Today’s broadsheet from the FM website pressroom. There are 4 sections, all with hot news.
- Links to 4 interesting articles of news and analysis
- Quote of the Day
- News about themes from 2 posts past on the FM website
- Thought for the day (-1)
- Plus an Afterword
(I) Links to interesting news and analysis
(a) “State Tax Revenues Show Record Drop, For Second Consecutive Quarter“, Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government, October 2009 — “Fiscal 2009 Also Brought Record Overall Decline of 8.2% , or $63 Billion.” See the key graphs here.
(b) “Too fearful to publicise peak oil reality“, Madeline Bunting, op-ed in The Guardian, 10 November 2009 — “The economic establishment accepts the world soon won’t be able to meet energy demands, but wants to keep quiet about it.”
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Mexico continues to fall apart in slow-mo. There seems to be little we can do to help, so our government pretends all is fine — rather than take defensive measures.
Contents
- Mexico Security Memo, Stratfor, 9 November 2009 — A typical week in Mexico, reported by one of the few agencies covering this important story.
- “The Fall of Mexcio“, Philip Caputo, The Atlantic, December 2009
- FM recommendations about Mexico
- Other articles about Mexico
- For more information and an Afterword
Excerpts
(1) Mexico Security Memo, Stratfor, 9 November 2009 — A typical week in Mexico. Excerpt:
Gunmen posing as police officers entered the Amadeus strip club in Juarez, Chihuahua state and methodically executed six people in the early morning hours of Nov. 4, including U.S. Air Force Staff Sgt. David Booher Montanez.
The Secretary of Public Security for the city of Garcia, Nuevo Leon state, retired Brig. Gen. Juan Arturo Esparza, was killed along with four of his bodyguards in a firefight that took place outside of the Garcia mayor’s home in the afternoon of Nov. 4. The mayor of Garcia, Jaime Rodriguez, exited his home to find a group of eight trucks with armed men outside. Rodriguez then issued a call for help; Esparza and his four bodyguards were the only ones to respond. The governor of the state of Nuevo Leon, Rodrigo Medina de la Cruz, promptly relieved the remaining 70 officers of their duties and ordered the Nuevo Leon state Investigative Agency to investigate their inaction. … The inaction by the rest of the Garcia police department underscores the remaining corruption issues that continue to plague the Mexican security apparatus.
(2) “The Fall of Mexcio“, Philip Caputo, The Atlantic, December 2009 — This is very much worth reading in full. Excerpt:
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Today’s broadsheet from the FM website pressroom. There are four sections, all with hot news.
- Links to interesting news and analysis
- Today’s special item
- News about themes from posts past on the FM website
- Lifted from the comments of the FM website
(I) Links to interesting news and analysis
- “Barack Hoover Obama: The best and the brightest blow it again“, Kevin Baker, Harper’s magazine, July 2009 — A look at Hoover’s impressive but inadequate accomplishments. Will Obama follow in his footsteps? I strongly recommend reading this, hidden history to most Americans.
- “How they are turning off the lights in America“, Edwin X Berry (PhD Physics, Meteorologist; bio here), posted at Climate Physics, October 2009
- “Studies ‘overstate species risks’“, BBC, 6 November 2009 — A rare note of sanity amidst the green hysteria.
- “The lost generation“, Paul Krugman, blogging at the New York Times, 7 November 2009 — The sad reality that economic growth in the developed world peaked during the 1960’s, and has slowed every decade since.
- “Reagan! Reagan! Reagan!“, Paul Krugman, blogging at the New York Times, 7 November 2009 — The sad reality that US economic growth was slower by almost every metric from 1950-1980 than 1980-2007.
(II) Today’s special item
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Honor killings of daughters. Ubiquitous in many (not all) nations with Islamic majorities. A growing problem in Europe. Now appearing in the USA.
There are precedents in western civilization (e.g., Héloïse and Abelard), esp killing of unfaithful wives and their partners. But the form found in some Islamic societies is far more serious. Here are two articles about this problem. The first provides a solid base of fact and analysis. The second provides intense and gripping real-life examples – far more than just the superficial facts.
- “Crimes of the Community – Honour-based violence in the UK“, James Brandon and Salam Hafez, Centre for Social Cohesion, 2008 (PDF, 169 pages)
- “A Piece of White Silk“, Jacqueline Rose, London Review of Books, 5 November 2009
The London Review of Books and the New York Review of Books are among the most valuable magazines I’ve found, providing a great breadth of view — summaries of books I’ll never get to read.
This problem is coming to America. The first small wave has already arrived.
Excerpts
(1) “Crimes of the Community – Honour-based violence in the UK“, James Brandon and Salam Hafez, Centre for Social Cohesion, 2008 (PDF, 169 pages) — Introduction:
In recent years, honour crimes have received an increasing amount of interest from the media, the police and politicians. This has been fuelled by the extensive coverage of the murder of several young Kurdish and Pakistani women by their families. This growing public concern has been largely welcomed by women’s groups and has prompted the government to take steps to tackle these crimes. However the media’s focus on honour killings and, to a lesser extent, forced marriages and Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) has obscured the true scale of honour-based crime. Honour killings represent only the tip of the iceberg in terms of violence and abuse perpetrated against women in the name of honour.
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Today’s broadsheet from the FM website pressroom. There are four sections:
- Links to interesting news and analysis
- Today’s special item
- News about themes from posts past on the FM website (including some hot news)
- An interesting comment lifted from the FM website
(I) Links to interesting news and analysis
- “British Muslims Fear Repercussions Over Tomorrow’s Train Bombing” — Horrifying!
- “Governor Paterson Paints Grim Picture of N.Y. Budget Crisis“, New York Times, 8 November 2009
- “Oil at $100 Doesn’t Compute as OPEC Output Pace Grows“, Bloomberg, 9 November 2009
- “Afghanistan Mission Creep Watch – The Barack ‘Baines’ Obama Version“, Michael Cohen, Democracy Arsenal, 9 November 2009
- “High and dry“, The Standard, 9 November 2009 — Macau has only 10 days of water remaining in its reservoirs, due to the drought.
(II) Today’s special item
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Here are some recent articles about the US army, under great stress from our current wars.
- “Task Force Takes Up Effort to Prevent Suicides“, American Forces Press Service, 1 October 2009
- “Army Releases September Suicide Data“, DoD, 8 October 2009
- “Pentagon, VA Team Up to Improve Mental Health Care“, American Forces Press Service, 26 October 2009
- “Suicide Toll Fuels Worry That Army Is Strained“, Wall Street Journal, 3 November 2009
- “Is There a Lot of Crime on Military Bases? Not as much as you’d think“, Daniel Engber, Slate, 5 November 2009
- “Fort Hood FAQ – Can you carry a concealed weapon on military bases? And other questions answered“, Slate, 6 November 2009
- Update about the killings in Texas, perhaps another crack in an Army near the breaking point (second post), on the FM website, 6 november 2009
- “Fort Hood tragedy rocks military as it grapples with mental health issues“, Los Angeles Times, 9 November 2009 — “Psychological problems are rampant, leaders admit. The Iraq and Afghanistan wars have been long, and repeat deployments are highly stressful. Doctors, too, fall prey to mental illness.”
The comments to the previous posts in this series have been largely by scum denying the problem and castigating those who draw attention to it. As if “rah-rah” for America’s wars equals support for our people in the military. Fortunately many in the Department of Defense takes these things seriously. As expressed by SecrDef Robert M. Gates to the Association of the United States Army on 5 October 2009:
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Two of the most valuable magazines I read are the New York Review of Books and the London Review of Books. They give me a breath of view that I’d never have otherwise, with analysis of books I’d love to read but never will find the time to do so.
Here’s an example, important information for all Americans.
Can Our Shameful Prisons Be Reformed?, David Cole, New York Review of Books, 19 November 2009
Race, Incarceration, and American Values
by Glenn C. Loury, with Pamela S. Karlan, Tommie Shelby, and Loïc Wacquant
Boston Review/MIT Press, 86 pp., $14.95
Let’s Get Free: A Hip-Hop Theory of Justice
by Paul Butler
New Press, 214 pp., $25.95
Releasing Prisoners, Redeeming Communities: Reentry, Race, and Politics
by Anthony C. Thompson
New York University Press, 262 pp., $39.00; $21.00 (paper)
Introduction
With approximately 2.3 million people in prison or jail, the United States incarcerates more people than any other country in the world — by far. Our per capita rate is six times greater than Canada’s, eight times greater than France’s, and twelve times greater than Japan’s. Here, at least, we are an undisputed world leader; we have a 40% lead on our closest competitors — Russia and Belarus.
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A persistent problem on the FM website is the number of belligerent commenters. They make big statements, usually laced with insults (sometimes nothing but insults). When called on their statements, they usually disappear (often to appear again on another thread, repeating this behavior). When I email them, asking for a response — the email address they gave proves to be a fake.
The most recent case are comments by ”Steel Rain” (a great nome de plume). After insults in 5 comments, he at last gave a few specifics to which I responded with considerable detail. 36 hours later, still no response. As usual, I emailed a copy to him — receiving a notice “Delivery to the following recipients failed.”
So I have activated the ”comment registration” feature, commonly used by active websites. Perhaps this will either screen these people out, or force them to back up their statements. We’ll see.
Notes
- Of those people posting the nine thousand comments during the past 12 months, I’ve taken the extreme step of banning only two.
- The opposite kind of comments are treasured (if not always treated here as well as they deserve). People like Oldskeptic, Atheist, and FxConde. They are willing and able to back up their statements, often devastatingly so (as I painfully learned!).
- These two sets of characteristics have no relation to their politics. Both sets of behaviors appear among with politics both of the left and right.
One core reality too-often ignored in post-election analysis: the role of the economy. Americans tend to vote their pocketbook in elections to Congress and the Presidency.
This is nuts, on many levels.
- Who sets economic policy?
- How long between policy changes and results?
- How do policy-makers navigate?
- But at least they have economic theory to guide them!
- And so the American people rationally votes…
(1) Who sets economic policy?
The most important agency setting US economic is the Federal Reserve. The Fed can act quickly to change one of the fastest-acting economic variables (monetary policy). “Fast” means over 6 – 9 months. The President and Congress have little influence over the Fed, except by the slow process of new appointments — and the atomic bomb of limiting its power.
(2) How long between policy changes and results?
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Some articles you might find of interest, updates about matters discussed on the FM website.
Contents
- About government efforts to control the news
- At last, sensible action to mitigate the housing crisis
- News about the financial crisis
- About the US dollar
(1) About government efforts to control the news
“Media Criticism, Chicago-Style“, Glenn Reynolds, op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, 5 November 2009
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