Krugman Interview Calpundit interviewed Paul Krugman, who was on tour promoting his book over the weekend. The entire transcript is here; it appears they talked for quite a while. In case you were wondering but you don’t have time to read the whole thing, here’s the big question and answer: KEVIN: If you were king […]

The Civil Service Laws Republicans often deride the Civil Service Laws as creating a giant union of inefficient government employees, and in a very small way, they are right. It is in fact hard, though not impossible, to fire protected government workers, and that can lead to instances of startling incompetence. But that factor is […]

Electronic Voting This CNN story, Gaffe casts doubts on electronic voting, is a bit dated but important. In a nutshell, Diebold Election Systems Inc. is the leading vendor of electronic voting machines, particularly touch-screen voting machines. Diebold’s machines have already been hacked (not in an actual election) and, as CNN reports, Diebold recently posted the […]

Huh? Dick Cheney on Sunday (from the Washington Post): “If we’re successful in Iraq . . . then we will have struck a major blow right at the heart of the base, if you will, the geographic base of the terrorists who had us under assault now for many years, but most especially on 9/11,” […]

It’s Your Children’s Money. Quick, Take It! When it comes to the federal deficit, there are few free lunches. What we don’t pay for today, we and our children will pay for tomorrow, with interest–the birth tax: When President Bush informed the nation last Sunday night that remaining in Iraq next year will cost another […]

The Consequences of Tax Cuts Paul Krugman has a piece in this weekend’s New York Times Magazine about the long-term consequences of the Bush tax cuts. His argument is one that has been made elsewhere, but is nevertheless compelling: the Republican tax cuts have intentionally set the US on the path that will lead to […]

Bush’s Popularity Here’s a new bit of polling data from Gallup: GALLUP NEWS SERVICE PRINCETON, NJ — President George W. Bush’s job approval rating has dropped significantly over the last two weeks, and now, at 52%, is at its lowest point since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and within one point of the lowest […]

Aid to Cows I love this image from the BBC’s Cancun coverage: It’s a nice graphic depiction of the oft-cited comparison (slightly specious, but still good for making the point) that the annual dairy subsidy in the European Union in 2000 was $913 per cow, average income in sub-Saharan Africa was $490 per capita, and […]

Proposal for a 2004 Campaign Theme Picking up where AB left off with this post, here’s my proposal for the theme of the anti-Bush 2004 campaign: Time after time, George Bush’s policies fail to work. The Bush presidency has been a complete failure. You probably recognize this as an elaboration of Gephardt’s excellent “miserable failure” […]

Negotiating Tactics in Cancun Right now an important meeting of trade ministers is happening in Cancun, Mexico, where they are discussing possible changes to WTO rules. I’ve been worried that the US was going to get taken advantage of in the negotiations, though. So I was glad to read this story from the BBC reporting […]