This weekend the By The Fault Weekend Reader looks at language.
From the TED conference, linguist Steven Pinker questions the very nature of our thoughts — the way we use words, how we learn, and how we relate to others. In his best-selling books, he has brought sophisticated language analysis to bear on topics of wide general interest. Dr. Pinker teaches at Harvard University.
This weekend the By The Fault Weekend Reader takes a look at European views and coverage of Senator Barack Obama.
Germany
Obama’s visit to Berlin has become polemical with his request for a speech at the historic Brandenburg Gate that has divided German politicians. Chancellor Merkel is against it arguing that it sends the wrong signals. However, the minority SPD (Germany’s Social Democratic Party) which has seen its polling numbers dropped to under 20% seems intent on riding Obama’s coattails in the hopes of regaining some of its lost lustre.
German Politicians Are in an Obama Tizzy from Der Spiegel.
Obama Reacts to Debate in Berlin from Der Spiegel.
‘Tough Love’ Expected in Obama’s Berlin Speech Der Spiegel.
Weak Explanations For Obama’s Non-Flip-Flop On FISA from Across the Pond.
Unwelcome in Germany from Zeit in German.
Angela Merkel is right to oppose Obama speaking at the Brandenburg Gate. “It’s never good when German policy gets mixed up in US election politics.”
Great Britain
Barack Obama heads to London for European tour from The Times of London.
Democratic unity: still an oxymoron, an op-ed by Michael Tomasky in the UK Guardian.
In praise of … Rathaus Schöneberg An Editorial in the UK Guardian.
The Tired Politics of Racial Division An Editorial from the UK Independent
Switzerland
Swiss papers reserved about Obama’s chances from Swiss Info.
Russia
Turning the Page: Medvedev, Obama US-Russian Relations from Russia Monitor.
Russian view on US election A Video Report from the BBC
Spain — ABC (Madrid)
Barack Obama’s presidential candidacy prompts the Spanish daily to reflect on the differences between political cultures in Europea and America: “We always put yesterday before tomorrow and we love to fight the same battles and the same debates a thousand times over without coming to any result. The US, on the other hand [according to Immanuel Kant], is the ‘country of the grandchildren’. … While the [announced] changes in Spain are aimed at more or less preserving the status quo, the changes in the US are real and permanent. … What a contrast to our country, where the political leaders - whether left-wing or right-wing, democratic or totalitarian, capable or incapable - cling on to their posts until they get thrown out, not because someone better is there to replace them but because of their own mistakes.” (05/06/2008)
Denmark — Berlingske Tidende
“As things stand now, McCain is a better man for Europe,” the Danish daily Berlingske Tidende writes. “[But] anyone who watches the orator Barack Obama gets the feeling this is a very special political figure, even though he is still an unknown quantity. … Many possibilities are opening up now for Obama to concentrate on politics and on the causes he wants to commit to if he wins. We can only hope he will move towards the political centre. While President Bill Clinton rejuvenated the Democratic Party by moving it closer to the centre, there are signs that Barack Obama is more conventional. He has a hesitant stance on free global trade, an unclear foreign policy and a traditional policy of redistribution. But Obama could give us a pleasant surprise, for instance by swerving to the right, where the Americans are.” (05/06/2008)
Slovenia — Delo
The daily does not expect a potential President Barack Obama to execute major changes in transatlantic politics: “After eight years of George W. Bush, who embodied all the negative stereotypes and prejudices regarding the US, everyone wants a new American president. But there will be fewer changes in the US’s foreign policy than Europe hopes. … The new president’s top priority will understandably be reconciliation with the world, and above all with Europe. Disagreements between the two are bad for both [sides] from a global perspective. The respect the US once commanded has been replaced by anger, opposition and fear. If a candidate who wants to adhere to Bush’s course wins, the transatlantic rift will only grow deeper.” (05/06/2008)
A note to our European and International Readership, feel free to comment and express your views, positive or negative, on what you expect from the United States. My chief objections to Obama are his lack of experience and the apparent lack of core convictions that are continuously leading to his 180 flips. Granted McCain does not inspire much either. Oh for a Zapatero or a Merkel. Pas Sarkozy and Berlusconi let’s not even go there. Helen Clarke down in New Zealand, ten years on the job. I am ambivalent on Kevin Rudd, an improvement on John Howard no doubt.
This weekend, the By The Fault Weekend Reader looks at candidates’ proposals on taxes.
A Report from the Tax Policy Center of the Urban Institute and Brookings Institution
Tax and fiscal policy will loom large in the next president’s domestic policy agenda. Nearly all of the tax cuts enacted since 2001 expire at the end of 2010 and the individual alternative minimum tax (AMT) threatens to ensnare tens of millions of Americans. While a permanent fix palatable to both political parties has proven elusive, both candidates have proposed major tax changes. This report describes how we performed our modeling and analysis, outlines the major tax proposals, and discusses the implications of their policies for the revenue raised, taxpayer economic activity, and the distribution of the tax burden. The Tax Policy Center has a pdf and html version of the full report for printing.
A quicker one page overview of winners and losers is this article by Howard Gleckman of the Tax Policy Center.
Unfortunately the Tax Policy Center doesn’t look at the other candidates’ proposals. So here’s a quick look:
The Libertarian Party
Government spending at all levels is out of control. Most Americans understand the problem of “earmarks,” commonly used by pork-minded congressmen to buy votes. But while earmarks are an outrageous abuse of the taxpayer’s money, they account for a very small percentage of federal spending. Over the past decade, total government spending (state, local and federal) has increased from $2.9 trillion to an astonishing $5.1 trillion in 2008. The $3.1 trillion federal budget submitted by President Bush for next year was greater than the combined 1998 spending of the federal government, all 50 states and over 87,000 local governments.
The federal government must take the lead in making significant cuts in spending. Focusing on earmarks risks distracting attention from the broader problem of a government wildly wasting the money of hard-working Americans. Tens of billions of dollars in corporate welfare — essentially aid to dependent corporations — should be eliminated. Largesse for middle- and upper-income Americans, particularly so-called “entitlement” programs, must be cut. Billions in so-called defense spending, which protects America’s populous, prosperous allies rather than Americans, must be eliminated.
Cutting spending would allow America to implement real tax reform. Our goal should be to reduce both the tax burden on Americans and the intrusion in their lives resulting from IRS enforcement of the income tax. One of the best approaches would be to adopt some form of a consumption tax, like a national sales tax, replacing the Internal Revenue Service and all federal income taxes as well as payroll taxes.
It is not enough to eliminate the income tax. We also must repeal the 16th amendment, which authorizes Congress to levy an income tax. Without doing so, there would be an ever-present danger that a future Congress would attempt to bring back the income tax on top of the Fair Tax or any other alternative to the income tax.
For more on the Libertarian ticket, please visit Barr 2008.
Ralph Nader & Matt Gonzalez
Fair Tax Where the Wealthiest and Corporations Pay their Share; Tax Wealth More than Work; Tax Activities We Dislike More than Necessities
The complexity and distortions of the federal tax code produces distributions of tax incidence and payroll tax burdens that are skewed in favor of the wealthy and the corporations further garnished by tax shelters, insufficient enforcement, and other avoidances.
Corporate tax contributions as a percent of the overall federal revenue stream have been declining for fifty years and now stand at 7.4% despite massive record profits. A fundamental reappraisal of our tax laws should start with a principle that taxes should apply first to behavior and conditions we favor least and pinch basic necessities least, such as the clearly addictive industries (alcohol and tobacco), pollution, speculation, gambling, extreme luxuries, instead of taxing work or instead of the 5% to 7% sales tax food, furniture, clothing or books.
Tiny taxes (a fraction of the conventional retail sales percentage) on stock, bond, and derivative transactions can produce tens of billions of dollars a year and displace some of the taxes on work and consumer essentials. Sol Price, founder of the Price Clubs (now merged into Costco) is one of several wealthy people in the last century who have urged a tax on wealth. Again, it can be at a very low rate but raise significant revenues. Wealth above a quite comfortable minimum is described as tangible and intangible assets. The present adjustment of Henry George’s celebrated land tax could also be considered.
Over a thousand wealthy Americans have declared, in a remarkable conflict against interest, that the estate tax, which now applies to less than 2 percent of the richest estates, should be retained. The signers of this declaration included William Gates, Sr., Warren Buffett and George Soros. Ralph Nader does not believe that “unearned income” (dividends, interest, capital gains) should be taxed lower than earned income, or work, inasmuch as one involves passive income, including inheritances and windfalls, while the latter involves active effort with a higher proportion of middle and lower income workers relying on and working each day, some under unsafe conditions, for these earnings.
For more on Nader & Gonzalez, please visit Nader 2008.
June 20th is International Refugee Day. Refugees are generally considered to be trans-national but not only people are able to secure their safety outside their native land. Many are forced to flee their homes, generally due to war and political instability but also due to famine and natural disasters, elsewhere in their native lands. This weekend the By The Fault Weekend Reader looks at internally displaced persons (IDPs) in a few countries around the world.
The Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC)
The Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC), established in 1998 by the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), is the leading international body monitoring conflict-induced internal displacement worldwide. Through its work, the Centre contributes to improving national and international capacities to protect and assist the millions of people around the globe who have been displaced within their own country as a result of conflicts or human rights violations.
At the request of the United Nations, the Geneva-based IDMC runs an online database providing comprehensive information and analysis on internal displacement in some 50 countries. Based on its monitoring and data collection activities, the Centre advocates for durable solutions to the plight of the internally displaced in line with international standards. The IDMC also carries out training activities to enhance the capacity of local actors to respond to the needs of internally displaced people (IDPs). In its work, the Centre cooperates with and provides support to local and national civil society initiatives. For more on the IDMC, please visit the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre website. Their annual survey from April 2008.
The United States: Katrina IDPs
Over a million people, primarily in New Orleans but throughout the Gulf Coast were displaced by Hurricane Katrina in August 2005. They have been called refugees but is that is not accurate. They are IDPs and to deny them that status denys them of rights available under international law and specifically under the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). From the American Bar Association:
In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, important and as yet unaddressed questions linger about the legal status and rights of hundreds of thousands of people driven from their homes, whose lives remain uprooted by the devastation. From voting rights to housing, from education to medical care, extraordinary uncertainty abounds about the future of those who have returned to New Orleans and who have not returned and are currently living in other parts of the country, uncertain whether they ever will return to the Gulf Coast.
One indication of this country’s enigmatic response to Katrina is evidenced by the very uncertainty of how we refer to those uprooted by Katrina’s destruction and chaos. This threshold question is far from a semantic one. On August 31, 2005, Katrina survivors Faye Bussard and Lionel Drummond were called “refugees” by Newsweek, despite their eligibility to vote and their obligation to pay taxes. This term was likewise used by the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and the Associated Press during their initial reporting. Political polar opposites, President George Bush and Reverend Jesse Jackson agreed that “refugee” was not the correct term to describe those forced to flee the deadly storm. Bush said they were not refugees but “Americans.” Jackson went further, decrying the use of the term “refugees” as racist. Most people eventually settled on the term “survivors.”
The label attached to the storm’s victims has legal consequences for their treatment and the rights they may assert. One term used in international law may well help structure and clarify the country’s understanding of the rights and status of those people displaced from their homes by Katrina: “internally displaced persons” (IDPs). This term was defined in 1998 when the United Nations (UN) issued its Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).
Burundi IDPs
Peace is in the air in Bujumbura after more than 15 years of civil strife and the madness that descended on Central Africa as a whole that began with the April 1994 genocide in Rwanda. While Rwanda found its path to reconciliation quicker than anyone could have hoped for, Burundi has struggled with ethnic violence. In a country of six million people, at least a million were either refugees or IDPs in the aftermath of the Central African War. By 2004, that number was down to about a half million equally split between refugees and IDPs. Despite this marked improvement in the security situation in Burundi in recent years, some 100,000 internally displaced people (IDPs) remain in settlements throughout the country as of early 2008. Here is an article on the prospects for peace now in Burundi from the International Herald Tribune.
Colombia’s IDPs
Colombia may be a country on the mend but it still has a lot of mending to do. The conflict in Colombia has forced millions of people, mainly indigenous or marginalised rural groups, from their homes over the past five decades. The second-largest IDP population in the world, after that of Sudan, Colombia was in 2007 the only country in the region with a still large internal displacement problem. Estimates reach between 2 and 3.7 million displaced persons representing roughly 7% of the Colombian population. Here’s a video from UNHCR on the problem in Colombia and some efforts to improve the situation:
This weekend, the By The Weekend Reader looks at Iraq and its oil. Iraq has the world’s second largest proven oil reserves. According to oil industry experts, new exploration will probably raise Iraq’s reserves to 200+ billion barrels of high-grade crude, extraordinarily cheap to produce. The four giant firms located in the US and the UK have been keen to get back into Iraq, from which they were excluded with the nationalization of 1972. During the final years of the Saddam era, they envied companies from France, Russia, China, and elsewhere, who had obtained major contracts. But UN sanctions (kept in place by the US and the UK) kept those contracts inoperable.
Since the invasion and occupation of Iraq in 2003, much has changed. In the new setting, with Washington running the show, “friendly” companies expect to gain most of the lucrative oil deals that will be worth hundreds of billions of dollars in profits in the coming decades. The Iraqi constitution of 2005, greatly influenced by US advisors, contains language that guarantees a major role for foreign companies. Negotiators hope soon to complete deals on Production Sharing Agreements that will give the companies control over dozens of fields, including the fabled super-giant Majnoon. But first the Parliament must pass a new oil sector investment law allowing foreign companies to assume a major role in the country. The US has threatened to withhold funding as well as financial and military support if the law does not soon pass. Although the Iraqi cabinet endorsed the draft law in July 2007, Parliament has balked at the legislation. Most Iraqis favor continued control by a national company and the powerful oil workers union strongly opposes de-nationalization. Iraq’s political future is very much in flux, but oil remains the central feature of the political landscape.
This past week, the Economist Intelligence Unit put a brief on the price of oil and if Iraqi production might be able to stem the seemingly perpetual climb in the price of a barrel of oil. The brief is entitled Iraq economy: Oil supply saviour? Here’s their overview:
The growing concerns in the world energy market about the risks of a supply crunch have been a critical factor behind the recent surge in oil prices to a new record of US$135/barrel. Speculators are betting huge sums on the assumption that the oil market (and other primary energy markets) will remain tight for many years to come, owing to the inelasticity of demand and to the constraints on long-term supply. Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest oil exporter, is doing its bit to allay these concerns, but has acknowledged that once its current crop of oilfield projects is complete in around 2013, there will be little scope for further capacity increases. Similar strains are evident in most of the other major oil-producing countries. One significant exception is Iraq, which holds (at least) 10% of the world’s proven reserves, but accounts for only 2.5% of total production. Iraq has the potential to furnish a long-term solution to the oil market’s long-term supply problem, but it will need to improve dramatically on its recent performance before buyers of oil futures will be convinced that it can deliver.
The Battle for Iraq’s Oil
Interview with Antonia Juhasz
Here’s an interview of a good friend of mine, Antonia Juhasz, who writes on corportatism and has a forthcoming book on the oil companies arguing that they should be broken up to encourage competition. I disagree, they should be allowed to consolidate or they should be nationalized. Economies of scale are needed in energy. See my post What Cash Cows Do for how oil companies are buying back their stock and likely to take themselves private.
Iraq Energy Outlook
Experts agree that Iraq may be one of the few places left where vast reserves, known and unknown, have barely been exploited. This is a report from the US Department of Energy.
A History of Oil in Iraq
The Global Policy Forum, a United Nations policy monitoring NGO, has a brief overview of the history of the Iraqi oil industry.
Iraqi Public Opinion Polls
The Global Policy Forum also has series of Iraqi Opinion Polls. It is, after all, their country.
This week, the By The Fault Weekend Reader is a video lecture given by Professor Jared Diamond of UCLA, the Pulitzer Prize winning author of Guns, Germs and Steel. This lecture was part of his book tour for Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. It runs about an hour.
Here’s the promotional literature associated with this lecture:
Diamond began by noting his reasons for beginning this project: the phenomenon of civilizations that built great cities and structures only to abandon them completely. He pointed out the roles of deforestation and population control as important factors in societal lifecycles. Diamond compared this to the problem of modern societies in facing the same problems that led to the collapse of those civilizations, and noted that in some cases (such as China) those environmental problems can threaten those outside their own borders. Diamond noted the other factors, such as outside enemies and trade partners, that can threaten societies. Perhaps more importantly, he answered why some civilizations can overcome those obstacles and others are overwhelmed by them. Surprisingly, a leading indicator of impending collapse is high infant mortality.
Not to worry you but our infant mortality rate is rising.
American babies are three times more likely to die in their first month as children born in Japan, and newborn mortality is 2.5 times higher in the United States than in Finland, Iceland or Norway, Save the Children researchers found.
Only Latvia, with six deaths per 1,000 live births, has a higher death rate for newborns than the United States, which is tied near the bottom of industrialized nations with Hungary, Malta, Poland and Slovakia with five deaths per 1,000 births.
“The United States has more neonatologists and neonatal intensive care beds per person than Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom, but its newborn rate is higher than any of those countries,” said the annual State of the World’s Mothers report.
The report, which analyzed data from governments, research institutions and international agencies, found higher newborn death rates among U.S. minorities and disadvantaged groups. For African-Americans, the mortality rate is nearly double that of the United States as a whole, with 9.3 deaths per 1,000 births. While infant mortality rates had been declining in the United States, since 2000 they have either stagnated or climbed slightly among the poor or minority groups.
Here is the By The Fault Weekend Reader, a series of interesting articles. The first is a video.
Mark Bittman on What’s Wrong With What We Eat
How To Make Your Diet Greener
The Christian Science Monitor examines way you can make your food shopping greener.
Grim Reaping
This article from Common Dreams looks at the impact of the industrialization of agriculture upon the land.
Livestock’s Environmental Impact
This report from the Food & Agricultural Organization looks at the impact of livestock on the environment.
The Japanese Diet
Thanks to the relatively healthier Japanese diet and lifestyle, Japanese women and men live longer and healthier than everyone else on Earth. This article from WebMD explores the health benefits of the Japanese diet.
It’s an away weekend for the boys. We have escaped from San Francisco up to Napa for the weekend. In light of this, the By The Fault Weekend Reader takes a look at issues related to this beautiful region of California.
The Global Wine Industry
Undergraduate students at Duke University in the Markets and Management Program have compiled a concise overview of the Global Wine Industry.
California Wine Industry
The official website of the Wine Institute of California.
The Napa Economy in Statistics
An overview of the economic data on Napa from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Identity Theft in Napa
Who knew? But apparently Napa is the Identity Theft Capital of the United States. More from Yahoo News.
The Science of Wine-Making
Two articles on oenology, the science of wine-making: This first one covers the Chemistry of Wine and the second one is a Beginners Guide to Wine-Making.