The Economist this week lays out the problems facing our defenses against bioterrorism. It notes that the science behind vaccination and chemical antidotes is difficult, but that the difficulties are compounded by the disincentives for private companies to develop and sell such treatments. On the one hand, liability makes firms skittish, because the potential risk […]
One thing that has struck me about the Iraq debate in the last week is the way conservatives have gone on the attack against anti-war liberals and leftists by arguing that the peace movement is protecting a dictator that anyone concerned with human rights (i.e. liberals) should abhor. David Brooks was most forceful on this […]
People do seem to be weighing in rather thoughtfully on Romney’s televised address on Wednesday. But I couldn’t concentrate on the policy implications of the budget crisis with those two family portraits looming prominently in the mid-ground. Clearly placed so to generate warm fuzzy feelings, they immediately made me worry that the dreadful Mitt-meets-Ann TV […]
The New Republic this week has a profile of sorts of the leading Dem presidential contenders in Iowa. Using an appearance before NARAL, it argues that all of them are shamelessly pandering to traditional Democratic constituencies:
So when the six Democratic presidential candidates spoke before a core Democratic interest group, NARAL Pro-Choice America, Tuesday night, one […]
I may have missed an article yesterday, but it seems that the Globe is just coming round to the Herald’s reporting (here and here) of a mini-scandal at the MBTA. It’s amazing that this story hasn’t gotten bigger play: it turns out that two T officials, one the general manager, took well-appointed jobs with a […]
It remains to be seen if Bush will pull a rabbit out of the hat with a well-delivered State of the Union address tonight. Word is that he won’t spend much time putting forth the case for Iraq (which hopefully I’ll be able to get around to discussing here in a day or two), but […]
Today’s Globe has a depressing article about the attempts of some guppie residents of Bay Village to close down Jacques, the only drag bar in town, on the grounds that it encourages prostitution and drug use and makes the neighborhood unfit for raising children. The article interviews one gay lawyer (who wishes to adopt), and […]
The Globe’s Ideas section weighed in on Gangs of New York, arguing that the film a) gets history wrong - common complaint and b) that it would have been better to make a film about 18th century Boston mobs as the founding of our nation.
But if Scorsese and his handlers at Miramax had […]
Has anyone noticed that the Clonaid equipment looks suspiciously like an Easy Bake oven?
An op-ed on the Brookings Institution site blasts the Dems for not taking on the problem of government reform. As its author, Paul Light, writes,
Much as it prides itself on being the party of federal workers, the Democratic Party has become the champion of the mid-level managers and poor performers who thrive in a seniority-based […]
The PBS News Hour had a discussion last night on the recent study of alcohol consumption in men and incidence of heart attack. (It’s available in RealAudio from their website). As usual, the study (in the New England Journal of Medicine) was taken up by health journalists - particularly those on the HealthWatch local TV […]
Despite the self-conscious ruminations of Adaptaion, it’s The Hours that seems to be a textbook problem in adapting a book to the big screen. Only this despite itself. Rule No. 1 in adaptation is Avoid Voiceover Narration. The screenwriter should be able to show what goes on, not merely describe it in words. Perhaps what’s […]
A good article in Sunday’s NY Times dispels the myth of the “marriage penalty” in our tax code. The author, Edmund Andrews, points out that married couples with only won income earner and more than one child fare the best, while single parents and two-income couples fare worse. And behind it - and behind Bush’s […]
Was pleased to read in the Metro yesterday that John Carroll of Greater Boston has a show of his own in the pipeline, Beacon Hill Beat. Not only does Carroll strive to make policy interesting and understandable, but he provides no small part of Greater Boston’s humor. I look forward to seeing what the show […]
Yesterday the Globe had a fascinating piece on gay-driven gentrification in Detroit. Like a lot of cities, Detroit has a section, Ferndale, in which the gay ghetto has turned a down-at-the-heels area into a middle-class part of town. There’s nothing new or particularly interesting about the idea that a gay presence can serve as the […]