Monday Reads
Posted: June 13, 2011 Filed under: Barack Obama, Foreign Affairs, morning reads, Republican presidential politics, Syria | Tags: Iowa, Iowa Caucuses, jobless recovery, Larry Summers, Obama reelection, Presidential Politics, protest crackdowns, Refugees, Syria 39 Comments
Good Morning!
I’ve been following a few stories recently. Of course, one is about my favorite blood sport: politics. One interesting recent announcement is that the two Mormons contending for the Republican Presidential slot are skipping Iowa. Most of the speculation has to do with the role of religionists in the Iowa Republican party. Law professor Ann Althouse has some interesting observations on what appears to be the unwillingness of evangelical Christians to vote for Mormons.
It’s distressing to see this conflation of conservatism and prejudice. It’s one thing if Iowan Republicans tend to go for someone with a stronger message of social conservatism, quite another if they are hostile to Mormons. Plenty of Mormons are social conservatives, and it just happens that the 2 Mormons in the race are not social conservatives. Can we get some serious research on this point? It’s a dangerous thing to allow insinuations of religious bigotry to seep into the public consciousness. I can’t tell if the Times is really against bigotry or not. If you portray Iowan religious conservatives as anti-Mormon, in one way, it seems anti-bigotry. But it’s also inviting us to feel hostility toward the Iowan evangelicals.
Althouses’ comments are based on this NYT article which states that Iowa may have an ‘ebbing influence’ on national elections.
But there are signs that its influence on the nominating process could be ebbing and that the nature of the voters who tend to turn out for the Republican caucuses — a heavy concentration of evangelical Christians and ideological conservatives overlaid with parochial interests — is discouraging some candidates from competing there.
Mitt Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts, announced Thursday that he would skip the state’s Republican straw poll this summer, saving his resources — and lowering expectations — for the state’s caucuses next year.
Earlier in the week, Jon M. Huntsman Jr., the former governor of Utah, conceded that he was likely to skip the Iowa caucuses altogether, noting that his opposition to ethanol subsidies makes him unpopular in a state where support for the corn-based fuel is all but demanded.
“I’m not competing in Iowa for a reason,” he told The Associated Press. In addition to his stand on ethanol, Mr. Huntsman, who served in the Obama administration as ambassador to China, says he believes in global warming and has not embraced the Tea Party movement like some of his rivals. And like Mr. Romney, Mr. Huntsman is a Mormon, a religion viewed with wariness by some conservative Christians.
Repercussions from the Arab Spring are continuing through Summer. Syria appears to be the latest country where members of the military are having second thoughts about cracking down on civil unrest in the general population.
The escalating military offensive in northwest Syria began after what corroborating accounts said was a shoot-out between members of the military secret police in Jisr al-Shughur, some of whom refused to open fire on unarmed protesters.
A growing number of first-hand testimonies from defected soldiers give a rare but dramatic insight into the cracks apparently emerging in Syria’s security forces as the unrelenting assault on unarmed protesters continues.
Speaking to Al Jazeera from Turkey, having crossed the border on Friday night, an activist based in Jisr al-Shughur and trusted by experienced local reporters described how a funeral on June 4 for a man shot dead by plain-clothes security a day earlier grew into a large anti-government protest.
“As the demonstration passed the headquarters of the military secret police they opened fire right away and killed eight people,” the activist, who was among the crowd, said. “But some of the secret police refused to open fire and there were clashes between them. It was complete chaos.”
There continues to be a mounting human crisis as Syrians fleeing violence pour into nearby Turkey.
As Syrian security forces move in to the besieged town of Jisr al-Shughour, thousands of refugees are fleeing across the Turkish border. More camps are being set up to house the new arrivals. Many of the refugees are in desperate need of medical help.
The emergency ward at Antakya hospital is about to receive its latest casualty from Syria. It is a young girl who has fallen sick and was brought to the Turkish border by her desperate mother, who is also pregnant. The ambulance driver says the violence in Syria means hospitals there are either full with the injured, or the journey is too hazardous.
The clashes in and around the northern Syrian town of Jisr al-Shughour have forced thousands to flee. Many of them have recorded the horrifying scenes on cellphones and cameras. In the border village of Harabjoz, people have set up tents as they wait to cross into Turkey. One refugee, who did not give his name, described the conditions they are facing. “There is no milk for the children,” he says. “We bought some but we have run out. They are targeting homes and yesterday gunmen targeted us. All these people will not survive because they burned all their crops,” he says. “Now it’s become sectarian for sure,” he said.
A spokesman for the United Nations’ refugee agency, Metin Corabatir, has warned of a growing crisis. “The latest figures UNHCR received from the border is 5051 who fled from Syria because of violence and persecution in this country,” he said.
Witnesses believe the true figure could be double that number – including those who have crossed undetected.
The Economist believes Obama is beatable in 2012 but seems dismayed at the Republican field of candidates. This was my Saturday night bath read and I found it interesting so I thought I’d pass it along. They biggest question is that how does a candidate that ran as a change agent and outsider run as ‘Goliath’ this time?
In 2008 Mr Obama represented change. This time he will have to fend off charges that he is to blame for the achingly slow recovery by arguing that it would have been worse without his actions, such as his $800 billion stimulus package and the takeover of GM and Chrysler. That may be true but it is not easy to sell a counterfactual on the stump (as the first President Bush learned). And there are other holes in Mr Obama’s record. What happened to his promises to do something about the environment or immigration or Guantánamo? Why should any businessman support a chief executive who has let his friends in the labour movement run amok and who let his health-care bill be written by Democrats in Congress? Above all, why has he never produced a credible plan to tackle the budget deficit, currently close to 10% of GDP?
Asking these questions will surely give any Republican a perch in this race. But to beat the president, the Republicans need both a credible candidate and credible policies.
I may have to change my opinion of Larry Summers a little bit. In this FT Op-Ed, Summers tries to fight the austerity agenda and a US “lost decade”. Wow.
Beyond the lack of jobs and incomes, an economy producing below its potential for a prolonged interval sacrifices its future. To an extent once unimaginable, new college graduates are moving back in with their parents. Strapped school districts across the country are cutting out advanced courses in maths and science. Reduced income and tax collections are the most critical cause of unacceptable budget deficits now and in the future.
You cannot prescribe for a malady unless you diagnose it accurately and understand its causes. That the problem in a period of high unemployment, as now, is a lack of business demand for employees not any lack of desire to work is all but self-evident, as shown by three points: the propensity of workers to quit jobs and the level of job openings are at near-record low; rises in non-employment have taken place among all demographic groups; rising rates of profit and falling rates of wage growth suggest employers, not workers, have the power in almost every market.
A sick economy constrained by demand works very differently from a normal one. Measures that usually promote growth and job creation can have little effect, or backfire. When demand is constraining an economy, there is little to be gained from increasing potential supply. In a recession, if more people seek to borrow less or save more there is reduced demand, hence fewer jobs. Training programmes or measures to increase work incentives for those with high and low incomes may affect who gets the jobs, but in a demand-constrained economy will not affect the total number of jobs. Measures that increase productivity and efficiency, if they do not also translate into increased demand, may actually reduce the number of people working as the level of total output remains demand-constrained.
I’m beginning to feel like part of a chorus these days. Nearly all economists are telling whatever news source they can that this is your basic demand problem. Now if the TV media would hire some one other than lawyers and political consultants we might get some traction here on getting a conversation about policy solutions.
I’ve got one more interesting link given to me by our resident psychologist, Bostonboomer. TNR has an interesting article up on why poor people can’t escape poverty easily.
In a paper in April 2010, Harvard behavioral economist Sendhil Mullainathan (for whom, full disclosure, I once worked) and MIT’s Abhijit Banerjee applied this same notion to decisions requiring self-control. If a doughnut costs twenty-five cents, they wrote, then that “$0.25 will be far more costly to someone living on $2 a day than to someone living on $30 a day. In other words, the same self-control problem is more consequential for the poor.” And so, in addition to all the structural barriers that prevent even determined poor people from escaping poverty, there may be another, deeper, and considerably more disturbing barrier: Poverty may reduce free will, making it even harder for the poor to escape their circumstances.
All of this suggests that we need to rethink our approaches to poverty reduction. Many of our current anti-poverty efforts focus on access to health, educational, agricultural, and financial services. Now, it seems, we need to start treating willpower as a scarce and important resource as well.
Okay, so what’s on your reading and blogging list this morning?
peej
Carissa
ecocatwoman
mablue2
peggysue22
quixote
skydancingguestblogger
Mona (aka Wonk the Vote)
Sky Dancing 
If a doughnut costs twenty-five cents, they wrote, then that “$0.25 will be far more costly to someone living on $2 a day than to someone living on $30 a day
Yeah but some days, you really need that doughnut
I heard the conservatives were out there feeding the poor donuts. Are they lying again?
and the cuppa that goes with it 😆
Gates reads the riot act to Europe
http://tinyurl.com/3ux8y3h
…Gates delivered the speech less than a month after President Obama spelled out his new military doctrine in his speech on the Middle East, sweeping aside past limitations on the use of military force and declaring that any country could be the target of US attack, depending only on whether US interests, as defined by the White House, were at stake. The perspective was one of indefinite warfare to establish neocolonial regimes in the Middle East, North Africa and beyond.
Now the secretary of defense was telling the European powers that they had to reorganize their own societies to provide the resources required for an enormous expansion of militarism. Otherwise, they face losing out on the booty—the oil that is to be plundered from Libya, and, more generally, access to raw materials and strategic territory…..
Fascinating.
And yet, Obama received the Nobel Peace Prize.
Obama receiving the Nobel Prize isn’t really the issue. Other presidents have received the award. The issues are WHEN he received the award, and WHAT he received it for. He received it at a time when, as commander-in-chief, he might be required to take military action. And he received it for the promise of peace rather than ACTUAL peace. Furthermore, he is an undeserving asshat that reads from a teleprompter, which should have disqualified him from the start.
Hillary 2012
Ok – OT – in a discussion this weekend – a group of us came up with the notion that we might be able to really scramble some brains if we were to flood the elective process with female candidates – we’re not talking about local offices – we were talking about POTUS level – there are a lot of bright women in this country who could no doubt do a better job than O – so instead of having 5 or 6 “suits” up there we’d have 7-9 pantsuits.
The main problem is that women don’t want to get caught up in the mess we call elections in this country. We’re worse than a third world country, when it comes to elections.
That’s a great idea, joanelle.
We don’t need any more women like Michelle Bachmann in the process. We need the bright women on the correct side of women’s issues. I ran against a woman that held strong anti-woman positions and ran a brutal, hateful campaign. These kinds of women damage the process and the rights of women.
HONK!!
The asshat in the White House makes it seem as though black people make bad leaders. Bachmann does the same for women.
Hillary 2012
Great posting today – in so many ways, I am looking for alternative to Obama and think it might be Romney. Kennedy got by the religious issue and I hope Romney does that also.
So – the big question is- can Romney get past the primaries. A key factor might be Democrats crossing over in the primaries to support Romney.
Romney’s got more positions on one subject than any politician I’ve ever known. He’s for or against what ever is expedient at the moment.
Re: Mormon candidates
I talked to a friend of mine over the weekend. She is a moderate Presbyterian Democrat who supported HiIllary in the 2008 primary and voted for Obama in the GE. She is unhappy with Obama’s performance as president but would not even consider voting for Huntsman or Romney simply because they are Mormons. She said “Mormons have an agenda”. She is a very reasonable, educated, older woman. So if the Mormonism of Huntsman and Romney is unacceptable to many moderate mainstream Protestants, as well as to conservative evangelicals, both men are going to have serious problems getting elected.
Romney has never given any indication that his mormonism will affect what he does. I don’t believe for one minute he is religious. The man is like a robot. He has no moral values, no ideology, other than “how can I get richer and more powerful.”
I don’t think Romney’s religious, either, but I do think he’s stupid and heartless–the episode with the dog pretty much put him out of consideration for me. But he and Huntsman both are going to get tagged with the policies and doctrines of the Mormon church, fair or not–and those are anti-woman, anti-gay and hostile to liberal values in general.
You might want to do a little research on Romney’s tenure as Governor of MA before you support him. You know how we always talk about Obama having no core values? Well Romney has no core values and will go much further right trying to please the evangelicals and wingnuts that Obama has.
In MA, Romney lowered the income tax and then increased fees on everything to make up for it, ensuring that funds were raised on the poor and middle classes rather than the rich. Now parking meters, drivers’ licences, car registrations–every gov’t service you can imagine is far more expensive than before (our fees were already high here).
Romney has no experience in creating jobs. His career as a “businessman” consisted of buying up companies, laying off all the employees and selling of the parts to make money. He will do nothing to change the course we are on in terms of economics except that he’ll kowtow even more to Wall Street than Obama does.
If you ask me, I think he’s another one with “Daddy” issues.
This is sad news:
Clarence Clemons, Springsteen’s legendary saxophonist, suffers stroke | Music | guardian.co.uk
E Street Band Saxophonist Clarence Clemons has Suffered a Stroke | Rolling Stone Music
That’s a shame. I hope he will recover.
Larry Summers – isn’t he the guy that helped smash Brooksly Born against the regulation of Credit Default Swaps which turned out to be a major contributer to the Financial Crisis?
I really wonder about his credentials.
Yup. And he lost a lot of Harvard’s money investing in them too.
hoping for someone besides Romney 🙂
No one ‘reasonable’ could come through a nationwide Republican primary. Iowa is a pretty good example of what Republican activists look like these days. Lincoln, Eisenhower, and Nixon would never make it through a Republican primary these days.
Goldwater and Reagan probably wouldn’t make it.
Goldwater for sure couldnt’ make it. He pretty much despised the religious right.
British fear ‘American-style’ healthcare system
Wow. Our health care system is so bad, it’s terrifying to people with national health care
Take that, you dumbasses who say “our health care system is the best in the world.”
I think most people in America–even with insurance–live in fear of getting sick. It’s almost like it’s NOT allowed. You’ll spend years paying it off. That is if you can.
We are the only Western country that doesn’t provide health insurance for its citizens and the only country where 2/3 of all bankruptcies are caused by lack of health insurance or under-insurance (When the insurance doesn’t pay or refuses to pay for the treatment.). People over 45 are at higher risk of dying if they loose their health coverage and face more medical issues.
I still haven’t seen one candidate on the Republican side say what they will do, as all the Obama reform did, was make insurance even more inaccessibly due to the insurance rate hikes. Truly sad…
Indiana continues its pro-death attack on Planned Parenthood:
http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20110613/NEWS02/306130048/1025/rsslink
‘Syrian army defectors tell of rape, indiscriminate murder’
Wow … is this high on the neocon, right wing ick factor or what.
Neocon Queen Bee: Weiner/Abedin marriage was a creeping Sharia conspiracy (and Breitbart blogger compares Weiner/Abedin to the Holocaust)
what is wrong with these people? How do they manage to escape the straight jacket?
So – the elephant in the room would be a Obama – Romney runoff with a high unemployment number.
How would one vote at that time – I will never give up my vote like Obama did in the Michigan primary.
That is undemocratic
Carification – I will not vote for a person who discounted my vote for Hillary – that practice goes to the core foundation in terms of voting
Add the poor performance in manny area’s, he does not come off as a good candidate.
It’s going to be an extremely difficult decision. I have no idea what I’m going to do.
More insanity from Rick Perry:
Gov. Perry: Economic Crisis Is Part of God’s Plan To Return Us To Biblical Principles
And this is the man who will add ‘excitement’ to the Republican choice of candidates? The man makes Santorum look reasonable. Plus I read a listing of what Perry’s Texas miracle really looks like in terms of job loss, labor protections, education stats, health stats, etc., etc., etc. Texas falls at the borrom of most states in anything that effects ordinary citizens.
Not a millionaire?? You just don’t count. Better start praying, hard.
Can I just say “Aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh!!”
These crazy wingnuts are going to drive me around the bend!