Skip to main content

Home/ Long Game/ Group items tagged essential

Rss Feed Group items tagged

Filter: All | Bookmarks | Topics Simple Middle
anonymous

Russia's Food Security Challenge - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...ussias_food_security_challenge

geopolitics russia

shared by anonymous on 23 Aug 10 - Cached
  • This would be an extraordinary development considering that Russia accounts for 17 percent of global grain output and exported 20 percent of its nearly 100 million ton production last year to major markets in the Middle East and North Africa. Some estimates have Russian grain harvests falling to as little as 60 million tons this year, and the projections seem to drop precipitously every week.
  • Making sure that its population is fed is one of the fundamental policy challenges for Moscow. In Russia, food security and state security are practically indistinguishable.
  • Russian cities are essentially islands of dense populations dependent on grain-producing regions that can be quite far away.
    • anonymous
      anonymous on 23 Aug 10
       
      It would be an interesting exercise to compare US grain supporting regions to that of Russian. Americans are often unaware that the *reason* their government doesn't control food production to such an extent isn't because of some innate political superiority, but the fact that such control is uneeded.
  • ...6 more annotations...
  • The free market is a luxury Russia simply cannot afford when it comes to food production. Instead, it must adopt a nonmarket mechanism — one that is enforced by the security apparatus if need be.
  • The most recent threat of a grain crisis has therefore seen Moscow revert to a number of strategies highly reminiscent of those employed by Soviet and Tsarist Russia.
  • First, the Kremlin has banned all exports until the end of the year
  • the Kremlin has put the Federal Security Service in charge of overseeing the grain distribution in the region
  • the Kremlin has directed the regional offices of the ruling United Russia party to oversee all grain distribution and price setting across the entire country
  • Russia has used the grain crisis to further strengthen its position within its periphery
  • anonymous on 23 Aug 10
     
    "The Moscow Times reported on Thursday that the severe drought in the Russian grain belt could make the country a net importer of grain, marking the first time in more than a decade that Moscow has been forced to import the commodity." By StratFor on August 20, 2010.
anonymous

Objectivism & "Metaphysics" (Part 1) - 0 views

aynrandcontrahumannature.blogspot.com/...tivism-metaphysics-part-1.html

philosophy criticalthinking

shared by anonymous on 27 Jul 10 - Cached
  • Metaphysics, in the proper sense of the word, is dialectical physics, or an attempt to determine matters of fact by means of logical or moral or rhetorical constructions.
  • Even when used to defend postulates that are basically sound, metaphysics remains, in the words of F. H. Bradley, “the finding of bad reasons for what we believe upon instinct.”
  • Karl Popper applied the word metaphysics to any claims or conjectures that are not empirically testable.
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • I don’t choose to call my so-called “basic view” of the universe metaphysical. It is merely, as Santayana calls it, cosmology or natural philosophy.
  • Unlike Rand, I don’t believe these basic presuppositions can be defended or validated via axioms or logical argumentation. All these fundamental presuppositions may conceivably be illusory—that is to say, the arguments against them cannot be decisively refuted. They are presuppositions which nature has bred in us (probably via evolution) and which have proved their worth, not by logic, but through centuries of practice.
  • They neither require nor are amenable to logical justification.
  • The belief that all human contentions and presuppositions require explicit philosophical justification constitutes a false demand.
  • Rand’s foundationalism only serves to encourage rationalization, verbalism, essentialism, and other modes of empty speculation, and is often symptomatic of a dogmatic turn of mind that has trouble accepting the provisional and conjectural nature of knowledge.
  • anonymous on 27 Jul 10
     
    "Rand defined metaphysics as "the study of existence as such or, in Aristotle's words, of 'being qua being.'" Well, that sure narrows it down!" By Greg Nyquist at Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature on July 26, 2010.
anonymous

An empirical perspective on religious and secular reasons « The Immanent Frame - 0 views

blogs.ssrc.org/...an-empirical-perspective

religion politics criticalthinking

shared by anonymous on 22 Oct 10 - Cached
  • An example of a policy that would apply to all citizens is gay marriage, and we have all encountered religious reasons for banning gay marriage, such as, “Leviticus 18:22 tells us that homosexuality is an abomination before God.”
  • “Public reason” is a bit more obscure, but liberal theorists mean by the term general reasons that are widely or near universally shared by citizens. This would preclude reasons deriving from any “comprehensive perspective,” such as religion, obviously including Leviticus 18:22.
  • It is critical for our society that we get this normative debate right, for the stakes are high. We face increasing religious diversity. Liberal theorists, like Rawls, say that unless we keep religious reasons out of the public sphere, we could descend into a religiously motivated civil war similar to the Thirty Years’ War of the sixteenth century. On the other hand, critics of liberal theorists, like religious ethicist Charles Mathewes, say that unless we allow each other to talk about our deep differences, such as our religious beliefs, we could descend into the same nightmare that concerns the liberal theorists.
  • ...24 more annotations...
  • This normative debate is about what people should do in public debates, but knowing what people actually do would allow theorists to develop greater nuance in their analyses.
  • One of the premises of this entire debate is that religious people want to use religious reasons in public debates.
  • If anyone would want to use religious reasons, it would be these activists. But what the scholars find is that, in fact, the religious Right offers secular reasons for their policy proposals.
  • This is not because they are normatively sanctioned for using religious reasons, as critics of liberal theory suggest. Rather, religious reasons do not convince people to accept one’s position.
  • Scholars such as Robert Audi say that religious reasons should not be used anywhere along the spectrum, while others, like Chris Eberle in an earlier post, argue that religious reasons can be given by elected officials while passing laws; and Charles Taylor writes that the use of religious reasons by elected officials is fine, but secular reasons are required in the “official language of the state,” such as the wording of laws.
  • the acceptability of using religious reasons depends on the proximity of the reason-giver to the creation of policy
  • near the “actual power” end of the spectrum, religious people do not want to give religious reasons, because they do not work.
  • If they do not work to mobilize a sub-group of citizens to  advocate for banning abortion, they are not going to be effective for forging a majority vote in Congress, which in theory is just as pluralistic as the citizenry.
  • In my interviews, a majority of the people thought one should use religious discourse with the Hindu neighbor, with conservative Protestants being the most likely to say so. Interestingly, a majority of the secular respondents also thought that one should use religious discourse
  • The most prevalent reason given for advocating the use of religious reasons is that using only secular reasons is not possible if you are religious.
  • respondents actually wanted to start the conversation with secular reasons in order to be understood.
  • As one evangelical said, he tries to avoid “Christian speak” because “nobody knows what the heck you are talking about.” However, if they were asked to give reasons for their reasons, then the respondents thought that eventually their religious reasons would have to be brought into the conversation, because those are “behind” everything.
  • two implications
  • First, it seems that both professional activists and ordinary religious people, including religious conservatives, want to use public reasons in the public sphere.
  • A second implication is that, contrary to what many theorists maintain, religious people appear to be quite capable of translating between religious and secular reasons
  • Calhoun, expanding on Habermas’s notion of translation, explores the idea that what is needed is not the translation of religious reasons into secular reasons, or the exclusive use of one or the other, but “mutual interrogation,” or a “complementary learning process” about people’s real reasons, religious or otherwise.
  • What would happen if people started invoking their comprehensive perspectives by using religious reasons? Famously, Richard Rorty claimed that religious reasons are a conversation-stopper, because they are unintelligible to those who do not share one’s religious beliefs. So, if Rorty is correct, Habermas’s translation proposal will never work.
  • Even though religious reasons are second-order, having religious reasons and not using them is considered insincere. To actually understand the other person’s argument, you have to hear their religious reasons if they have them.
  • Interestingly, the secular respondents did not want religious people to give secular reasons. Their reasoning is: if this is how a religious person thinks, why shouldn’t they be able to talk that way?
  • Of course, many of the secular people added that they were not going to be convinced by the religious reasons, but they would want others to offer such reasons if they wanted to.
  • This is but a sampling of the normative insights that can be developed from the limited existing empirical data on the use of religious reasons in the public sphere. It would be helpful for normative theorists to identify the critical empirical questions that they have, and for empiricists to discuss with them what is actually possible to determine. Working together, the two groups could really shake up the debate about this critical social issue.
  • My concern is that reason-giving isn’t necessarily where the action is, or at least where all of it is. Aside from the “that’s-just-who-I-am” approach you detail in the post, I can think of some other possible routes from religion to public discourse that bypass reason-giving.
  • A prime example here is Christine O’Donnell’s justification for her anti-masturbation stance, which is prima facie idiotic: “…if he already knows what pleases him, and he can please himself, then why am I in the picture?” Leaving aside O’Donnell in specific, everybody of course already knows why a real, live sexual partner is in the picture!
  • The statement only makes any sense at all if uttered in a religious context, i.e., one in which there is an assumed religious commonality between the speaker and the audience. In this case, the commonality is the religious assumption that the purpose of sexuality is essentially religious. Thus this deserves to be understood as religious reason-giving even though there is no religious language in the reason!
  • anonymous on 22 Oct 10
     
    "This "religion in the public sphere" thread has featured debates about whether citizens of liberal democratic societies can offer religious reasons for public laws that will be coercive on all citizens, or whether they must use, in John Rawls's terms, "public reason."" By John H. Evans at the Immanent Frame on October 1, 2010.
anonymous

France in Turmoil | STRATFOR - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...20101021_france_turmoil

geopolitics france europe

shared by anonymous on 22 Oct 10 - No Cached
  • The two groups have different economic and social interests, but they are coming together in their angst toward the government and in their anger toward President Nicolas Sarkozy. This presents a dangerous situation for Paris, as it has the potential to spark wider societal unrest unless the government moves to satisfy one of the groups.
  • The origins of the French welfare state go back to the 60-year period of nearly constant turmoil following the 1789 French Revolution. The revolution was followed by the 1793-94 Reign of Terror; the White Terror of 1794; Napoleon Bonaparte’s rule from 1804 to 1814, which included an almost uninterrupted period of pan-European warfare; another White Terror in 1815; and two more revolutions, in 1830 and 1848. The 1848 Revolution took on a particularly socialist tinge, as a nascent working class that was growing amid the country’s industrialization united with the peasantry in protest of their conditions.
  • Under Napoleon III, social order was largely restored for the next 20 years — to be disrupted by the war against Prussia in 1870 — but more importantly, the French social welfare state became a crucial part of the government’s social contract with its citizens. In order to pacify and unite its restive population, the state vowed that it would take care of its citizens from cradle to grave.
  • ...8 more annotations...
  • The French, in other words, are neither lazy nor illogical. The protesters see the reforms as a threshold that, if crossed by the government, could undermine the foundation of the last 150 years of French society. Thus, while only 7-8 percent of the working population belongs to a labor union — the lowest percentage in the EU and even lower than that in the United States — nearly 70 percent of the population supports the ongoing strikes and believes they should continue if the proposed reforms pass, which they likely will by Oct. 23.
  • The context of the 2010 unrest is therefore not very different from 1995. The French budget deficit is forecast to hit 8.2 percent of GDP, and Paris is being forced by Germany to rein in spending to conform to the EU’s fiscal rules. Germany is making EU-wide fiscal discipline an essential condition of its continued support for EU institutions, a message that was elucidated during the Greek sovereign debt crisis but understood to apply to everyone.
  • In addition to protests from the French middle classes and workers demanding a continuation of the established social contract, there are protests from French citizens who feel they were never offered that social contract in the first place.
  • The protests of the last couple of days in France have seen both groups pour out onto the streets. The rioting and violence are still not in any way at a level that could be construed as threatening to the government; both the 2005 and 2007 riots were more intense. However, the protesters are using more strategic tactics, targeting the country’s energy infrastructure, and hence are less reliant on drawing out the masses to the streets.
  • The youth need a flexible labor market and thus would need substantial portions of the French welfare state to be eroded if their employment situation were to be remedied. Therefore, Paris will have a hard time satisfying both groups.
  • Ultimately, the commitments Paris has made to its people over the last 150 years are incompatible with the commitments it has made to Berlin in the last 20 years.
  • However, the French state has a very clear history of conceding to its population’s demands. At the very least, it is inevitable that Paris will have to give in to one of the groups, either by admitting that the social contract cannot be changed or by offering it in an amended form to the disaffected youth and citizens of immigrant descent.
  • It is likely that it will give in to the more established group — the workers and middle classes — since they have shown with their tactics that they have the ability to seriously threaten the French state’s efforts to function by targeting its energy infrastructure. Simply moving forward with a policy that three-quarters of the population rejects is unsustainable. At the point when Paris gives in to one side, however, France may cease to be at conflict with itself and instead come into conflict with Germany.
  • anonymous on 22 Oct 10
     
    "Unrest in France sparked by protests against the government continued Oct. 21. The turmoil is ostensibly over proposed government pension reforms, but it is about much more than that. The protests themselves are a confrontation between the government and unionized labor - older generations that want to protect benefits hard won in the 19th century and enhanced in the 1970s and 1980s. At the same time, another group of French citizens - disaffected youths, many of immigrant Arab and African descent - are protesting not for employment benefits, but for employment itself." By StratFor on October 22, 2010.
anonymous

The World Looks at Obama After the U.S. Midterm Election - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...bama_after_us_midterm_election

geopolitics politics america

shared by anonymous on 04 Nov 10 - Cached
  • U.S. President Barack Obama hopes that the Republicans prove rigidly ideological.
  • John Boehner, already has indicated that he does not intend to play Gingrich but rather is prepared to find compromises. Since Tea Party members are not close to forming a majority of the Republican Party in the House, Boehner is likely to get his way.
  • I’d like to consider the opposite side of the coin, namely, how foreign governments view Obama after this defeat.
  • ...14 more annotations...
  • There were several major elements to his foreign policy.
  • First, he campaigned intensely against the Bush policy in Iraq, arguing that it was the wrong war in the wrong place.
  • Second, he argued that the important war was in Afghanistan, where he pledged to switch his attention to face the real challenge of al Qaeda.
  • Third, he argued against Bush administration policy on detention, military tribunals and torture, in his view symbolized by the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base.
  • In a fourth element, he argued that Bush had alienated the world by his unilateralism
  • The European view — or more precisely, the French and German view — was that allies should have a significant degree of control over what Americans do.
  • Thus, in spite of the Nobel Peace Prize in the early days of the romance, the bloom wore off as the Europeans discovered that Obama was simply another U.S. president. More precisely, they learned that instead of being able to act according to his or her own wishes, circumstances constrain occupants of the U.S. presidency into acting like any other president would.
  • Campaign rhetoric notwithstanding, Obama’s position on Iraq consisted of slightly changing Bush’s withdrawal timetable. In Afghanistan, his strategy was to increase troop levels beyond what Bush would consider. Toward Iran, his policy has been the same as Bush’s: sanctions with a hint of something later.
  • Obama seemed to believe the essential U.S. problem with the world was rhetorical. The United States had not carefully explained itself, and in not explaining itself, the United States appeared arrogant.
  • The idea that nations weren’t designed to trust or like one another, but rather pursued their interests with impersonal force, was alien to him. And so he thought he could explain the United States to the Muslims without changing U.S. policy and win the day.
  • It is not that anyone expected his rhetoric to live up to its promise, since no politician can pull that off, but that they see Obama as someone who thought rhetoric would change things. In that sense, he is seen as naive and, worse, as indecisive and unimaginative.
  • While it may seem an odd thing to say, it is true: The American president also presides over the world. U.S. power is such that there is an expectation that the president will attend to matters around the globe not out of charity, but because of American interest.
  • The questions I have heard most often on many different issues are simple: What is the American position, what is the American interest, what will the Americans do? (As an American, I frequently find my hosts appointing me to be the representative of the United States.)
  • I have answered that the United States is off balance trying to place the U.S.-jihadist war in context, that it must be understood that the president is preoccupied but will attend to their region shortly.
  • anonymous on 04 Nov 10
     
    "The 2010 U.S. midterm elections were held, and the results were as expected: The Republicans took the House but did not take the Senate. The Democrats have such a small margin in the Senate, however, that they cannot impose cloture, which means the Republicans can block Obama administration initiatives in both houses of Congress. At the same time, the Republicans cannot override presidential vetoes alone, so they cannot legislate, either. The possible legislative outcomes are thus gridlock or significant compromises." By George Friedman at StratFor on November 4, 2010.
anonymous

Germany's Geopolitical Opening - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/..._germanys_geopolitical_opening

geopolitics germany

shared by anonymous on 10 Nov 10 - Cached
  • Germany is, of course, not like any other country. It was the primary culprit behind the deadliest conflict to ever befall mankind — World War II — and of the greatest state-organized massacre of a single group of people — the Jewish Holocaust. As such, it essentially was forced to give up much of its sovereignty for the next 40 years and to serve as the board for the geopolitical chess match between Washington and Moscow throughout the Cold War.
  • Germany is forcefully defending its interests and national economic strategy ahead of the G-20 summit. The stage is therefore set for a serious disagreement between Washington and the chief trade surplus countries, specifically Germany and China, at the summit. Germany is also beginning to take shots at China, especially for its decision to limit exports of rare earth elements crucial for German industry. These economic disagreements come as Berlin becomes comfortable with its own geopolitical assertiveness. As far as Germany is concerned, it is no longer anybody’s chessboard. It is beginning to see itself as one of the world powers again — with grand strategies, pawns to sacrifice and everything else that goes along with the title of a chess grand master.
  • anonymous on 10 Nov 10
     
    "German Defense Minister Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg said on Tuesday that Germans as a nation "must really do something to articulate the relationship between regional security and economic interests without coming to deadlock." Guttenberg cited China's decision to limit rare earth element exports as an example of how competition for resources with the emerging powers could negatively affect Germany's economic well-being. In other words, Guttenberg made a direct link between Berlin's economic and security policies. In any other country such a link is obvious and often reiterated by policymakers, but when German President Horst Koehler expressed similar sentiments in May, he was forced to resign a week later due to criticism that he was overstepping his constitutional bounds (the presidency in Germany is a ceremonial position and one of Europe's constitutionally weakest head-of-state institutions). "
anonymous

Who Fears the Russian Bear? - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...0101207_who_fears_russian_bear

geopolitics russia

shared by anonymous on 08 Dec 10 - Cached
  • Rogozin was being sardonic for dramatic effect — Moscow is not actually surprised that NATO has an active war plan against it. Russia completed joint exercises — called “Zapad” (meaning west in Russian) — with Belarus at the end of 2009 that placed 13,000 troops on the borders of the Baltic states and had as its supposed aim the simulation of the liberation of Kaliningrad from NATO forces.
  • And ultimately, Western European — and specifically German — lobbying for inclusion of Russia as a “strategic partner” should be the writing on the wall for the region: Its fate was to either adopt a neutral posture and accept Russian security hegemony or keep being pressured by Moscow.
  • Poland feels spurned, especially by Washington’s decision first to pull out on the initial ballistic missile defense (BMD) plans in September 2009 and then, on a rotational basis, to deploy an unarmed Patriot missile battery to the country with a minimal contingent of 20-30 personnel, when Warsaw hoped for an armed deployment with a more robust — and more importantly, permanent — U.S. military presence.
  • ...3 more annotations...
  • If we understand Tusk correctly, he essentially hints that the current public Polish-American relationship is an “illusion” and that, in reality, the U.S. security guarantees are insufficient.
  • To Americans, Poland looks like a country with no options. Sure, it feels spurned, but where will the Poles turn? As it did prior to WWII, Germany is making deals with Russia, and French and British security guarantees are unreliable. The United States, remembering its history of fighting wars to defend small allies for the sake of its credibility, would say that the Poles should know better than to doubt American guarantees.
  • Poland is not going to cease being an American ally — not considering its current geopolitical circumstances. But Polish officials also do not have the luxury of dismissing American horse-trading with the Russians over Polish security.
  • anonymous on 08 Dec 10
     
    "The global focus on Tuesday returned to the North European Plain, specifically east of the Oder and north of the Pripyat Marshes, where Russia, Poland, Belarus and the three Baltic states continue to share what is the geopolitical version of an awkward Soviet-era communal apartment. Russian envoy to NATO Dmitri Rogozin, referring to the leaked U.S. diplomatic cables revealing NATO plans to defend the three Baltic states from Russia, asked that the plans be formally withdrawn at the next NATO-Russia meeting. Rogozin pointed out that the recently penned NATO 2010 Strategic Concept speaks of a "true strategic partnership" - a direct quote from the mission statement - between the alliance and Russia and that the supposed "anti-Russian" military plan to defend the Baltics is incompatible with the document. Referring to the plan, Rogozin rhetorically asked, "Against who else could such a defense be intended? Against Sweden, Finland, Greenland, Iceland, against polar bears, or against the Russian bear?""
anonymous

The U.S. Withdrawal From Iraq - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...al_coverage_us_withdrawal_iraq

geopolitics middle east

shared by anonymous on 05 Mar 10 - Cached
  • The United States plans to withdraw all combat forces from Iraq by the end of 2011, with the drawdown slated to accelerate following the March 7 parliamentary elections. However, those elections could upset the fragile political situation that has held in Baghdad for five years, albeit with considerable U.S. oversight. Internal ethno-sectarian tensions and external forces with interests in Iraq also threaten to complicate matters. STRATFOR examines the factors that could affect the withdrawal and determine the fate of the region for years to come.
  • The United States is attempting to roll back its military commitment to Iraq substantially, not only to extract itself from Iraq but also to better focus its resources and efforts in Afghanistan. It has done all it can militarily and is essentially waiting out the durability of domestic political circumstances in the country during and following the elections. In other words, the U.S. military is no longer the keeper of the peace in Iraq. The elections and following transition of power will be a test of whether the Iraqis can keep the peace themselves, and the U.S. withdrawal may depend on how the Iraqis answer that test.
anonymous

The Netanyahu-Obama Meeting in Strategic Context - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...netanyahuobama_meeting_context

geopolitics

shared by anonymous on 23 Mar 10 - Cached
  • The polemics in this case are not the point. The issue is more fundamental: namely, the degree to which U.S. and Israeli relations converge and diverge. This is not a matter of friendship but, as in all things geopolitical, of national interest. It is difficult to discuss U.S. and Israeli interests objectively, as the relationship is clouded with endless rhetoric and simplistic formulations. It is thus difficult to know where to start, but two points of entry into this controversy come to mind.
  • The first is the idea that anti-Americanism in the Middle East has its roots in U.S. support for Israel, a point made by those in the United States and abroad who want the United States to distance itself from Israel. The second is that the United States has a special strategic relationship with Israel and a mutual dependency. Both statements have elements of truth, but neither is simply true — and both require much more substantial analysis. In analyzing them, we begin the process of trying to disentangle national interests from rhetoric.
  • Arab anti-Americanism predates significant U.S. support for Israel.
  • ...8 more annotations...
  • the United States was not actively involved in supporting Israel prior to 1967, yet anti-Americanism in the Arab world was rampant. The Arabs might have blamed the United States for Israel, but there was little empirical basis for this claim.
    • anonymous
      anonymous on 26 Mar 10
       
      This is important for anyone pointing at American policy toward Isreal and claiming a causal relationship.
  • American grand strategy has always been derived from British grand strategy. The United States seeks to maintain regional balances of power in order to avoid the emergence of larger powers that can threaten U.S. interests.
  • Note that the United States is interested in maintaining the balance of power. This means that the U.S. interest is in a stable set of relations, with no one power becoming excessively powerful and therefore unmanageable by the United States.
  • The United States, given its overwhelming challenges, is neither interested in Israel’s desire to reshape its region, nor can it tolerate any more risk deriving from Israel’s actions. However small the risks might be, the United States is maxed out on risk.
  • Therefore, Israel’s interests and that of the United States diverge. Israel sees an opportunity; the United States sees more risk.
  • It may not be the most persuasive threat, but the fact is that Israel cannot afford any threat from the United States, such as an end to the intense U.S.-Israeli bilateral relationship. While this relationship might not be essential to Israel at the moment, it is one of the foundations of Israeli grand strategy in the long run. Just as the United States cannot afford any more instability in the region at the moment, so Israel cannot afford any threat, however remote, to its relationship with the United States.
  • What is clear in all this is that the statement that Israel and the United States are strategic partners is not untrue, it is just vastly more complicated than it appears.
  • Israel has an interest in housing in East Jerusalem. The United States does not. This frames the conversation between Netanyahu and Obama. The rest is rhetoric.
anonymous

Germany: Looking for Bismarck - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...00325_germany_looking_bismarck

geopolitics military germany

shared by anonymous on 29 Mar 10 - Cached
  • According to the draft circulated on Thursday at the two-day EU heads of government summit, Greece would indeed be offered a financial aid package of around 22 billion euro, but only after Athens was no longer able to raise funds by selling its bonds in the international markets, and even then at above-market rates, entirely obviating the point of the bailout. That is akin to offering a homeowner, who is about to default on a mortgage, a refinancing offer that equals or increases his mortgage rates above the rate he already cannot pay.
  • The proposal may very well push Athens to pursue an International Monetary Fund package independent of the eurozone, which could be the intention of Berlin perhaps looking to wash its hands of the entire problem.
  • Germany essentially has a limited window of opportunity in the next 10 years to make or break its leadership of the European Union and therefore its claim to global relevancy. Germany’s birth rate is lower than all of the major European powers that surround it (France, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Sweden), while its population is significantly older than that of Poland.
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • The ultimate problem for Germany is that the moment the rest of Europe perceives that Berlin is looking out solely for its own national interests — such as when it refuses to put up money to save a eurozone member state — it ceases to be a viable European leader.
  • But the clock is ticking, and Europe’s demographic challenges are right around the corner. At that point, all of Europe will be so embroiled in domestic political, economic and social concerns that settling issues of leadership and power will be impossible, and that is if the EU even survives the coming crisis.
  • anonymous on 29 Mar 10
     
    The Geopolitical Diary entry (at StratFor) for March 26, 2010.
anonymous

Health care reform: A simple explanation, updated - 0 views

politifact.com/...orm-simple-explanation-updated

healthcare layscience scientificadmin partisan politics

shared by anonymous on 16 Apr 10 - Cached
  • The Senate bill does not require employers to offer insurance, but it does impose taxes on employers if they don't offer insurance and their employees qualify for new health insurance tax credits.
  • regulate the exchanges so that insurance companies couldn't discriminate against people with pre-existing conditions, or charge wildly different amounts for similar coverage.
  • Insurers would have to cover preventive care, and they wouldn't be able to cut off coverage unfairly or set annual limits on benefits.
  • ...13 more annotations...
  • expands eligibility for insurance programs like Medicaid and the state Children's Health Insurance Program. All poor people would qualify for Medicaid.
  • People who don't buy insurance would have to pay a penalty on their taxes. Under the Senate bill, the share of legal nonelderly residents with insurance coverage is expected to rise from about 83 percent currently to about 94 percent.
  • promote standardized electronic health records
  • A comparative effectiveness research center would conduct and publish scientific research to find which treatments are the most effective.
  • the new rules aim to pay doctors for good patient outcomes instead of paying them per procedure, also called "fee-for-service."
  • For the large group market, the CBO found that rates would either stay the same or decline slightly. For the small group market, rates would essentially stay the same as well. The individual market is a more complicated story
  • Covering millions of people who are now uninsured would cost billions more per year.
  • Critics say the Democratic plans would lead to health care rationing.
  • The public option is an insurance plan run by the government that individuals can choose over private insurance.
  • The more generous the benefits, the higher the costs.
  • The House measure put more restrictions on how insurers could offer coverage for abortion services.
  • the CBO warns that it's very difficult to put dollar figures on many of these things, because of the size of the health care industry and the inherent unpredictability of major policy changes over many years.
  • It's good to keep in mind that when it comes to health care reform, no one has a crystal ball.
  • anonymous on 16 Apr 10
     
    From Politifact. A basic explanation.
anonymous

On Closing the Culture Gap - 0 views

seedmagazine.com/...on_closing_the_culture_gap

layscience longnow

shared by anonymous on 09 Apr 10 - Cached
  • acquiring a fundamental understanding of cultural evolution just might be the key to saving civilization from itself.
  • No living person knows even a billionth of the cultural information possessed by humanity. No reader of Seed could assemble a 747 from its parts, let alone tell how each part was manufactured, where, and from what.
    • anonymous
      anonymous on 09 Apr 10
       
      This is what The Long Now is dedicated toward: a repository of essential knowledge for our species.
  • The discourse would emphasize that our brilliant, dominant species has undermined its own life-support systems. It now faces a daunting array of self-generated threats, ones that the human family could cooperatively organize to fight and, with luck, overcome by avoiding the first collapse of a global civilization.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • Climate change, biodiversity loss, nuclear conflict—all are caused by human activity. We need a way to reorganize and refocus the sciences and humanities with a “Millennium Assessment of Human Behavior.”
  • anonymous on 09 Apr 10
     
    By Paul Ehrlich in Seed Magazine on April 8, 2010.
anonymous

Goldman Sachs and Boomer morality - 0 views

blog.lifecourse.com/...dman-sachs-and-boomer-morality

generations

shared by anonymous on 28 Apr 10 - Cached
  • I would wager to say that, back in the 1960s and 1970s, nothing infuriated Boomers more about how the American economy was run than the idea that powerful greasy old men, dressed in oversize pin-striped suits and hidden away in smoke-filled rooms, essentially made all the strategic decisions about where capital would flow and (therefore) what would be produced and consumed.  These anonymous titans, from their “commanding heights,” claimed they exercised prudent and responsible judgment, but their very paternalism just infuriated us more.  We wanted to blow it all up.
  • And guess, what?  We succeeded.  The ascendancy of Boomers as voters and leaders since the late 1970s has coincided with a radical deregulation of our economy, especially in those areas, like investment and finance, where trusted “fiduciaries” were supposed to take care of others.  In the new Boomer world, the market was the great leveler and everyone was liberated to take care of themselves.
  • Boomers should stifle their shock.  It’s like being bothered by the sight of Bill Clinton caught with his fly open.  Boomers have taken America all the way here on that whole long crazy trip of theirs.  And now they have to accept the consequences.
  • anonymous on 28 Apr 10
     
    By Neil Howe at Lifecourse Blog on April 23, 2010.
anonymous

U.K.: Electoral Uncertainty Looms - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...uk_electoral_uncertainty_looms

geopolitics

shared by anonymous on 06 May 10 - Cached
  • Britons go to the polls May 6 to cast their votes in what is expected to be one of the closest elections in decades. While polls indicate the conservatives are favored over the ruling Labour Party and the insurgent Liberal Democrats, it is possible that a hung parliament or a weak coalition government could take office, coming at a time when Britain desperately needs strong leadership out of its economic doldrums.
  • The close electoral race has plunged the United Kingdom into a national debate about the possibility that no party will have an absolute majority with which to form a government, a scenario referred to as a “hung parliament.”
  • The electoral system employed in the United Kingdom is referred to as “first-past-the-post” — essentially a winner-takes-all system in which electoral districts elect individual members of parliament.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • The lack of experience governing with hung parliaments in the United Kingdom’s political culture — not to mention the non-existence of inter-party dialogue necessary for coalition-formation to take place — only heightens the sense of uncertainty around the outcome for the election.
  • anonymous on 06 May 10
     
    By Stratfor on May 6, 2010.
anonymous

Germany: Creating Economic Governance - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...y_creating_economic_governance

geopolitics

shared by anonymous on 18 May 10 - Cached
  • Berlin has written some very large checks to ameliorate the economic crisis — Germany’s combined contributions to the Greek bailout and the eurozone rescue fund are about 151 billion euros ($192 billion), not counting the German portions of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) contributions — but in return, Germany wants to redefine how the eurozone is run.
  • The EU project has its roots in the end of World War II and the beginning of the Cold War. As originally conceived it had two purposes. The first was to lock Germany into an economic alliance with its neighbors that would make future wars between Western Europeans not only politically unpalatable but also economically disastrous. The second was to provide a politico-economic foundation for a Western Europe already unified under NATO in a military/security alliance led by the United States against the Soviet Union. The memory of World War II provided the moral impetus for European integration, while the Cold War largely provided the geopolitical context.
  • As STRATFOR has said, the eurozone had a political logic but was economically flawed from the start.
  • ...6 more annotations...
  • the eurozone has thus far been exceedingly economically beneficial to Germany. Berlin’s 151 billion euro contribution to the two bailout funds pales in comparison to the overall boost in exports that Berlin has received since forging the eurozone.
  • Furthermore, if the euro were to fragment or disintegrate, the EU would essentially end as a serious political force. Currencies are only as stable as the political systems that underpin them.
  • A collapse of a currency — such as those in Germany in 1923, Yugoslavia in 1994, and Zimbabwe in 2008 — is really just a symptom of the underlying deterioration of the political system and is usually followed closely by exactly such a political crisis.
  • The immediacy of the crisis is the impetus for such radical changes to Europe’s “economic governance.” French President Nicolas Sarkozy actually proposed something similar in the wake of the September 2008 crisis, but Berlin sternly rejected him at the time. The crisis that has followed, however, has changed Germany’s mind.
  • The bottom line is that Germany and other member states are shelling out cash and breaking EU treaties because it is in their national interests to do so at this particular moment. If they are to institutionalize such rules for the long term, it is inevitable that they will be broken once national interests revert back to the standard concerns of sovereignty over fiscal policy.
  • Once Germany has paid for its leadership of Europe, will it also be willing to enforce its leadership with direct punitive actions? And if it does, how will its neighbors react?
  • anonymous on 18 May 10
     
    May 14, 2010
anonymous

Russia: The Fate of Conscription - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...00520_russia_fate_conscription

geopolitics

shared by anonymous on 20 May 10 - Cached
  • Russian Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov was quoted May 19 as saying that Russia could not professionalize its military with contract soldiers.
  • The Russian military has long been large and conscripted. Even today, almost half of Russia’s 395,000-strong active duty army is drafted — and despite significant reforms like dropping the period of conscription from two years to one, the living and working conditions for a Russian conscript remain notoriously abysmal.
  • Stretching from the International Dateline to Europe, Russia spans most of the eastern hemisphere and suffers from extremely long, essentially indefensible borders.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • it is difficult to overstate the depth and complexity of the challenge of military reform in Russia. At every turn, reformists must overcome entrenched vested interests within the military and rigid, outdated paradigms. Even if they accomplish this, they must then face the perennial Russian challenge of defending the indefensible. If Russia can no longer afford or populate a large standing army, it must have one that is more agile and capable.
  • anonymous on 20 May 10
     
    May 20, 2010
anonymous

Europe: The New Plan - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...20101220-europe-new-plan

europe geopolitics euro

shared by anonymous on 21 Dec 10 - Cached
  • the euro, has suffered from two core problems
  • the lack of a parallel political union
  • the issue of debt
  • ...20 more annotations...
  • Taxation and appropriation — who pays how much to whom — are essentially political acts. One cannot have a centralized fiscal authority without first having a centralized political/military authority capable of imposing and enforcing its will.
  • the checkbook is not the ultimate power in the galaxy. The ultimate power comes from the law backed by a gun.
  • Americans fought the bloodiest war in their history from 1861 to 1865 over the issue of central power versus local power.
  • Northern Europe is composed of advanced technocratic economies, made possible by the capital-generating capacity of the well-watered North European Plain and its many navigable rivers
  • a people that identifies with its brethren throughout the river valleys and in other areas linked by what is typically omnipresent infrastructure. This crafts a firm identity at the national level rather than local level and assists with mass-mobilization strategies.
  • Southern Europe, in comparison, suffers from an arid, rugged topography and lack of navigable rivers.
  • identity is more localized; southern Europeans tend to be more concerned with family and town than nation, since they do not benefit from easy transport options or the regular contact that northern Europeans take for granted.
  • southern European economies are highly dependent upon a weak currency
  • While states of this grouping often plan together for EU summits, in reality the only thing they have in common is a half-century of lost ground to recover, and they need as much capital as can be made available.
  • European Union is now made up of 27 different nationalities
  • With Europe having such varied geographies, economies and political systems, any political and fiscal union would be fraught with complications and policy mis-prescriptions from the start. In short, this is a defect of the euro that is not going to be corrected, and to be blunt, it isn’t one that the Europeans are trying to fix right now.
  • The ECB’s primary (and only partially stated) mission is to foster long-term stable growth in the eurozone’s largest economy — Germany — working from the theory that what is good for the continent’s economic engine is good for Europe.
  • Smaller, poorer economies are more volatile, since even tiny changes in the international environment can send them through either the floor or the roof.
  • The question is not “whither the euro” but how to provide a safety net for the euro’s less desirable, debt-related aftereffects.
  • When the not-so-desperate eurozone states step in with a few billion euros — 223 billion euros so far, to be exact — they want not only their money back but also some assurance that such overindulgences will not happen again.
  • The second is that the Dec. 16 agreement is only an agreement in principle.
  • Three complications exist,
  • First, when a bailout is required, it is clearly because something has gone terribly wrong.
  • The third complication is that the bailout mechanism is actually only half the plan. The other half is to allow states to at least partially default on their debt
  • tates that just squeaked by in 2010 must run a more difficult gauntlet in 2011 — particularly if they depend heavily on foreign investors for funding their budget deficits.
  • anonymous on 21 Dec 10
     
    "Europe is on the cusp of change. An EU heads-of-state summit Dec. 16 launched a process aimed to save the common European currency. If successful, this process would be the most significant step toward creating a singular European power since the creation of the European Union itself in 1992 - that is, if it doesn't destroy the euro first."
anonymous

Clive Thompson on How Tweets and Texts Nurture In-Depth Analysis - 0 views

www.wired.com/...st_thompson_short_long

criticalthinking media internet

shared by anonymous on 20 Jan 11 - Cached
  • The long take is the opposite: It’s a deeply considered report and analysis, and it often takes weeks, months, or years to produce. It used to be that only traditional media, like magazines or documentaries or books, delivered the long take. But now, some of the most in-depth stuff I read comes from academics or businesspeople penning big blog essays, Dexter fans writing 5,000-word exegeses of the show, and nonprofits like the Pew Charitable Trusts producing exhaustively researched reports on American life.
  • The real loser here is the middle take.
  • This is what the weeklies like Time and Newsweek have historically offered: reportage and essays produced a few days after major events, with a bit of analysis sprinkled on top. They’re neither fast enough to be conversational nor slow enough to be truly deep. The Internet has essentially demonstrated how unsatisfying that sort of thinking can be.
  • anonymous on 20 Jan 11
     
    "We're often told that the Internet has destroyed people's patience for long, well-thought-out arguments. After all, the ascendant discussions of our day are text messages, tweets, and status updates. The popularity of this endless fire hose of teensy utterances means we've lost our appetite for consuming-and creating-slower, reasoned contemplation. Right? I'm not so sure. In fact, I think something much more complex and interesting is happening: The torrent of short-form thinking is actually a catalyst for more long-form meditation."
anonymous

Airport Attack Highlights Russia's Deeply Embedded Issues - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...russias-deeply-embedded-issues

geopolitics russia

shared by anonymous on 25 Jan 11 - Cached
  • Moscow faces a deeper-rooted problem than what must currently be done about Chechnya or Dagestan — and that problem is Russia’s inherent indefensibility and insecurity.
  • Russia, though vast in size, has few geographic barriers separating and protecting it from surrounding nations. Lacking well-placed oceans or mountains, Russia has throughout history had to essentially create these barriers in the form of buffer states by dominating various nations, whether it be Estonia or Tajikistan or somewhere in between.
  • The mountainous terrain has bred ethnic groups like Chechens, Ingush and Dagestanis that have a warrior-like and clan-based mentality and are especially opposed to taking orders from Moscow.
  • anonymous on 25 Jan 11
     
    "Moscow witnessed another act of terrorism on Monday as a suicide bomber detonated an explosive device and killed dozens of people at Domodedovo International, Russia's busiest airport. All signs point to the attacker hailing from one of the republics of the restless Northern Caucasus, likely either Chechnya or Dagestan, where Islamist militant-fueled violence and instability are regular occurrences. Monday's attack marks the second time in less than one year that such militants have struck beyond their unstable republics and into Russia's bustling capital, more than 1,000 miles away."
anonymous

Why Fukushima made me stop worrying and love nuclear power - 0 views

www.guardian.co.uk/...pro-nuclear-japan-fukushima

shared by anonymous on 22 Mar 11 - Cached
  • A crappy old plant with inadequate safety features was hit by a monster earthquake and a vast tsunami. The electricity supply failed, knocking out the cooling system. The reactors began to explode and melt down. The disaster exposed a familiar legacy of poor design and corner-cutting. Yet, as far as we know, no one has yet received a lethal dose of radiation.
  • But energy is like medicine: if there are no side-effects, the chances are that it doesn't work.
  • And how do we drive our textile mills, brick kilns, blast furnaces and electric railways – not to mention advanced industrial processes? Rooftop solar panels? The moment you consider the demands of the whole economy is the moment at which you fall out of love with local energy production. A national (or, better still, international) grid is the essential prerequisite for a largely renewable energy supply.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • But the energy source to which most economies will revert if they shut down their nuclear plants is not wood, water, wind or sun, but fossil fuel. On every measure (climate change, mining impact, local pollution, industrial injury and death, even radioactive discharges) coal is 100 times worse than nuclear power. Thanks to the expansion of shale gas production, the impacts of natural gas are catching up fast.
  • anonymous on 22 Mar 11
     
    "You will not be surprised to hear that the events in Japan have changed my view of nuclear power. You will be surprised to hear how they have changed it. As a result of the disaster at Fukushima, I am no longer nuclear-neutral. I now support the technology."
« First ‹ Previous 61 - 80 of 94 Next ›
Showing 20▼ items per page