or board of governors—to craft a university-wide policy statement that unmistakably affirms the centrality of free expression. The statement would make it clear that it is not the proper role of a university to shield individuals from ideas or opinions they find unwelcome, disagreeable, or even deeply offensive. By legislative provision, this new statement would supersede and nullify any restrictive speech codes adopted by any constituent school of the state university system.</p>
<p>Second, the system’s campuses would be declared open to any speaker whom students, student groups, or members of the faculty have invited. This would prevent administrators from disinviting speakers, however controversial, whom members of the campus community wish to hear from.</p>
<p>Third, the bill would expressly bar students, faculty members, employees, or any other members of the university system from interfering with the freedom of others to express their views. This means no more shouting down of visiting speakers, and no more obstruction of legitimate meetings and events.</p>
<p>In order to protect the free-speech rights of visiting speakers, and of everyone else on campus, the bill would authorize a range of disciplinary sanctions for those who interfere with the speech of others, with particularly strong penalties for anyone who commits a second offense. Equally important, the model bill includes very strong protections for the due process rights of students accused of interfering with the expressive rights of others.</p>
<p>In authorizing disciplinary sanctions for those who interfere with the free speech rights of others, the model bill draws inspiration from the classic affirmation and defense of campus free speech, Yale University’s <a href="http://yalecollege.yale.edu/deans-office/policies-reports/report-committee-freedom-expression-yale" type="external">Woodward Report</a> of 1974. The Woodward Report not only eloquently upheld the centrality of free expression to the university’s mission, it also laid out a strategy for fairly but firmly punishing those who had forcibly silenced the speech of others. The discipline policy devised by the Woodward Report remains in Yale’s regulations to this day, and new the model Campus Free Speech Act takes a leaf from that book.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, we tend to take it for granted nowadays that students, and even faculty members, can disrupt university functions, interrupt, and shout down speakers they don’t like, and yet suffer no penalty whatever. That is wrong. Legitimate protest must of course be permitted and protected. Yet interrupting, physically assaulting, or shouting down speakers is tyranny, pure and simple, and cannot be tolerated by any community that cherishes and protects free expression.</p>
<p>Freedom is not a license to attack your foes. License of that sort is the opposite of freedom. If you want to understand freedom, consider what Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes of the Supreme Court famously said in 1929: “If there is any principle of the Constitution that more imperatively calls for attachment than any other it is the principle of free thought—not free thought for those who agree with us but freedom for the thought that we hate.”</p>
<p>If true freedom of speech is “freedom for the thought that we hate,” then freedom is actually a form of self-mastery. Far from being license, true freedom is an act of self-control, a refusal to physically extinguish even the speech we abhor. Freedom is a refusal to attack our opponents with everything we’ve got. Campus demonstrators have mistakenly elevated what they think of as sensitivity and civility over the principle of free expression. Yet the truth is, freedom of speech itself is the ultimate act of civility.</p>
<p>This means that the minor passing offenses that are the price for our tolerance of free speech are well worth putting up with, because in the long run a society that practices freedom is a society that promotes civility. In the long run, free speech is our most certain path to mutual respect and civil peace, while the rejection of free speech almost guarantees descent into civil strife. It all happened before our eyes in the fall of 2015 on our college campuses, when attempts to shut down speakers and take over meetings gave us a tiny taste of the kind of civil conflict that is commonplace in countries that lack true freedom.</p>
<p>And there’s more to this proposed legislation than a powerful affirmation of the right to free speech, a provision discouraging speaker disinvitations, and the creation of a fair but firm discipline policy for those who interfere with the speech of others. The model bill would also instruct university boards of trustees to issue a statement that defines and defends the principle of institutional neutrality on public policy controversies of the day.</p>
<p>It’s often forgotten that institutional neutrality is a critical component of campus free speech. If a university, as an institution, were to take a public stand on controversial issues such as military intervention in the Middle East or the role of government in health care, this would put tremendous pressure on any faculty or students who disagreed with the university’s posture.</p>
<p>We see this problem play out today in crusades to have colleges and universities divest themselves of any stock in oil companies, or in the state of Israel. It’s often argued that colleges ought to avoid such divestment schemes because of their fiduciary responsibility to protect and enlarge their endowments. Yet the most important reason to avoid politicized divestment schemes too often remains unspoken. Any college that joins in the fossil-fuel divestment crusade, or that acquiesces to the campaign to boycott, divest, and sanction the State of Israel is taking an institutional stand that inevitably places unfair pressure on faculty and students who do not share these political views.</p>
<p>The classic statement in defense of the need for institutional neutrality at universities is the University of Chicago’s <a href="http://www-news.uchicago.edu/releases/07/pdf/kalverpt.pdf" type="external">Kalven Report</a> of 1967. The Kalven Report rightly argues that the neutrality of the University is in fact the surest guarantee of free inquiry and viewpoint diversity in its members. The fullest freedom for faculty and students, as individuals, to participate in political action and social protest actually requires the institutional political neutrality of the university itself. And the Kalven Report is a crucial inspiration for this provision of the model bill.</p>
<p>Note, however, that this provision of the bill is written in such a way as to affirm the general principle of institutional neutrality, while still leaving the university considerable flexibility in deciding exactly how that principle ought to be applied in practice.</p>
<p>The model bill would also instruct state university system trustees to include in freshman orientation programs a section describing all of these various policies and regulations. The idea is to explain to the students from the very beginning of their time at the university how vital the principles of free speech are. It’s also critically important that students understand from the start the discipline policy for interfering with the free speech rights of others. The goal, of course, is not to punish students for interfering with the expressive rights of others, but to deter them from undertaking such actions in the first place.</p>
<p>Additionally, the model bill would mandate the creation of a Committee on Free Expression within the university board of trustees, and would charge it with issuing an annual report to the public, to the governor, and to the state legislature on the status of free expression, on the status of administrative discipline for the disruption of speech, and on the status of institutional neutrality in the state university system. In effect, this provision institutionalizes what Yale did in the 1970s when it created the Committee on Free Expression that issued the famous Woodward Report.</p>
<p>Such a public report would also create a counterforce to pressure on university administrators from anti-free-speech demonstrators. Now university administrators will have to worry about more than angering demonstrators who suppress the speech of others. Under the model bill, every year, university administrators will have to answer to the people of their state for their defense of free speech, for their willingness to discipline those who would interfere with the speech of others, and for their willingness to uphold the critical principle of institutional neutrality.</p>
<p>Keep in mind that this is merely a public report, the real power of which lies strictly in the light that it sheds, and in its ability to persuade. Yet simply exposing the betrayal of free expression at Yale and making recommendations for improvement was enough to bring positive change to that university in the 1970s. A public report by a Committee on Free Expression worked then for Yale, and would work now and in the years ahead for our various state university systems.</p>
<p>Bear in mind that all of these provisions are designed to work in concert. By strongly affirming the core principles of free expression, creating a discipline policy for those who interfere with the freedom of others, informing students of the principles of free speech and of the penalty for disregarding it, and then holding administrators publicly accountable for failure to enforce the provisions of the bill, the model bill is designed to create a virtuous cycle that will prevent speaker shout-downs and disinvitations from ever happening in the first place.</p>
<p>Another provision of the model Campus Free Speech Act prevents public universities from creating restricted “free speech zones.” In fact, individuals who are prevented from speaking on campus, are relegated to unreasonable “free speech zones,” or are discriminated against based on the content of their speech will have recourse to the courts. Universities may be compelled by the courts to compensate successful plaintiffs for reasonable court costs and attorney fees. And this, of course, creates yet another incentive for university administrators to protect free speech.</p>
<p>In short, the model Campus Free Speech Act is an ambitious attempt to restore freedom of speech to our public colleges and universities, an attempt that can and should serve as a model for private universities as well.</p>
<p>Virtually everything in this proposed bill is based on the very best models we have for defending free speech at our universities, from Yale’s Woodward Report to the University of Chicago’s Kalven Report and <a href="https://provost.uchicago.edu/sites/default/files/documents/reports/FOECommitteeReport.pdf" type="external">Stone Report</a>. Liberals and conservatives alike should be able to support the Campus Free Speech Act, just as Yale’s Woodward Report in its day was praised and supported across the political spectrum.</p>
<p>The model Campus Free Speech Act embodies the common understanding of liberty that unites all of us as Americans, even as it allows us to work out our differences through the democratic process.</p>
<p>(Editor’s note: Stanley Kurtz, senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, discussed the model Campus Free Speech Act at the Martin Center’s January 13 meeting for members of the University of North Carolina Board of Governors. He&#160;can be reached at [email protected].)</p> | false | 1 | rise safe spaces trigger warnings speaker disinvitations often illiberal conduct campus demonstrators past years clear core constitutional value free speech siege colleges universities fraying commitment freedom speech part college educated millennials well many faculty administrators reached point threatens liberal education survival liberty thought expression america large address problem arizonas goldwater institute collaborated devise comprehensive statelevel legislation designed restore freedom speech american academy resulting model statelevel legislation made public week along white paper explaining provisions constitutes possibly comprehensive effort ever undertaken restore protect freedom thought expression americas college campuses model campus free speech act would instruct governing body state university systemgenerally called board trustees board governorsto craft universitywide policy statement unmistakably affirms centrality free expression statement would make clear proper role university shield individuals ideas opinions find unwelcome disagreeable even deeply offensive legislative provision new statement would supersede nullify restrictive speech codes adopted constituent school state university system second systems campuses would declared open speaker students student groups members faculty invited would prevent administrators disinviting speakers however controversial members campus community wish hear third bill would expressly bar students faculty members employees members university system interfering freedom others express views means shouting visiting speakers obstruction legitimate meetings events order protect freespeech rights visiting speakers everyone else campus bill would authorize range disciplinary sanctions interfere speech others particularly strong penalties anyone commits second offense equally important model bill includes strong protections due process rights students accused interfering expressive rights others authorizing disciplinary sanctions interfere free speech rights others model bill draws inspiration classic affirmation defense campus free speech yale universitys woodward report 1974 woodward report eloquently upheld centrality free expression universitys mission also laid strategy fairly firmly punishing forcibly silenced speech others discipline policy devised woodward report remains yales regulations day new model campus free speech act takes leaf book unfortunately tend take granted nowadays students even faculty members disrupt university functions interrupt shout speakers dont like yet suffer penalty whatever wrong legitimate protest must course permitted protected yet interrupting physically assaulting shouting speakers tyranny pure simple tolerated community cherishes protects free expression freedom license attack foes license sort opposite freedom want understand freedom consider justice oliver wendell holmes supreme court famously said 1929 principle constitution imperatively calls attachment principle free thoughtnot free thought agree us freedom thought hate true freedom speech freedom thought hate freedom actually form selfmastery far license true freedom act selfcontrol refusal physically extinguish even speech abhor freedom refusal attack opponents everything weve got campus demonstrators mistakenly elevated think sensitivity civility principle free expression yet truth freedom speech ultimate act civility means minor passing offenses price tolerance free speech well worth putting long run society practices freedom society promotes civility long run free speech certain path mutual respect civil peace rejection free speech almost guarantees descent civil strife happened eyes fall 2015 college campuses attempts shut speakers take meetings gave us tiny taste kind civil conflict commonplace countries lack true freedom theres proposed legislation powerful affirmation right free speech provision discouraging speaker disinvitations creation fair firm discipline policy interfere speech others model bill would also instruct university boards trustees issue statement defines defends principle institutional neutrality public policy controversies day often forgotten institutional neutrality critical component campus free speech university institution take public stand controversial issues military intervention middle east role government health care would put tremendous pressure faculty students disagreed universitys posture see problem play today crusades colleges universities divest stock oil companies state israel often argued colleges ought avoid divestment schemes fiduciary responsibility protect enlarge endowments yet important reason avoid politicized divestment schemes often remains unspoken college joins fossilfuel divestment crusade acquiesces campaign boycott divest sanction state israel taking institutional stand inevitably places unfair pressure faculty students share political views classic statement defense need institutional neutrality universities university chicagos kalven report 1967 kalven report rightly argues neutrality university fact surest guarantee free inquiry viewpoint diversity members fullest freedom faculty students individuals participate political action social protest actually requires institutional political neutrality university kalven report crucial inspiration provision model bill note however provision bill written way affirm general principle institutional neutrality still leaving university considerable flexibility deciding exactly principle ought applied practice model bill would also instruct state university system trustees include freshman orientation programs section describing various policies regulations idea explain students beginning time university vital principles free speech also critically important students understand start discipline policy interfering free speech rights others goal course punish students interfering expressive rights others deter undertaking actions first place additionally model bill would mandate creation committee free expression within university board trustees would charge issuing annual report public governor state legislature status free expression status administrative discipline disruption speech status institutional neutrality state university system effect provision institutionalizes yale 1970s created committee free expression issued famous woodward report public report would also create counterforce pressure university administrators antifreespeech demonstrators university administrators worry angering demonstrators suppress speech others model bill every year university administrators answer people state defense free speech willingness discipline would interfere speech others willingness uphold critical principle institutional neutrality keep mind merely public report real power lies strictly light sheds ability persuade yet simply exposing betrayal free expression yale making recommendations improvement enough bring positive change university 1970s public report committee free expression worked yale would work years ahead various state university systems bear mind provisions designed work concert strongly affirming core principles free expression creating discipline policy interfere freedom others informing students principles free speech penalty disregarding holding administrators publicly accountable failure enforce provisions bill model bill designed create virtuous cycle prevent speaker shoutdowns disinvitations ever happening first place another provision model campus free speech act prevents public universities creating restricted free speech zones fact individuals prevented speaking campus relegated unreasonable free speech zones discriminated based content speech recourse courts universities may compelled courts compensate successful plaintiffs reasonable court costs attorney fees course creates yet another incentive university administrators protect free speech short model campus free speech act ambitious attempt restore freedom speech public colleges universities attempt serve model private universities well virtually everything proposed bill based best models defending free speech universities yales woodward report university chicagos kalven report stone report liberals conservatives alike able support campus free speech act yales woodward report day praised supported across political spectrum model campus free speech act embodies common understanding liberty unites us americans even allows us work differences democratic process editors note stanley kurtz senior fellow ethics public policy center discussed model campus free speech act martin centers january 13 meeting members university north carolina board governors he160can reached commentskurtznationalreviewcom | 1,082 |
<p>By Drazen Jorgic</p>
<p>ISLAMABAD (Reuters) – Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi said it would be counter-productive for the United States to sanction Pakistani officials or further cut military assistance, warning it would hurt both countries’ fight against militancy.</p>
<p>U.S.-Pakistan relations have frayed since President Donald Trump last month set out a new Afghanistan policy and lashed out at nuclear-armed Pakistan as a fickle ally that gives safe haven to “agents of chaos” by harboring the Afghan Taliban and other militants.</p>
<p>The United States has already begun conditioning future aid to Pakistan on progress Islamabad makes in tackling the Haqqani network militants who it alleges are Pakistan-based and have helped the Taliban carry out deadly attacks inside Afghanistan.</p>
<p>Pakistan denies hosting militant sanctuaries, and Islamabad bristles at claims it has not done enough to tackle militancy, noting it has borne the brunt of violence in the so-called war on terror, suffering more than 60,000 casualties since 2001.</p>
<p>Former petroleum minister Abbasi, 58, who was installed as prime minister last month after the Supreme Court ousted veteran premier Nawaz Sharif over undeclared income, told Reuters that any targeted sanctions by Washington against Pakistani military and intelligence officials would not help U.S. counter-terrorism efforts.</p>
<p>“We are fighting the war against terror, anything that degrades our effort will only hurt the U.S. effort,” Abbasi said in an interview in Islamabad on Monday. “What does it achieve?”</p>
<p>U.S. officials privately say the targeted sanctions would be aimed at Pakistani officials with ties to extremist groups and are part of an array of options being discussed to pressure Pakistan to change its behavior, including further aid cuts.</p>
<p>ARMS DEALS WITH CHINA, RUSSIA?</p>
<p>Washington’s civilian and military assistance to Pakistan was less than $1 billion in 2016, down from a recent peak of $3.5 billion in 2011, and Abbasi warned that Washington will not achieve its counter-terrorism aims by starving Pakistan of funds.</p>
<p>“If the military aid cuts degrade our effort to fight war on terror, who does it help?” he said. “Whatever needs to be done here, it needs to be a cooperative effort.”</p>
<p>Abbasi said one practical side-effect of military aid cuts and U.S. Congress blocking the sale of subsidized F-16 fighter jets to Pakistan will be to force Islamabad to buy weapons from China and Russia.</p>
<p>“We’ve had to look at other options to maintain our national defensive forces,” he said.</p>
<p>The Trump administration’s tougher stance is seen as pushing Islamabad closer to Beijing, which has pledged about $60 billion in roads, rail and power infrastructure in Pakistan as part of its ambitious Belt and Road initiative to build vast land and sea trade routes linking Asia with Europe and Africa.</p>
<p>“We have a major economic relationship with (China), we have a major military relationship since the 1960s, so that’s definitely one of our options,” he said.</p>
<p>Abbasi said it was “unfair” to blame Pakistan for all the troubles in Afghanistan, saying Washington should show more appreciation for Pakistan’s losses from militancy and its role in hosting 3.5 million Afghan refugees.</p>
<p>He added that Afghan-based militants have also launched cross-border attacks on civilians and military in Pakistan, prompting Pakistan to begin investing “several billion dollars” to fence the disputed and porous 2,500 km (1,500 mile) border.</p>
<p>“We intend to fence the whole border to control that situation,” Abbasi added.</p>
<p>ECONOMIC HEADWINDS</p>
<p>Abbasi, a skydiving enthusiast and co-founder of a budget airline, also faces growing headwinds on the economy ahead of a general election, likely in mid-2018.</p>
<p>Growth in Pakistan’s $300 billion economy surged to 5.3 percent in 2016-17, its fastest pace in a decade, but the macro-economic outlook has deteriorated, stoking concerns Pakistan may need an International Monetary Fund (IMF) bailout, as it did in 2013, to avert another balance of payments crisis.</p>
<p>Foreign currency reserves have dwindled by almost a quarter to $14.7 billion since last October, while the 2016-17 current account deficit has more than doubled to $12.1 billion.</p>
<p>Abbasi said Islamabad was looking at a raft of measures to alleviate current account pressures to avoid going back to the IMF, including reducing imports of luxury goods, boosting exports, and possibly devaluing its currency.</p>
<p>Finance Minister Ishaq Dar is a staunch opponent of a weaker rupee – whose level against the dollar is effectively controlled by the central bank – but Abbasi said it had been discussed.</p>
<p>“There are pros and cons to devaluation, but that could be a decision we take,” he said, adding that any devaluation would not be drastic, and “today, it’s not on the table yet.”</p>
<p>Abbasi, who has hinted his former boss remains the power behind the throne by repeatedly calling him “the people’s prime minister”, said the three-time premier remains hugely popular despite his disqualification by the Supreme Court on July 28.</p>
<p>“Politics is not decided in courts,” said Abbasi, who was jailed along with Sharif after the 1999 military coup. “Politically, Nawaz Sharif is stronger today than he was on July 28.”</p>
<p>Abbasi is also pushing ahead with a wide-ranging tax reform agenda before the elections – a tough task in a nation that has one of the world’s lowest tax-to-GDP ratios and where tax evasion is rampant and often culturally acceptable.</p>
<p>The ruling PML-N party is looking for cross-party support for the reforms, but Abbasi said radical changes would require an integrated approach, including building confidence among tax payers, reducing income taxes and making it less attractive to invest in a real estate sector that attracts black money.</p>
<p>“You not only need to have a stick, you need to have a carrot also,” he said.</p> | false | 1 | drazen jorgic islamabad reuters pakistans prime minister shahid khaqan abbasi said would counterproductive united states sanction pakistani officials cut military assistance warning would hurt countries fight militancy uspakistan relations frayed since president donald trump last month set new afghanistan policy lashed nucleararmed pakistan fickle ally gives safe agents chaos harboring afghan taliban militants united states already begun conditioning future aid pakistan progress islamabad makes tackling haqqani network militants alleges pakistanbased helped taliban carry deadly attacks inside afghanistan pakistan denies hosting militant sanctuaries islamabad bristles claims done enough tackle militancy noting borne brunt violence socalled war terror suffering 60000 casualties since 2001 former petroleum minister abbasi 58 installed prime minister last month supreme court ousted veteran premier nawaz sharif undeclared income told reuters targeted sanctions washington pakistani military intelligence officials would help us counterterrorism efforts fighting war terror anything degrades effort hurt us effort abbasi said interview islamabad monday achieve us officials privately say targeted sanctions would aimed pakistani officials ties extremist groups part array options discussed pressure pakistan change behavior including aid cuts arms deals china russia washingtons civilian military assistance pakistan less 1 billion 2016 recent peak 35 billion 2011 abbasi warned washington achieve counterterrorism aims starving pakistan funds military aid cuts degrade effort fight war terror help said whatever needs done needs cooperative effort abbasi said one practical sideeffect military aid cuts us congress blocking sale subsidized f16 fighter jets pakistan force islamabad buy weapons china russia weve look options maintain national defensive forces said trump administrations tougher stance seen pushing islamabad closer beijing pledged 60 billion roads rail power infrastructure pakistan part ambitious belt road initiative build vast land sea trade routes linking asia europe africa major economic relationship china major military relationship since 1960s thats definitely one options said abbasi said unfair blame pakistan troubles afghanistan saying washington show appreciation pakistans losses militancy role hosting 35 million afghan refugees added afghanbased militants also launched crossborder attacks civilians military pakistan prompting pakistan begin investing several billion dollars fence disputed porous 2500 km 1500 mile border intend fence whole border control situation abbasi added economic headwinds abbasi skydiving enthusiast cofounder budget airline also faces growing headwinds economy ahead general election likely mid2018 growth pakistans 300 billion economy surged 53 percent 201617 fastest pace decade macroeconomic outlook deteriorated stoking concerns pakistan may need international monetary fund imf bailout 2013 avert another balance payments crisis foreign currency reserves dwindled almost quarter 147 billion since last october 201617 current account deficit doubled 121 billion abbasi said islamabad looking raft measures alleviate current account pressures avoid going back imf including reducing imports luxury goods boosting exports possibly devaluing currency finance minister ishaq dar staunch opponent weaker rupee whose level dollar effectively controlled central bank abbasi said discussed pros cons devaluation could decision take said adding devaluation would drastic today table yet abbasi hinted former boss remains power behind throne repeatedly calling peoples prime minister said threetime premier remains hugely popular despite disqualification supreme court july 28 politics decided courts said abbasi jailed along sharif 1999 military coup politically nawaz sharif stronger today july 28 abbasi also pushing ahead wideranging tax reform agenda elections tough task nation one worlds lowest taxtogdp ratios tax evasion rampant often culturally acceptable ruling pmln party looking crossparty support reforms abbasi said radical changes would require integrated approach including building confidence among tax payers reducing income taxes making less attractive invest real estate sector attracts black money need stick need carrot also said | 575 |
<p>By Mitra Taj</p>
<p>NUEVA FUERABAMBA, Peru (Reuters) – This remote town in Peru’s southern Andes was supposed to serve as a model for how companies can help communities uprooted by mining.</p>
<p>Named Nueva Fuerabamba, it was built to house around 1,600 people who gave up their village and farmland to make room for a massive, open-pit mine.</p>
<p>The new hamlet boasts paved streets and tidy houses with electricity and indoor plumbing, once luxuries to the indigenous Quechua-speaking people who now call this place home.</p>
<p>The mine’s operator, MMG Ltd, the Melbourne-based unit of state-owned China Minmetals Corp, threw in jobs and enough cash so that some villagers no longer work.</p>
<p>But the high-profile deal has not brought the harmony sought by villagers or MMG, a testament to the difficulty in averting mining disputes in this mineral-rich nation.</p>
<p>Resource battles are common in Latin America, but tensions are particularly high in Peru, the world’s No. 2 producer of copper, zinc and silver. Peasant farmers have revolted against an industry that many see as damaging their land and livelihoods while denying them a fair share of the wealth. Peru is home to 167 social conflicts, most related to mining, according to the national ombudsman’s office, whose mission includes defusing hostilities.</p>
<p>Nueva Fuerabamba was the centerpiece of one of the most generous mining settlements ever negotiated in Peru. But three years after moving in, many transplants are struggling amid their suburban-style conveniences, Reuters interviews with two dozen residents showed. Many miss their old lives growing potatoes and raising livestock. Some have squandered their cash settlements. Idleness and isolation have dulled the spirits of a people whose ancestors were feared cattle rustlers.</p>
<p>“It is like we are trapped in a jail, in a cage where little animals are kept,” said Cipriano Lima, 43, a former farmer.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, the mine, known as Las Bambas, has remained a magnet for discontent. Clashes between demonstrators and authorities in 2015 and 2016 left four area men dead.</p>
<p>Nueva Fuerabamba residents have blocked copper transport roads to press for more financial help from MMG.</p>
<p>The company acknowledged the transition has been difficult for some villagers, but said most have benefited from improved housing, healthcare and education.</p>
<p>“Nueva Fuerabamba has experienced significant positive change,” Troy Hey, MMG’s executive general manager of stakeholder relations, said in an email to Reuters. MMG said it spent “hundreds of millions” on the relocation effort.</p>
<p>Mining is the driver of Peru’s economy, which has averaged 5.5 percent annual growth over the past decade. Still, pitched conflicts have derailed billions of dollars worth of investment in recent years, including projects by Newmont Mining Corp (NYSE:) and Southern Copper Corp.</p>
<p>To defuse opposition, President Pablo Kuczynski has vowed to boost social services in rural highland areas, where nearly half of residents live in poverty.</p>
<p>But moving from conflict to cooperation is not easy after centuries of mistrust. Relocations are particularly fraught, according to Camilo Leon, a mining resettlement specialist at the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru.</p>
<p>Subsistence farmers have struggled to adapt to the loss of their traditions and the “very urban, very organized” layout of planned towns, Leon said.</p>
<p>“It is generally a shock for rural communities,” Leon said.</p>
<p>At least six proposed mines have required relocations in Peru in the past decade, Leon said. Later this month, Peru will tender a $2-billion copper project, Michiquillay, which would require moving yet another village.</p>
<p>‘EVERYTHING IS MONEY’</p>
<p>MMG inherited the Nueva Fuerabamba project when it bought Las Bambas from Switzerland’s Glencore (LON:) Plc in 2014 for $7 billion.</p>
<p>Under terms of a deal struck in 2009 and reviewed by Reuters, villagers voted to trade their existing homes and farmland for houses in a new community. Heads of each household, about 500 in all, were promised mining jobs. University scholarships would be given to their children. Residents were to receive new land for farming and grazing, albeit in a parcel four hours away by car.</p>
<p>Cash was an added sweetener. Villagers say each household got 400,000 soles ($120,000), which amounts to a lifetime’s earnings for a minimum-wage worker in Peru.</p>
<p>MMG declined to confirm the payments, saying its agreements are confidential.</p>
<p>Built into a hillside 15 miles from the Las Bambas mine, Nueva Fuerabamba was the product of extensive community input, MMG said. Amenities include a hospital, soccer fields and a cement bull ring for festivals.</p>
<p>But some residents say the deal has not been the windfall they hoped. Their new two-and-three story houses, made of drywall, are drafty and appear flimsy compared to their old thatched-roof adobe cottages heated by wood-fired stoves, some said.</p>
<p>Many no longer plant crops or tend livestock because their replacement plots are too far away. Jobs provided by MMG mostly involve maintaining the town because most residents lack the skills to work in a modern mine.</p>
<p>Many villagers spent their settlements unwisely, said community president Alfonso Vargas. “Some invested in businesses but others did not. They went drinking,” he said.</p>
<p>Now basics like water, food and fuel – once wrested from the land – must be paid for.</p>
<p>“Everything is money,” Margot Portilla, 20, said as she cooked rice on a gas stove in her sister-in-law’s bright-yellow home. “Before we could make a fire for cooking with cow dung. Now we have to buy gas.”</p>
<p>GHOST TOWN</p>
<p>Some residents said they have benefited from the move.</p>
<p>The new town is cleaner than the old village, said Betsabe Mendoza, 25. She invested her settlement in a metalworking business in a bigger town.</p>
<p>Portilla, the young mom, says her younger sisters are getting a better education than she did.</p>
<p>Still, the streets of Nueva Fuerabamba were virtually deserted on a recent weekday. Vargas, the community leader, said many residents have returned to the countryside or sought work elsewhere. Alcoholism, fueled by idle time and settlement money, is on the rise, he said.</p>
<p>Some villagers have committed suicide. Over the 12 months through July, four residents killed themselves by taking farming chemicals, according to the provincial district attorney’s office. It could not provide data on suicides in the old village of Fuerabamba.</p>
<p>MMG, citing an “independent” study done prior to the relocation, said the community previously suffered from high rates of domestic violence, alcoholism, illiteracy and poverty.</p>
<p>While the company considers the new town a success, it acknowledged the transition has not been easy for all.</p>
<p>“Connection to land, livelihood restoration and simple adaptation to new living conditions remain a challenge,” MMG said.</p>
<p>Nueva Fuerabamba residents continue pressuring the company for additional assistance. Demands include more jobs and deeds to their houses, which have yet to be delivered because of bureaucratic delays, said Godofredo Huamani, the community’s lawyer.</p>
<p>MMG said it stays apace of community needs through town hall meetings and has representatives on hand to field complaints.</p>
<p>While villagers fret about the future, many cling to the past. Flora Huamani, 39, a mother of four girls, recalled how women used to get together to weave wool from their own sheep into the embroidered black dresses they wear.</p>
<p>“Those were our traditions,” said Huamani from a bench in her walled front yard. “Now our tradition is meeting after meeting after meeting” to discuss the community’s problems.</p>
<p>Graphic: ‘Relocating a village’ click http://tmsnrt.rs/2AwftBU</p> | false | 1 | mitra taj nueva fuerabamba peru reuters remote town perus southern andes supposed serve model companies help communities uprooted mining named nueva fuerabamba built house around 1600 people gave village farmland make room massive openpit mine new hamlet boasts paved streets tidy houses electricity indoor plumbing luxuries indigenous quechuaspeaking people call place home mines operator mmg ltd melbournebased unit stateowned china minmetals corp threw jobs enough cash villagers longer work highprofile deal brought harmony sought villagers mmg testament difficulty averting mining disputes mineralrich nation resource battles common latin america tensions particularly high peru worlds 2 producer copper zinc silver peasant farmers revolted industry many see damaging land livelihoods denying fair share wealth peru home 167 social conflicts related mining according national ombudsmans office whose mission includes defusing hostilities nueva fuerabamba centerpiece one generous mining settlements ever negotiated peru three years moving many transplants struggling amid suburbanstyle conveniences reuters interviews two dozen residents showed many miss old lives growing potatoes raising livestock squandered cash settlements idleness isolation dulled spirits people whose ancestors feared cattle rustlers like trapped jail cage little animals kept said cipriano lima 43 former farmer meanwhile mine known las bambas remained magnet discontent clashes demonstrators authorities 2015 2016 left four area men dead nueva fuerabamba residents blocked copper transport roads press financial help mmg company acknowledged transition difficult villagers said benefited improved housing healthcare education nueva fuerabamba experienced significant positive change troy hey mmgs executive general manager stakeholder relations said email reuters mmg said spent hundreds millions relocation effort mining driver perus economy averaged 55 percent annual growth past decade still pitched conflicts derailed billions dollars worth investment recent years including projects newmont mining corp nyse southern copper corp defuse opposition president pablo kuczynski vowed boost social services rural highland areas nearly half residents live poverty moving conflict cooperation easy centuries mistrust relocations particularly fraught according camilo leon mining resettlement specialist pontifical catholic university peru subsistence farmers struggled adapt loss traditions urban organized layout planned towns leon said generally shock rural communities leon said least six proposed mines required relocations peru past decade leon said later month peru tender 2billion copper project michiquillay would require moving yet another village everything money mmg inherited nueva fuerabamba project bought las bambas switzerlands glencore lon plc 2014 7 billion terms deal struck 2009 reviewed reuters villagers voted trade existing homes farmland houses new community heads household 500 promised mining jobs university scholarships would given children residents receive new land farming grazing albeit parcel four hours away car cash added sweetener villagers say household got 400000 soles 120000 amounts lifetimes earnings minimumwage worker peru mmg declined confirm payments saying agreements confidential built hillside 15 miles las bambas mine nueva fuerabamba product extensive community input mmg said amenities include hospital soccer fields cement bull ring festivals residents say deal windfall hoped new twoandthree story houses made drywall drafty appear flimsy compared old thatchedroof adobe cottages heated woodfired stoves said many longer plant crops tend livestock replacement plots far away jobs provided mmg mostly involve maintaining town residents lack skills work modern mine many villagers spent settlements unwisely said community president alfonso vargas invested businesses others went drinking said basics like water food fuel wrested land must paid everything money margot portilla 20 said cooked rice gas stove sisterinlaws brightyellow home could make fire cooking cow dung buy gas ghost town residents said benefited move new town cleaner old village said betsabe mendoza 25 invested settlement metalworking business bigger town portilla young mom says younger sisters getting better education still streets nueva fuerabamba virtually deserted recent weekday vargas community leader said many residents returned countryside sought work elsewhere alcoholism fueled idle time settlement money rise said villagers committed suicide 12 months july four residents killed taking farming chemicals according provincial district attorneys office could provide data suicides old village fuerabamba mmg citing independent study done prior relocation said community previously suffered high rates domestic violence alcoholism illiteracy poverty company considers new town success acknowledged transition easy connection land livelihood restoration simple adaptation new living conditions remain challenge mmg said nueva fuerabamba residents continue pressuring company additional assistance demands include jobs deeds houses yet delivered bureaucratic delays said godofredo huamani communitys lawyer mmg said stays apace community needs town hall meetings representatives hand field complaints villagers fret future many cling past flora huamani 39 mother four girls recalled women used get together weave wool sheep embroidered black dresses wear traditions said huamani bench walled front yard tradition meeting meeting meeting discuss communitys problems graphic relocating village click httptmsnrtrs2awftbu | 752 |
<p>It has the escalating, claustrophobic structure of the darkest farce, but humor doesn’t pile up in “ <a href="http://variety.com/t/under-the-tree/" type="external">Under the Tree</a>” so much as it bleeds out. In the course of Icelandic writer-director <a href="http://variety.com/t/hafsteinn-gunnar-sigurdsson/" type="external">Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurdsson</a>’s memorably mordant third feature, savage black comedy passes almost imperceptibly into stunned, visceral tragedy — like a laugh turning in the throat and coming out as a choke. Charting an initially familiar battle of across-the-fence attrition between bad neighbors in polite surroundings, Sigurdsson gradually takes petty bourgeois tensions to alien, gasp-worthy extremes; what the film occasionally lacks in human finesse, it makes up for in sheer anything-goes resolve. The bleakness of its blackness might not portend a major crossover hit, but on the strength of both its universality and its singular Scandi irony, “Under the Tree” should spread its branches into international arthouses.</p>
<p>Columbia graduate Sigurdsson’s 2011 debut feature “Either Way” wasn’t widely released beyond the festival circuit, but wound up being comfortably remade by David Gordon Green as “Prince Avalanche” — and it’s not hard to see the director’s latest enjoying similar treatment, given how smoothly its sins-of-suburbia narrative could transfer to a middle-American context. Which is not to say “Under the Tree” wants for cultural or geographical particularity, beginning with the dove-gray northern light that dominates&#160;Monika Lenczewska’s deliberately muted widescreen lensing: With a wry eye for trivial detail, Sigurdsson fills in a boxy, tidy, perennially overcast world where even the outdoors seem indoors, and the parking lot of IKEA doubles for one desperate parent as an idyllic picnic spot.</p>
<p>The parent in question is Atli (Steinþór Hróar Steinþórsson), an unremarkable thirtysomething husband and father thrown out on his ear by his wife Agnes (Lára Jóhanna Jónsdóttir) after being caught wet-handed with an old girlfriend’s sex tape. Her calm, abrupt decision to cut him from her life and that of their young daughter sends Atli into a fevered spiral of stalking, though their messy, hostile separation is practically civil compared to the film’s other driving dispute, as Atli’s retired parents — into whose trim modern identikit house their son is forced to move — go to war with their younger, somewhat hipper neighbors Konrad (Þorsteinn Bachmann) and Eybjorg (Selma Björnsdóttir).</p>
<p>Sigurdsson and co-writer Huldar Breiðfjörð’s Chablis-dry script deftly staggers conflict not just across domestic walls, but between them, with points of argument ranging from patently absurd to distinctly raw. Atli’s father Baldvin (Sigurður Sigurjónsson, quietly excellent) is mild-mannered to a point; his mother Inga (Edda Björgvinsdóttir), however, has long dispensed with niceties even to her nearest and dearest, corroded as she is by mourning for an absent second son. Unhinged grief pulls her into arguments with anyone, with newish trophy wife Eybjorg her most persistent opponent — and the vast, venerable tree in Inga’s backyard their most regular bone of contention.</p>
<p>Such towering natural features are rare in an area of manicured lawns and sharp-cornered patios, and the film and Inga alike treat the tree as an old-school emblem of tradition and security; to Eybjorg, however, it’s merely a large, unwanted shadow on her year-round sunbathing space. Foliage isn’t the only thing under threat in an ugly clash between old and new worlds: Family members, material possessions and pets are all potentially caught in the crossfire, and Sigurdsson watches the extreme fallout with a dispassionate gaze that only amplifies the frequent, galling ugliness of the situation. Given the most flagrantly off-kilter character in the ensemble,&#160;Björgvinsdóttir takes much the same approach: Her deep-frozen performance skilfully hovers on the line between catatonic and psychotic, with alternately, sometimes simultaneously, hilarious and horrifying results.</p>
<p>Talented, country-hopping cinematographer Lenczewska (whose diverse recent credits range from “Message to the King” to the new-wave Greek formality of “Park”) opts for about the most washed-out palette available in each frame — a half-erased palette that initially seems limiting but eventually connotes the pervasive extent of the characters’ respective emotional fugs. Daníel Bjarnason’s tart, brittle score makes clear from the outset that this is no cuddly dysfunctional family sitcom, though its yawning silences leave plenty of room for unsettled laughter.</p>
<p>Reviewed at Venice Film Festival (Orizzonti), Sept. 1, 2017. (Also in Toronto Film Festival — Contemporary World Cinema.) Running time: 89 MIN. (Original title: “Undir Trénu”)</p>
<p>(Iceland-Denmark-Poland-Germany) A Netop Films, Profile Pictures, Madants, One Two Films production. (International sales: New Europe Film Sales, Warsaw.) Producers: Grímar Jónsson, Sindri Páll Kjartansson, Þórir Snær Sigurjónsson. Co-producers: Caroline Schluter Bingestam, Ditte Milsted, Jacob Jarek, Beata Rzeźniczek, Klaudia Smieja, Jamila Wenske, Sol Bondy.</p>
<p>Director: Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurdsson. Screenplay: Sigurdsson, Huldar Breiðfjörð. Camera (color, widescreen): Monika Lenczewska. Editor: Kristján Loðmfjörð. Music: Daníel Bjarnason.</p>
<p>Steinþór Hróar Steinþórsson, Edda Björgvinsdóttir, Sigurður Sigurjónsson, Lára Jóhanna Jónsdóttir, Þorsteinn Bachmann, Selma Björnsdóttir, Dóra Jóhannsdóttir, Sigríður Sigurpálsdóttir Scheving. (Icelandic dialogue)</p> | false | 1 | escalating claustrophobic structure darkest farce humor doesnt pile tree much bleeds course icelandic writerdirector hafsteinn gunnar sigurdssons memorably mordant third feature savage black comedy passes almost imperceptibly stunned visceral tragedy like laugh turning throat coming choke charting initially familiar battle acrossthefence attrition bad neighbors polite surroundings sigurdsson gradually takes petty bourgeois tensions alien gaspworthy extremes film occasionally lacks human finesse makes sheer anythinggoes resolve bleakness blackness might portend major crossover hit strength universality singular scandi irony tree spread branches international arthouses columbia graduate sigurdssons 2011 debut feature either way wasnt widely released beyond festival circuit wound comfortably remade david gordon green prince avalanche hard see directors latest enjoying similar treatment given smoothly sinsofsuburbia narrative could transfer middleamerican context say tree wants cultural geographical particularity beginning dovegray northern light dominates160monika lenczewskas deliberately muted widescreen lensing wry eye trivial detail sigurdsson fills boxy tidy perennially overcast world even outdoors seem indoors parking lot ikea doubles one desperate parent idyllic picnic spot parent question atli steinþór hróar steinþórsson unremarkable thirtysomething husband father thrown ear wife agnes lára jóhanna jónsdóttir caught wethanded old girlfriends sex tape calm abrupt decision cut life young daughter sends atli fevered spiral stalking though messy hostile separation practically civil compared films driving dispute atlis retired parents whose trim modern identikit house son forced move go war younger somewhat hipper neighbors konrad Þorsteinn bachmann eybjorg selma björnsdóttir sigurdsson cowriter huldar breiðfjörðs chablisdry script deftly staggers conflict across domestic walls points argument ranging patently absurd distinctly raw atlis father baldvin sigurður sigurjónsson quietly excellent mildmannered point mother inga edda björgvinsdóttir however long dispensed niceties even nearest dearest corroded mourning absent second son unhinged grief pulls arguments anyone newish trophy wife eybjorg persistent opponent vast venerable tree ingas backyard regular bone contention towering natural features rare area manicured lawns sharpcornered patios film inga alike treat tree oldschool emblem tradition security eybjorg however merely large unwanted shadow yearround sunbathing space foliage isnt thing threat ugly clash old new worlds family members material possessions pets potentially caught crossfire sigurdsson watches extreme fallout dispassionate gaze amplifies frequent galling ugliness situation given flagrantly offkilter character ensemble160björgvinsdóttir takes much approach deepfrozen performance skilfully hovers line catatonic psychotic alternately sometimes simultaneously hilarious horrifying results talented countryhopping cinematographer lenczewska whose diverse recent credits range message king newwave greek formality park opts washedout palette available frame halferased palette initially seems limiting eventually connotes pervasive extent characters respective emotional fugs daníel bjarnasons tart brittle score makes clear outset cuddly dysfunctional family sitcom though yawning silences leave plenty room unsettled laughter reviewed venice film festival orizzonti sept 1 2017 also toronto film festival contemporary world cinema running time 89 min original title undir trénu icelanddenmarkpolandgermany netop films profile pictures madants one two films production international sales new europe film sales warsaw producers grímar jónsson sindri páll kjartansson Þórir snær sigurjónsson coproducers caroline schluter bingestam ditte milsted jacob jarek beata rzeźniczek klaudia smieja jamila wenske sol bondy director hafsteinn gunnar sigurdsson screenplay sigurdsson huldar breiðfjörð camera color widescreen monika lenczewska editor kristján loðmfjörð music daníel bjarnason steinþór hróar steinþórsson edda björgvinsdóttir sigurður sigurjónsson lára jóhanna jónsdóttir Þorsteinn bachmann selma björnsdóttir dóra jóhannsdóttir sigríður sigurpálsdóttir scheving icelandic dialogue | 524 |
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