Today is a milestone in the Big Dig project, as the underground tunnel is now open and connecting to the Zakim bridge. It’s exciting to see years of construction come to fruition, even if the project is not finished. All the same, it’s hard for me not to feel that the accomplishment, while impressive, isn’t […]
OK, I know I pooh-poohed mainstream gay politics a couple of weeks ago for confusing the stakes between material and symbolic fights. Now I’m riveted by the drama of the Supreme Court’s sodomy law hearing. The American Prospect has a thorough run-down:
Rehnquist then asked whether Smith was saying that a state couldn’t pass a law […]
The combination of the Big Dig rerouting, chemical terrorism scare at Park Street and track switching problems conspired to make yesterday a day of hour commutes on the T. Perhaps some people won’t have much sympathy, having longer commutes themselves, but at 4 miles from downtown I could walk in that amount of time. […]
I read in Slate that a group of historians (led by George Chauncy) has filed an amicus brief for the appellants in the current Supreme Court case on Texas’ sodomy law. It’s an interesting application of gay historiography, including its constructionist and Foucauldian view of sexuality, to the legal issue of anti-sodomy legislation. Essentially, […]
Mark Tran, business editor of the Guardian, has a piece today on the risks that the American economy and empire is on the verge of collapse. “It takes a brave soul to argue that America, the world’s largest economy and by far its most potent military power, is about to go into decline, when it […]
Will the Iraqis rise up to cheer the Anglo-American forces (let’s stop calling them “coalition forces”) or will they see the U.S. particularly as colonialist invaders? Part of the problem in answering the question is that we have no trustworthy account; conservatives and Iraqi ex-pats are eager to see proof that Saddam needed to be […]
As Robert Byrd said today, Bush’ bill for war costs is only a downpayment. How else do we make sense of the $ 3.5 Billion slated for Iraqi relief and reconstruction? It sounds like a lot, but here’s the rough breakdown (from the OMB website): $1B for oil field repair, $1.7B for infrastructure repair, […]
Matthew, of a cross-town blog, has a survey of NYC anti-war protestors. Probably not completely scientific sampling at only 200 entries, but still interesting. The results confirm my suspicions that many of the anti-war left don’t object to the specifics of this war as to any war the U.S. might engage in, including our 2001 […]
The Globe reveals today that Romney’s restructuring plans for UMass drew upon a commissioned study by Bain Consulting (Romney’s former company). They summarize the report, though I’m left wanting more detail of what it says:
Romney aides point to Bain’s analysis of the University of Massachusetts at Boston as characteristically ‘’eye opening’’ for the governor and […]
I know many have been too occupied with international events to pay much attention to local news - and the Globe’s Metro section does seem thin lately - but an excellent article on Massachusetts housing problem in Commonwealth magazine (free registration required) is worth the read. Not only does it trace the issue through the […]
In all the reaction to Michael Moore’s Oscar acceptance speech, people seem to be focusing on whether he was right or wrong, appropriate in tone or not. I have another question: how is it that Moore - the man who made his career claiming that the liberals are too often humorless and demonstrating through his […]
There has been talk (encouraged by Josh Marshall’s article in The Hill) about the differences between postwar reconstruction of Germany and Japan and the possibility of rehabilitating Iraq as a democracy. Joseph Nye’s piece in the Globe today, for instance, argues that “conditions in the Middle East today are not like Germany and Japan in […]
I received an email from a friend (it seems to be making the Internet rounds) featuring safety hazard icons from the ready.gov website, with satirical text accompanying them. If you haven’t seen them, you should take a look at the website directly (like here or here or here). Even without satirical gloss, the drawings are […]
To help Israel weather their recent economic crisis, the Bush administration, according to the BBC, has promised $1B in direct military aid and $9B in loan guarantees. This, at a time when the federal budget doesn’t have one extra cent to help American states and cities in their fiscal crises, which are universal, deep-reaching, and […]
Just some figures that seem relevant: According to the OMB’s historical budget publication, in 2001, over 20% ($308.5 B) of our on-budget federal outlays went to the military. And that was before any buildup for Iraq. The figure being tossed around in the press is closer to $400B for our current yearly military spending. And […]