January 5, 2013
Two previous recent postings[1] explored the parameters and the prerequisites for a progressive second presidential term for Barack Obama. Each of those postings triggered three broad responses from a largely skeptical audience.
read more »
Posted in US Blog | Comment Now »
January 2, 2013
Amid the scampering up and down the fiscal cliff that now dominates political life in Washington, some more important and basic questions are in danger of vanishing from view, questions about the general character and progressive potential of Barack Obama’s second term. Questions such as these. Will this Administration in the end prove to […]
read more »
Posted in US Blog | Comment Now »
December 19, 2012
Co-authored with Don Frey[1] As reports thicken of a possible deal between the White House and the House Republicans – a deal which will supposedly avoid the rest of us going over some fiscal cliff on January 1 – it is worth remembering at least four reasons why such a deal is probably […]
read more »
Posted in US Blog | 2 Comments »
December 5, 2012
Public conversation in and around Washington D.C. is currently preoccupied with the question of the fiscal cliff. And rightly so, for very big things are at stake. Not least whether or not a political crisis will tip the economy back into recession, and whether an election result that mandated a tax increase on the […]
read more »
Posted in US Blog | Comment Now »
November 15, 2012
It is lobbying week in Washington DC. Tuesday was labor’s day at the White House. Wednesday it was the turn of the business community. Friday it will be the usual politicians – Boehner, Cantor, McConnell, Pelosi, Reid – in other words, the usual political gridlock masquerading as democracy in action.[1]
read more »
Posted in US Blog | Comment Now »
November 2, 2012
Basic belief systems, if regularly reinforced by carefully orchestrated advertising campaigns, are enormously difficult things to shift. Paradigms of thought, once established in dominance, are hard to get rid of. We have just lived through 30 years of an orchestrated consensus on the wonders of free-market capitalism. No matter that the business deregulation it […]
read more »
Posted in US Blog | 2 Comments »
October 17, 2012
(co-authored with Eileen Coates: National Board Certified Public School Teacher) One of the most telling questions in the second of the debates between the presidential candidates focused on the gender pay gap: asking in what ways the candidates would “rectify the inequalities in the workplace, specifically regarding females only making 72 percent of what […]
read more »
Posted in US Blog | Comment Now »
October 15, 2012
If you listen only to Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan, you could be forgiven for thinking that the United States is not simply in need of strong interventionist leadership abroad. It is also short of military hardware and troops.
read more »
Posted in US Blog | Comment Now »
September 22, 2012
Central to the Republican critique of the Obama Administration in this election cycle has been the Administration’s supposed failure to address and resolve the problem of America’s growing debt. There is much wild and loose talk in beltway circles these days about federal over-spending, about federal over-borrowing, about the nation steadily going broke, and […]
read more »
Posted in US Blog | 2 Comments »
September 8, 2012
Charles Dickens came to mind again this week – his opening to A Tale of Two Cities – his intriguing contrast between “the best of times….the worst of times…the age of wisdom…the age of foolishness.” His cities were London and Paris. Ours were Tampa and Charlotte, but the contrasts remain the same. As […]
read more »
Posted in US Blog | Comment Now »
