Free Republic

The health care reform debate is only through the first round. In a few years, as early as 2013 or 2014, we are likely to see another round, with at least as much whacked-out drama as this one. But the cry will not be, “Bring back the good old days!” The cry will be, “These costs are killing us! Do something! Now!” This next round will be entirely focused on draconian cost-cutting. The push for reform was about three things: Cost, quality, and access. Well, one out of three is not bad. The bill we got will eventually do a...

COLORADO SPRINGS — This tax-averse city is about to learn what it looks and feels like when budget cuts slash services most Americans consider part of the urban fabric. More than a third of the streetlights in Colorado Springs will go dark Monday. The police helicopters are for sale on the Internet. The city is dumping firefighting jobs, a vice team, burglary investigators, beat cops — dozens of police and fire positions will go unfilled. The parks department removed trash cans last week, replacing them with signs urging users to pack out their own litter. Neighbors are encouraged to bring...

... let’s talk about prostate cancer. Right now, men with the most common form can choose from at least five different courses of treatment... Some doctors swear by one treatment, others by another. But no one really knows which is best. Rigorous research has been scant. Above all, no serious study has found that the high-technology treatments do better at keeping men healthy and alive. “No therapy has been shown superior to another,” an analysis by the RAND Corporation found. Dr. Michael Rawlins, the chairman of a British medical research institute, told me, “We’re not sure how good any of...

The top 25 US originators of subprime mortgages – the risky assets that sparked the global financial crisis – spent almost $370m in Washington over the past decade on lobbying and campaign donations as they tried to ward off tighter regulation of their industry, an investigation has shown... Most of the top 25 originators, most of which are now bankrupt, were either owned or heavily financed by the nation’s largest banks, including Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, Wells Fargo, JPMorgan and Bank of America. Together, they originated $1,000bn in subprime mortgages in 2005-07 – almost three-quarters of the total... The banks, which...

This is the only "non-politcal" item I've ever posted on FR but... well... just watch it. (Rated "G")

David Cameron has driven a social revolution in British Conservatism since becoming leader of the main UK opposition party in late 2005. The great fear has always been that ideas for fixing Britain’s “broken society” and delivering civic renewal would not be integrated with the party’s economic policy. But last week, George Osborne, shadow chancellor of the exchequer, signalled that the Conservatives are breaking with the neo-liberal absolutism of the past 30 years to forge a new approach to the market economy. Mr Osborne could not have been clearer; he repudiated laisser faire economics and the libertarian philosophy that licensed...

Link to .PDF of full report, search for "Mexico"

What confronts the world can be seen as the latest in a succession of financial crises that have struck periodically over the last 30 years. The current financial turmoil in the US and Europe affects economies that account for at least half of world output, making this upheaval more significant than all the others. Yet it is also depressingly similar, both in its origins and its results, to earlier shocks. To trace the parallels – and help in understanding how the present pressing problems can be addressed – one needs to look back to the late 1970s. Petrodollars, the foreign...

... Florida, set in the deepest south but not entirely of it, highlights a different divide - one that might prove more important to the presidential poll this autumn. Here, the McCain-Obama battle is one between American generations, the war vet versus the enigma who looks at least a decade younger than his 46 years. The surprise of this contest is that, with Hillary Clinton out of the race, that much-discussed demographic, the baby boomer generation, has been cut out of the race. Obama is surfing a different demographic wave - Morley Winograd and Michael Hais, authors of Millennial Makeover,...

A study by two conservative researchers attempting to determine why conservatives are underrepresented on college and university faculties. The conclusion is while some portion of this imbalance can be traced to "bias" and "discrimination", a large part results from a decision by students with conservative values not to pursue a career with limited economic potential that also requires sacrifice of family commitments to achieve academic advancement. "Since conservatives place an especially high priority on financial security and raising a family, the academy needs to make efforts to adopt more family-friendly policies... "As graduate school is not financially lucrative and pre-tenure...

As the world’s leaders gather in New York this week to discuss climate change, you’re going to hear a lot of well-intentioned talk about how to stop global warming. From the United Nations, Bill Clinton, and even the Bush administration, you’ll hear about how certain mechanisms—cap-and-trade systems for greenhouse gas emissions, carbon taxes, and research and development plans for new energy technologies—can fit into some sort of global emissions reduction agreement to stop climate change. Many of these ideas will be innovative and necessary; some of them will be poorly thought out. But one thing binds them together: They all...

Over the past two decades, a growing share of the public has come to the view that American society is divided into two groups, the "haves" and the "have-nots." Today, Americans are split evenly on the two-class question with as many saying the country is divided along economic lines as say this is not the case (48% each). In sharp contrast, in 1988, 71% rejected this notion, while just 26% saw a divided nation. Of equal importance, the number of Americans who see themselves among the "have-nots" of society has doubled over the past two decades, from 17% in 1988...

Log Cabin Responds to Resignation of Senator Larry Craig Statement from Log Cabin President Patrick Sammon (Washington, DC)—Log Cabin President Patrick Sammon made the following statement about the resignation of Senator Larry Craig (R-ID): "Senator Craig made the right decision in resigning from the U.S. Senate. He lost his credibility to serve the people of Idaho and his actions damaged the credibility of the Republican Party. Senator Craig had no other choice but to resign—for the good of his State, the good of his Party, and the good of his family. "His actions in Minnesota and the way he handled...

There is nearly a consensus that American health care is careening toward fiscal catastrophe. Reasonable estimates of unfunded health care liabilities are sky-high. But the belief that health care costs threaten to wreck the U.S. economy is misguided. In the first place, procedure by procedure, those costs are quite probably falling. It is spending that is rising, which is not the same thing at all. The advent of minimally invasive techniques means that, for example, the cost of a gallbladder operation has dropped substantially, and the patient can usually return to work the next day instead of sitting at home...

US presses Iraq on amnesty issue By Roula Khalaf and Guy Dinmore in Washington Published: October 17 2006 22:05 | Last updated: October 17 2006 22:15 The Bush administration is pressing the Iraqi government of Nouri al-Maliki to issue a “broad” and “painful” amnesty for insurgents in spite of intense opposition to the proposal from politicians both in Iraq and the US, according to a senior administration official. Amid growing anxiety in Washington over Iraq’s escalating sectarian violence, the US is advocating more determined moves towards a national reconciliation with the Sunni community that dominates Iraq’s insurgency. It also wants...

Examples aren’t hard to come by. Shiites seek revenge on Sunnis for the revenge they sought on Shiites; Irish Catholics retaliate against the Protestants who retaliated against them; and since 1948, it’s hard to think of any partisan in the Middle East who has done anything but play defense. In each of these instances, people on one side claim that they are merely responding to provocation and dismiss the other side’s identical claim as disingenuous spin. But research suggests that these claims reflect genuinely different perceptions of the same bloody conversation...

FP: (Some) suggest... domestic drilling offshore and in Alaska. MS: It’s very important. Everything we can do to stabilize supply buys us more time to adjust to peak oil. People ask what difference it would make if we drilled for oil in ANWR... There could be up to 1.5 million bpd of oil there. It doesn’t solve the larger problem, but it’s a safety valve. FP: If you were the secretary of energy right now, what policies would you recommend to President Bush? MS: If we restructure the way we use fuels, we might be able to get along very...

(An Interview wiht Connie Mack, Chairman of the Tax-Reform Panel now finalizing its recommendations to the President and Congress.) Q. Well, the U.S. government has to get money from somewhere. As a two-term former Republican senator from Florida, where do you suggest we get money from? A. What money? Q. The money to run this country. A. We'll borrow it. Q. ... When the president says we need another $200 billion for Katrina repairs, does he just go and borrow it from the Saudis? A. In a sense, we do. Maybe the Chinese. Q. Is that fair to our children?...

Selections from a series of interior pictures of 500 Shanghai homes occupied by individuals and families living lives ranging from paupers to billionaires, accompanied by brief biographical sketches depicting the lives of their occupants. "I've been in Shanghai for more than 10 years. Working makes my day and night. Life pace is too fast and I don't have any social security. I dare not say I contributed a lot to Shanghai's development, but I am working for this city. Life is unfair. I don't have a legal identity for me to find a decent job. I don't have time to...

A longish but IMO interesting article from the left, in which the author tries to make sense of the Conservative revolution, makes the argument that the Conservative-Liberal split in the US really *is* about "family values", and attempts to explain to his readers what this difference is about. I’ve posted it because, putting his politics aside, the description of the “conservative” and “liberal” views of family life, it’s relationship to religious conviction, and how it produces a “moral” society rings true to me, and it's the best such short description I’ve seen – but don’t bother with the second half...