RadioActive with Steve Mitton: November 2010

Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Obama No Longer Insane

Narcissistic personality disorder, characterized by an inflated sense of self-importance and the need for constant attention, has been eliminated from the upcoming manual of mental disorders, which psychiatrists use to diagnose mental illness.

As Charles Zanor reports in today’s Science Times, the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders — due out in 2013 and known as D.S.M.-5 — has eliminated five of the 10 personality disorders that are listed in the current edition. The best known of these is narcissistic personality disorder.

It is a puzzle why the manual’s committee on personality disorders has decided to throw N.P.D. off the bus. Many experts in the field are not happy about it….One of the sharpest critics of the D.S.M. committee on personality disorders is a Harvard psychiatrist, Dr. John Gunderson, an old lion in the field of personality disorders and the person who led the personality disorders committee for the current manual.

WikiLeaks Fallout: Should Hillary Clinton Resign?

hould Hillary Clinton resign as secretary of state due to the WikiLeaks revelations? My friend Jack Shafer at Slate makes a good case. His reason: Clinton, like predecessor Condoleezza Rice, signed orders instructing U.S. foreign service officers to spy on the diplomats of other nations. Cables went out under her name telling State Department officials overseas to collect the fingerprints, facial images, DNA, and iris scans of African leaders, to obtain passwords, credit card numbers, and frequent flyer accounts used by foreign diplomats, and to gather private information on United Nations officials, including Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

Diplomats are not spies (though spies do pose as diplomats). They do collect information -- by working contacts overseas, reviewing the local media, interacting with the population of the nations where they are stationed -- often acquiring intelligence that is as valuable, if not more so, than the secrets snatched by intelligence officials. But there is a line between a diplomat and a spook. The former uses aboveboard methods to find out what his or her government needs to know about other nations; the latter resorts to espionage, wiretaps, bribery, and other underhanded means. There are many reasons for keeping the two roles distinct. Diplomats are awarded immunity and can gain certain access overseas because they are not spies.

The senior American diplomat at the UN tonight defended her team after WikiLeaks disclosed a US spying operation targeting the UN's secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon, and members of the security council.

Susan Rice, the US ambassador appointed to the UN by Barack Obama last year, appeared uncomfortable and, at times, exasperated as she took questions from the media at the UN today.

She denied US diplomats were engaged in spying. "Let me be very clear: our diplomats are just that," she said. "They are diplomats. That is what they do every day. They get out and work with partners here at the UN and around the world."

Clinton probed Argentine leader's 'nerves,' 'anxiety,' 'stress'

Seeking a frank evaluation of Argentina's president, the office of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asked the U.S. Embassy in Buenos Aires late last year to delve into her psyche.

"How is Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner managing her nerves and anxiety?" asked a cable dated Dec. 31, 2009, and signed "CLINTON" in all capital letters.

The cable, sent at 2:55 p.m. on New Year's Eve, and originating in the department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research, asked a series of other probing questions as part of what it said was an attempt by her office to understand "leadership dynamics" between Kirchner and her husband, former President Nestor Kirchner.

AP Enterprise: Guards shown watching inmate attack

The surveillance video from the overhead cameras shows Hanni Elabed being beaten by a fellow inmate in an Idaho prison, managing to bang on a prison guard station window, pleading for help. Behind the glass, correctional officers look on, but no one intervenes when Elabed is knocked unconscious.

No one steps into the cellblock when the attacker sits down to rest, and no one stops him when he resumes the beating.

Videos of the attack obtained by The Associated Press show officers watching the beating for several minutes. The footage is a key piece of evidence for critics who claim the privately run Idaho Correctional Center uses inmate-on-inmate violence to force prisoners to snitch on their cellmates or risk being moved to extremely violent units.

On Tuesday, hours after the AP published the video, the top federal prosecutor in Idaho told the AP that the FBI has been investigating whether guards violated the civil rights of inmates at the prison, which is run by the Corrections Corporation of America.

The investigation concerns the prison's rate of violence and covers multiple assaults between inmates, including the attack on Elabed, U.S. Attorney Wendy Olson said.

Correctional center spokesman Steve Owen said the company is cooperating with federal agents, as it has with other law enforcement overseeing the prisons.

Lawsuits from inmates contend the company denies prisoners medical treatment as a way of covering up the assaults. They have dubbed the Idaho lockup "gladiator school" because it is so violent.

Tea Party May Target Major Companies That Back Obama Agenda, Poll Shows

According to a new poll, Tea Party activists and conservatives are willing to put their money where their mouths are and stop purchasing products from companies that promote President Barack Obama’s agenda.

The results of the survey led the pollster to conclude that Tea Partiers could “realistically” lead a boycott of such companies.

The poll was commissioned by the National Center for Public Policy Research and FreedomWorks, the latter a conservative organization whose chairman, Dick Armey, is often closely associated with the Tea Party movement.

Back in June Chancellor Angela Merkel introduced an austerity package for Germany, which has Europe’s largest economy, that included a proposed $84 billion in spending cuts by 2014 while avoiding tax hikes. Labor activists in the country protested the cuts and the Obama administration urged Germany to engage in a program of government “stimulus” spending instead, but on Thursday the BBC reported that full employment may well be possible in Germany soon:

Germany’s economy minister Rainer Bruederle has given an upbeat assessment of his country’s recovery, including the assertion that “full employment will soon be possible”.

He said that Germans were “doing well and spending again”, and that domestic consumption was strong.

Data released this week showed German business confidence at a 20-year high.

German optimism is in marked contrast with the gloom engulfing some European economies struggling with high debts.

Second World War Rationing: Cancun climate change summit: scientists call for rationing in developed world

In a series of papers published by the Royal Society, physicists and chemists from some of world’s most respected scientific institutions, including Oxford University and the Met Office, agreed that current plans to tackle global warming are not enough.

Unless emissions are reduced dramatically in the next ten years the world is set to see temperatures rise by more than 4C (7.2F) by as early as the 2060s, causing floods, droughts and mass migration.

Washington Set to Control Your Light Switch

Ever since this continent was electrificated, Americans have been allowed to plug anything they want into their own electrical outlet.

The history of electricity is a biography of modernism. Originally intended just to light homes, electric power was soon used to run sewing machines, fans, teakettles, and toasters. According to Dr. Rachel P. Maines the fifth electrical appliance to be invented, was a device to treat hysteria (which is used in more homes today, than sewing machines and electric teakettles). Shortly after hysteria was cured, electric irons and vacuum cleaners became feasible.

Following the big war, came an explosion of things you could stick into an outlet: hair driers, electric drills, popcorn poppers, and television sets Not to mention, those goofy things that have a big belt and motor and are supposed to help you lose weight by jiggling your belly.

Today a home built only a generation ago is woefully inadequate for the number of appliances that need to find a plug. Hence, there has been a great market in power-strips. In my home office, (built in 1959) I actually have one outlet branching off into four different power-strips to handle all the appliances required of my profession.

At Cancun, 'Climate Change Experts' Call for End to Developed World Economic Growth for 'The Next 20 Years'

This would be really funny if it weren't for the fact that so many supposedly informed people, including our president and those who surround him, may actually buy into ideas being proposed at the United Nations-sponsored Cancun climate conference, and will relish the means by which they could be put into place.

At the UK Telegraph today, environment correspondent Louise Gray feeds us the following headline and sub-headline:

Cancun climate change summit: scientists call for rationing in developed world

Global warming is now such a serious threat to mankind that climate change experts are calling for Second World War-style rationing in rich countries to bring down carbon emissions.

From all appearances, such rationing would last at least two decades, during which there would be, by design, no economic growth. Zero, zip, nada.

Here are selected paragraphs from Gray's grouse (bolds and number tags are mine):

In a series of papers published by the Royal Society, physicists and chemists from some of world’s most respected scientific institutions, including Oxford University and the Met Office, agreed that current plans to tackle global warming are not enough.

Unless emissions are reduced dramatically in the next ten years the world is set to see temperatures rise by more than 4C (7.2F) by as early as the 2060s, causing floods, droughts and mass migration. [1]

Sheriff cranks up the Christmas carols despite his cranky inmates

The self-proclaimed "toughest sheriff" in America, Phoenix's Joe Arpaio, who has survived six separate inmate lawsuits trying to stop him from playing Christmas music, will begin playing the tunes again this year - starting Monday with "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,""Frosty the Snowman" and "Feliz Navidad."

The 8,000 inmates also will hear, among others, "A Christmas Kwanzaa Solstice," "Over the Skies of Israel," "Ramadan," "Llego a La Ciudad," "Let it Snow" and "Rodolpho El Reno de la Nariz Rojita."

"Maybe the holiday music can help lift the spirits of the men and women who are away from friends and family during the holidays, not just the inmates, but the dedicated men and women who work in the Maricopa County Jails," the sheriff said in an announcement Sunday.

Home Secretary Theresa May, second left, visit the British Border Agency staff at Terminal 5 of Heathrow Airport, London, where they were shown differences between fake and real passports Tuesday Nov. 23, 2010. Britain's Home Office says it will be announcing the country's permanent immigration quota --- a new limit intended to dramatically reduce the number of non-EU nationals permitted to work in Britain. (AP Photo/ Steve Parsons, Pool)

Britain will impose a tough annual limit on the number of non-Europeans allowed to work in the country and slash visas for overseas students as it seeks to dramatically reduce immigration, the government said Tuesday.

Home Secretary Theresa May told the House of Commons that the number of non-EU nationals permitted to work in Britain from April 2011 will be capped at about 22,000 — a reduction of about one-fifth from 2009.

But thousands of people who are allowed to work in Britain on intracompany transfers aren't included in those figures — or under the new quota. Critics said that means it's unclear how Prime Minister David Cameron's government will meet a pledge to cut net immigration, which also includes students and families of visa holders, to below 100,000 by 2015, from about 196,000 last year.

How EPA Could Destroy 7.3 Million Jobs

Environmental Protection Agency officials Wednesday provided power companies and states with new guidance on EPA’s plans to regulate greenhouse gases.

A D.C. lobbyist for two major power companies told Bloomberg News that “the energy and manufacturing sectors will essentially be in a construction moratorium” as a consequence.

Here we are, with 15 million Americans unemployed and millions more underemployed, and the EPA is moving blindly ahead with new regulations that will increase dramatically the energy costs of U.S. industries, reducing their competitiveness and profitability, and making it less likely they will hire.

Why Obama and Kim Jong Il Love START Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2010/11/22/obama-kim-jong-il-heart-start/#ixzz16I4DMufJ

Even as North Korea discloses a new uranium enrichment facility and Iran moves toward a nuclear breakout, President Obama and America’s liberal foreign policy establishment are demanding ratification of a treaty that will dramatically weaken our defenses against nuclear assault.

The new U.S.-Russia START treaty being rushed through the Senate by the White House could stymie our defenses against nuclear threats from North Korea and Iran, hand Russia a tactical nuclear advantage, and further diminish our nuclear arsenal’s declining credibility.

The new treaty is meant to replace the previous START treaty between the U.S. and Russia, which expired last year. Supporters say the new pact should be ratified, which requires approval from two-thirds of the Senate, in order to eliminate more strategic warheads and resume inspections of Russian nuclear sites.

The Climate Cash Cow

Hoaxes: A high-ranking member of the U.N.'s Panel on Climate Change admits the group's primary goal is the redistribution of wealth and not environmental protection or saving the Earth.

Money, they say, is the root of all evil. It's also the motivating force behind what is left of the climate change movement after the devastating Climate-gate and IPCC scandals that saw the deliberate manipulation of scientific data to spur the world into taking draconian regulatory action.

Left for dead, global warm-mongers are busy planning their next move, which should occur at a climate conference in relatively balmy Cancun at month's end. Certainly it should provide a more appropriate venue for discussing global warming than the site of the last failed climate conference — chilly Copenhagen.

Japanese TSA Airport Security Guy

Content Warning: Japanese Interpretation Of TSA Security Measures
Note: The 'content warning' is NOT about language

Sunday, November 21, 2010

Soros's CAP gives Obama his marching orders to subvert the will of the people

George Soros funds the Center for American Progress, which has been characterized as Barack Obama's Ideas Factory. John Podesta, its head, led the transition team when Barack Obama became President. The Center has also become a hiring hall for the Obama team, filling its positions with former employees (among these was controversial Van Jones -- who now is back at the Center).

Apparently, George Soros and his Center are upset that the American people placed a roadblock in their plans when we rose up and painted the nation red. The Center now is providing a blueprint of ways Barack Obama can do an end run around the people's will by resorting to methods that will strike many of us as being improper-to say the least. Relying on executive orders, interpretation of regulations, rule -making and the like they are collectively a recipe for even more power being assumed by President Obama.

From Tuesday's Politico Playbook:

[The] Center for American Progress today is releasing a report, "Power of the President," proposing 30 executive actions the president can take to advance progressive change in the areas of energy, the economy, health care, education, foreign policy, and national security. "The following authorities can be used to ensure progress on key issues facing the country today: Executive orders, Rulemaking, Agency management, Convening and creating public-private partnerships , Commanding the armed forces, Diplomacy.

Meet the 'New' Donald Berwick

Dr. Donald Berwick has his coming out party today in Washington. After President Obama snuck him into office during a recess appointment as the head of the second largest health insurance company in the world- CMS (Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services) without so much as a single hearing, Senators finally have an opportunity to meet him during a Finance Committee meeting. The prepared transcript of Berwick's remarks at first glance, conveys a sense that he is a strong patient advocate and champion of patient rights. Were we to take these statements at face value, there would be much to look forward to during his tenure leading CMS. However, the spoken word in Washington is not to be trusted, and nowhere more so than in this case. We need simply go to You Tube or the internet and find the Berwick speeches and articles that portray a very different man.

The Donald Berwick that we have come to know, has stated his positions clearly and they are very different from what he is now trying to convince Senators and the American people that he supposedly stands for. There is no ambiguity about how Berwick feels about the sanctity of the doctor patient relationship. In his book "New Rules" he writes: "Today, this isolated relationship (between doctor and patient) is no longer tenable or possible... Traditional medical ethics, based on the doctor- patient dyad must be reformulated to fit the new mold of the delivery of health care...Regulation must evolve. Regulating for improved medical care involves designing appropriate rules with authority... Health care is being rationalized through critical pathways and guidelines. The primary function of regulation in health care, especially as it affects the quality of medical care, is to constrain decentralized decision making."

The GOP’s Budget Cowardice

The draft proposal offered last week by the chairmen of the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform was only the first shot in what is expected to be a very long war over how to eliminate the federal deficit and begin paying down our national debt. That debt already exceeds $13.7 trillion, and if the unfunded liabilities of Social Security and Medicare are included, it actually tops $100 trillion.

Obviously, Republicans would not want to embrace every one of the commission’s recommendations, especially the tax hikes. Even so, the commission’s report does show the magnitude of the cuts actually needed to reduce spending to even 21 percent of GDP (and it really should go lower). But if the draft proposal by chairmen Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson accomplishes nothing else, it has already done a service by showing just how feeble the GOP’s commitment to deficit reduction really is.

California Suggests Suicide; Texas Asks: Can I Lend You a Knife?

In the future, historians may likely mark the 2010 midterm elections as the end of the California era and the beginning of the Texas one. In one stunning stroke, amid a national conservative tide, California voters essentially ratified a political and regulatory regime that has left much of the state unemployed and many others looking for the exits.

California has drifted far away from the place that John Gunther described in 1946 as “the most spectacular and most diversified American state … so ripe, golden.” Instead of a role model, California has become a cautionary tale of mismanagement of what by all rights should be the country’s most prosperous big state. Its poverty rate is at least two points above the national average; its unemployment rate nearly three points above the national average. On Friday Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was forced yet again to call an emergency session in order to deal with the state’s enormous budget problems.

Earmark Donor States

I have an op-ed in Politico about “earmark donor states.” It’s a term I invented to highlight a rarely discussed side of earmarking: public choice economics.

As public choice theory would predict, the earmarking process operates under a system of concentrated benefits and diffuse costs. Based on an analysis of 2009 data, 16 states receive a disproportionately large percentage of the earmark pie and can be labeled “earmark beneficiary” states. The other 34 states and the District of Columbia are “earmark donors,” as they receive fewer earmark dollars than they proportionally should.

To determine which states win and lose in the earmarking game, I looked at the share of taxes each state sends to Washington and compared it to the share of earmarks that each state receives.

In the op-ed, I use Colorado, one of the biggest earmark donor states, as an example:

Mormon church was unfairly targeted over Prop. 8, BYU professor says

Supporters of Proposition 8 came under fire from the national media and gay-rights activists, but none as much as the LDS Church, which became an unfairly overinflated target for the media, a BYU professor explained recently during a two-day Mormon Media symposium at BYU.

The showdown began in May 2008 when the California Supreme Court overturned Proposition 22, the ballot initiative that had banned same sex marriage in 2000, explained Joel Campbell, an associate communications professor at Brigham Young University and former writer for the Deseret News.

In June 2008, Proposition 8 had qualified for the November ballot and on June 29, 2008, the First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints asked that a letter be read in LDS congregations across California stating their support for the proposition and requesting that members support it, too, said Campbell.

Great things are expected of terahertz waves, the radiation that fills the slot in the electromagnetic spectrum between microwaves and the infrared. Terahertz waves pass through non-conducting materials such as clothes , paper, wood and brick and so cameras sensitive to them can peer inside envelopes, into living rooms and "frisk" people at distance.

The way terahertz waves are absorbed and emitted can also be used to determine the chemical composition of a material. And even though they don't travel far inside the body, there is great hope that the waves can be used to spot tumours near the surface of the skin.

With all that potential, it's no wonder that research on terahertz waves has exploded in the last ten years or so.

New Castle councilman calls cops on boys' cupcake sale

When Andrew DeMarchis and Kevin Graff, two 13-year-olds from Chappaqua's Seven Bridges Middle School, set up shop at Gedney Park on a fall weekend last month, they were expecting a tidy profit.

Instead, the two wannabe entrepreneurs selling cupcakes, cookies, brownies and Rice Krispie treats baked by them for $1 apiece got a taste of cold, hard bureaucracy .

New Castle Councilman Michael Wolfensohn came upon the sale and called the cops on the kids for operating without a license.

The boys' parents are incensed and can't believe a Town Board member would handle the situation that way.

"I am shocked and sad for the boys. It was such a great idea, and they worked hard at it," said Laura Graff, Kevin's mother. "But then some Town Board member decided to get on his high horse and wreck their dreams."

Suing the Victim: Motorist Goes After Parents of the Boy He Struck and Killed

A driver who's serving a manslaughter sentence for striking and killing a 14-year-old boy is suing the victim's parents, blaming them for their son's death because they allowed him to ride his bike in the street without a helmet.

Matthew Kenney's parents, Stephen and Joanne, sued 48-year-old driver David Weaving shortly after he was sentenced last year to 10 years in prison, accusing him in Waterbury Superior Court of negligence and seeking more than $15,000 in damages.

Desperate British Health System Using Smokers’ Lungs in Transplants

What happens in Britain when the list of people needing organs is longer than the list people willing to donate them? The donees get “high risk” organs, like when 28-year-old Lyndsey Scott received the lungs of a 30-a-day smoker and died five months later.

“Desperate transplant patients are being given the lungs of chain smokers because the NHS is so short of organ donations,” London’s Daily Mail reports. “Surgeons are also being forced to use diseased body parts from cancer sufferers, drug addicts and the very elderly.”

The newspaper also reports that doctors are using tissue from those more at risk of carrying HIV and Hepatitis C, “such as gay men and drug users.”

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A 13-year-old Stanislaus County boy at the center of a flag controversy got a big show of support Monday as many bikers rallied to his side.

Cody Alicea was earlier told by Denair Middle School officials that he could not ride onto campus with a U.S. flag on his bike. The story has gained international attention, from Rush Limbaugh to soldiers in Afghanistan.

The school changed its mind, and now Alicea can display the stars and stripes.

Live Wire -- Get Latest Info From Denair
Images -- Boy Rides To School

When he rode from his home to school on Monday, he was followed by a parade of people on motorcycles. The group said the Pledge of Allegiance upon arriving at school.

Above all others

Inflated self-esteem can be decidedly counterproductive.

American students, for example, took first place in self-judged mathematical ability in a comparative study of eight countries, but last place in actual mathematical competency.

Korean students, in contrast, ranked themselves last in self-judged mathematical skills and took first place in actual mathematical performance.

The idea that self-esteem produces better performance, reversing the direction of better performance boosting self-esteem, is clearly a concept that's been oversold. But we feel good -- whether it's self-evaluations of leadership skills, looks, personality or math ability, it's not unusual for 25 percent of American students to self-judge themselves to be in the top 1 percent.

The downside can be a declining nation that's overstocked with egotistical and incompetent narcissists.

Failure is impossible for high school students! (No, really)

What would school have been like if you never had to worry about getting an F? Students at West Potomac High School in Alexandria, Va., are about to find out, the Washington Post reports.

Earlier this year, the school all but eradicated the standard mark for “failure”, instead supplying wayward students with the letter “I” for incomplete. So what does an “I” give you that an “F” doesn’t? Time to redeem yourself, for starters. Students with an “I” on their report card can (literally) learn their lesson and catch up over the year, at which point they will be given a grade for their mastery of the material, just like any other student.

So is this an inspired move to get those marginal students on track and learning, or just another way in which we’re coddling underachieving kids and hobbling the rest? Parents, educators and students are divided.

Opinion | One and done: To be a great president, Obama should not seek reelection in 2012

President Obama must decide now how he wants to govern in the two years leading up to the 2012 presidential election.

In recent days, he has offered differing visions of how he might approach the country's problems. At one point, he spoke of the need for "mid-course corrections." At another, he expressed a desire to take ideas from both sides of the aisle. And before this month's midterm elections, he said he believed that the next two years would involve "hand-to-hand combat" with Republicans, whom he also referred to as "enemies."

It is clear that the president is still trying to reach a resolution in his own mind as to what he should do and how he should do it.

Israel’s Airport Security, Object Of Envy, Is Hard To Emulate Here

Renewed threats of airborne terror have once again drawn attention to Israel’s track record of preventing terror attacks on airplanes.

American commentators and politicians, riled by the recent failure to stop terrorist Umar Farouk Abdulmuttalab from boarding a Northwest Airlines flight bound for Detroit, have raised calls for “Israelification” of American airports and the adoption of the security model used at Israel’s Ben Gurion International Airport.

But while Israel does maintain an excellent track record for preventing airplane terrorism, its unique system of security, which leans heavily on personal interaction and on group profiling, cannot easily be emulated by the United States.

“The way things work in the United States is 180 degrees opposite to the way things work in Israel,” said Yuval Bezherano, an executive at an Israeli consulting firm that designs airport security systems. “Adopting the full Israeli system won’t work, because of costs, time and legal differences.”

Conservative commentators have been bemoaning the decline of the American man almost as long as the American man has been in existence. As it turns out, they are right: Men these days are a mere shadow of what we once were. We've become physically weaker than our ancestors. We're slower runners. We can't jump as high as we once did. As Peter McAllister, an archaeologist with the University of Western Australia and the author of the new book "Manthropology: The Science of Why the Modern Male Is Not the Man He Used to Be," puts it, we might be the "sorriest cohort of masculine Homo sapiens to ever walk the planet." I, for one, blame guyliner.

"Manthropology," a tongue-in-cheek look at the science of maleness, examines what recent discoveries in the fields of archaeology and anthropology can teach us about the state of modern masculinity. Ice Age aboriginal tribesmen, he discovers, were able to run long distances at approximately the same speed as modern-day Olympic sprinters. Classic Grecian rowers could attain speeds of 7.5 miles an hour, which today's rowers can only attain for short bursts of time. Our culture may be obsessed with muscles: He notes that, since 1982, G.I. Joe's Sgt. Savage has gotten three times more muscular and Barbie's Ken now has a chest circumference attainable by only one in 50 men, but the luxuries of our contemporary lifestyle have caused a steady decline in genuine physical power. The book may be a light, breezy work, but it puts our current debate around masculinity into fascinating context.

Analysis: German tempers fray as U.S. policy gulf widens

Germany's undiplomatic outbursts against U.S. policy, calling it "clueless" before a G20 summit, show growing estrangement on economics as America's focus shifts away from transatlantic ties to domestic challenges and Asia.

"The Atlantic is getting wider," said Anton Boerner, head of Germany's Foreign Trade Association, who spoke of a "creeping alienation" between America and Europe, which has been exacerbated by the global financial crisis.

Germany and the United States often criticize each other's approaches to aiding economic recovery, with U.S. calls for more expansive policy falling on deaf ears in fiscally disciplined Germany. But Berlin has taken the rhetoric to a new level.

Nevada Senate polling draws scrutiny

Of all the competitive races in the nation, none saw as much errant public polling in the final weeks as the Nevada Senate contest. Much of the polling reported a close election between Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Sharron Angle, with the Republican challenger holding a slight advantage.

While the race was competitive, in the end it wasn’t even that close: Reid won 50 percent to 45 percent — a result virtually no one forecast.

So what happened? Rasmussen Reports says it miscalculated Reid's appeal among unaffiliated voters. CNN/Opinion Research thinks the race flipped during the final week. And Mason-Dixon Research concedes it underestimated the Democratic ground game. The three pollsters all showed Angle with a 4-point advantage — 49 percent to 45 percent — in polls released during the final week.

World To Fed: Stop Printing All That Money

he great Bernanke QE2 debate continues to heat up.

In the run-up to the G-20 meetings, China, Russia, Germany and others are all coming out against the Federal Reserve's quantitative easing agenda. They don't want hot-money excess dollars to flow into their higher-yielding currencies.

The assault against Bernanke's easy money has reached such fever that President Obama felt it necessary to defend the $600 billion in new-money printing in a news conference in India.

Meanwhile, World Bank President Robert Zoellick has actually called for putting gold back into global money, in order to use it as an international reference point to measure market expectations over inflation or deflation.

A Rebirth Of The American Revolution?

Does the Republican landslide signal a rebirth of the American Revolution?

Or is it evidence of a volatile, impatient, if not somewhat irrational electorate?

The first possibility is the most intriguing--and far-reaching. A rebirth of the American Revolution would signal a turn away from the statism of the progressive movement and an embrace of individual liberty as the cornerstone of American society. That would imply a shift in economic policies that could usher in an extended period of prosperity and above-average gains for equity markets.

WASHINGTON – Last week's election was bad for Democrats. The next one could be worse. Senate Democrats running in 2012 will be trying to hold their jobs in states where Republicans just scored major congressional and gubernatorial victories — Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, New Mexico and Virginia.

The Democrats' problems don't end with senators.

President Barack Obama carried those states in 2008, and he will need most of them to win re-election in two years. But this time they all will have Republican governors. These GOP governors can try to inhibit the president's policies and campaign operations. They also can help steer next year's once-a-decade House redistricting process in the GOP's favor.

DUNN: Hell hath no fury like a Palin scorned

In 2010, no prospective Republican presidential candidate has collected more IOUs than Sarah Palin, whose endorsements and encouragement have propelled many otherwise unknown candidates and likely losers into creditable and more often than not victorious races for office. Reagan collected his IOUs in 1980 after traveling the country on behalf of conservative candidates.

"Mm, your tears are so yummy and sweet! Oh, the tears of unfathomable sadness! My-yummy!" -- Cartman, South Park

Admittedly, it has been a lot of fun to watch the wailing and gnashing of teeth on the Left after the savage beating they received on election day. However, it's more than a little disturbing that almost no one on the Left seems to think they lost because they actually did a bad job.

In other words, according to liberals: Obamacare, the failure of the stimulus, Obama bowing to foreign leaders, the way they handled the BP oil spill, trying to close Guantanamo, not reading bills before they passed them, cash for clunkers, talking up amnesty, trying to pass card check and cap and trade, taking over student loans, refusing to seriously address the problems at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, taking over GM and Chrysler, doing nothing to stop Iran from gaining nuclear weapons, dropping the Black Panther intimidation case, expanding the bailouts and raising spending up to frightening levels had nothing whatsoever to do with why they lost.

Israeli Professor Nails It: Obama was Right when he said America is not a Christian Country

Wake me up when Obama is bombing Israel. That’s what I told my husband the night Obama won the presidency. I essentially tuned out of politics that day, having little interest in charting every step along the path to the destruction that we non-Obama voters predicted.

Of course, I thought I was yet engaging in hyperbole, but the conclusion to be drawn from this remarkable article by Middle East Studies professor Mordechai Nisan, of Hebrew University of Jerusalem, can be only that my hyperbole was hardly that. His commentary was published all too quietly by Newsmax a few weeks ago, and deserves a wider audience. In case any Americans out there still think it’s merely a coincidence that everything we touch turns to Islam, think again. Anyone who finds it strange that 9/11 led not to increased restrictions on people, money and influence flowing into America from the Middle East but to increased openness to these will be interested to know that in 9/11 our government saw not a formidable enemy to be dealt with, but a new market to be tapped. In fact, recall this paraphrase from a 1996 NY Times article by a Dr. Ron Hatchett, titled “The Third American Empire”:

Hungary is on its way to nationalizing the country’s private pension funds. The public’s ignorance about the system and gaps in financial education are playing into the government’s hands.

Hungary has a three-pillar pension system, with the state-funded pay-as-you-go scheme being the first pillar. It’s complemented with a mandatory private pension-fund regime introduced in 1997 as the second pillar, where payments toward future pensions are deducted from gross wages and invested on the market to generate additional returns. There’s also an optional third pillar, which enables future pensioners to save more money for their pension by contributing some of their net income to private pension funds.

Opera Company of Philadelphia "Hallelujah!" Random Act of Culture

Brain function and the Obamas

"It is my opinion that both of the adults residing in the White House leave much to be desired when it comes to intellectual ability and cognition. I believe that I have posited plausible arguments at AT, e.g., here, here and here.

Now there is a scientific explanation providing validation.

First, a quote from FLOTUS:

"I am a believer there is a beet gene. People who love beets love them and people who hate beets can't stand them. Neither the President nor I have the beet gene..."

Second, the explanation and validation:

Daily Dose Of Beet Juice Promotes Brain Health In Older Adults

Researchers for the first time have shown that drinking beet juice can increase blood flow to the brain in older adults - a finding that could hold great potential for combating the progression of dementia. "

Gregory Kane: MSNBC exposed as unfair and very unbalanced

"I believe the term is "schadenfreude."

The word comes from the German; it means "enjoyment derived from the troubles of others," according to the Merriam Webster Dictionary's Web site. I found myself coming down with a case of schadenfreude when I learned that MSNBC's Keith Olbermann has been suspended indefinitely without pay.

Olbermann's infraction was donating money to Democratic candidates. MSNBC went into what I call "National Public Radio mode," issuing some self-righteous statement about Olbermann violating journalistic ethics and the network's policies that forbid personnel from donating to political campaigns.

Now it's not Olbermann's personal problems that give me pleasure. As far as I'm concerned, he should be allowed to contribute to any candidate he wishes. Everybody knows his politics tend to be on the liberal side, and he's more commentator than news analyst.

Palin v. Bernanke

"One of the questions in respect of 2012 is how it has happened that the only major Republican figure, aside from Congressman Ron Paul, to stand up and be counted on the dollar is Sarah Palin. She is supposed to be an ex-beauty queen without a lot of sophistication. Yet she is reportedly scheduled to be in Phoenix today delivering a major address challenging the plan of the chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben Bernanke, to inflate the dollar. Snippets of her text were put up Sunday on the National Review Online and began immediately rocketing around the globe, no doubt in part because of the Palinesque phrasing, in which she called on Mr. Bernanke to “cease and desist.”

Now we don’t mind saying that the Sun has been looking forward to the Alaskan breaking out on this issue. In October 2009, we issued an editorial called “Palin and Paul.” We noted that those waiting for a politician to pick up on the monetary issue were perking up to a posting on Mrs. Palin’s Facebook page. In it she had noted that the Gulf oil states were reported to be negotiating with Russia about abandoning the dollar as a unit of pricing, observed that an official of the United Nations had called for a new world reserve currency, and, most importantly, warned that the value of the dollar was collapsing in terms of gold. Her posting, we wrote, suggested that she was ahead of the rest of the undeclared contenders for 2012."

Reid promises vote on aliens

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid over the weekend promised to force the Senate to vote on an immigration bill, the Dream Act, in a lame-duck session of Congress this month.

Mr. Reid, a Nevada Democrat who is in a desperate battle to keep his Senate seat, told Univision's "Al Punto," a Sunday political talk show, that he has the right as majority leader to decide what legislation reaches the floor, and said he is "a believer in needing to do something" on immigration.

In doing so, he elevated immigration to join jobs, spending and tax cuts — the issues most lawmakers expect to dominate Congress when they reconvene in November.

Study: Alcohol more lethal than heroin, cocaine

LONDON -- Alcohol is more dangerous than illegal drugs like heroin and crack cocaine, according to a new study.

British experts evaluated substances including alcohol, cocaine, heroin, ecstasy and marijuana, ranking them based on how destructive they are to the individual who takes them and to society as a whole.

Researchers analyzed how addictive a drug is and how it harms the human body, in addition to other criteria like environmental damage caused by the drug, its role in breaking up families and its economic costs, such as health care, social services, and prison.

For the Tea Party soldiers worried that the young upstarts they’re poised to send to Congress will lose their constitutional druthers once they get to Congress, Rep. Michele Bachmann has a message: Fear not, she’s going to set up constitutional classes.

Bachmann spokesman Sergio Gor says, “It was something she’s always wanted to do. There’s so many folks that come to Capitol Hill to discuss obscure and mundane topics, but no one coming regularly to discuss bill of rights or the role of government.”

Bachmann won’t be teaching the classes, Gor says, but will help organize sessions with constitutional scholars, experts, and judges likely to be held in one of the committee rooms on the Capitol Hill complex. The classes will be open to any members — not just freshman — looking to continue their study of America’s founding documents. They will not be open, however, to staff or members of the press, and the list of speakers won’t be made public.

More than three centuries ago, the residents of America staged a rebellion against an oppressive ruler who taxed them unjustly, ignored their discontents and treated their longing for freedom with contempt. They are about to revisit that tradition this week, when their anger and exasperation sweep through Congress like avenging angels. This time the hated oppressor isn't a foreign colonial government, but their own professional political class.

In New York last week I was struck by the startling shift of mood since my last visit, during Barack Obama's first year in office. This phenomenon took varying forms, of course, depending on the political orientation of my interlocutor, but the underlying theme of despair and disgust was almost universal. Liberal Democrats (who hugely outnumber most other factions in that city) were despondent and disappointed with the collapse of Obama's popularity. A few of them (remarkably few, actually) were ready to blame this on a "Right-wing conspiracy" of vaguely racist motivation. But most of them were frankly critical of the strategic mistakes they believed the White House had made, and the baffling inability of their President to connect with the people in an engaging way. His shocking lack of emotional expression during last month's commemoration of 9/11 – a point of particular significance to New Yorkers – was remarked upon by a number of people I met.

Judge: McDonald’s Must Pay Employee for Weight Gain

SAO PAULO (AP) — A Brazilian court ruled this week that McDonald’s must pay a former franchise manager $17,500 because he gained 65 pounds (30 kilograms) while working there for a dozen years

The 32-year-old man said he felt forced to sample the food each day to ensure quality standards remained high, because McDonald’s hired “mystery clients” to randomly visit restaurants and report on the food, service and cleanliness.

What's at stake Tuesday

During the Tuesday evening deluge, pay particular attention to these stories:

-South Carolina Rep. John Spratt, second-ranking Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, is seeking a 15th term. Missouri Rep. Ike Skelton, chairman of Armed Services, is seeking an 18th term. Texas Rep. Chet Edwards, 13th-ranking Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, is seeking an 11th term. Minnesota Rep. James Oberstar, chairman of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, is seeking a 19th term. In 2008, they won by 25, 32, 7 and 36 percentage points, respectively. In 2010, all are vulnerable, so voters in four districts could subtract 118 years of seniority.

-For 55 years, Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.), 84, has occupied the seat his father held for 22 years before him. The son received 71 percent in 2008. His district includes Ann Arbor, which requires conservatives to leave town at sundown. (Just kidding. Sort of.) He beat his 2008 Republican opponent by 46 points. Dingell probably will win while setting the 2010 record for the largest shrinkage of a 2008 majority.

Residents cry foul over ballots

A petition was filed with the Board of Elections over absentee ballots.

SEE THE PETITIONS

A trio of Bucks County residents backed by the county Republican committee say they have evidence linking Democratic Congressman Patrick Murphy's campaign to a scheme to flood the county voter registration office with fraudulent applications for absentee ballots.

In a petition filed Tuesday, county Republicans say the name of Murphy's campaign manager appeared on a Bristol post office box where voters were urged in a series of letters paid for by the state Democratic Committee to send absentee ballot applications.

The county Republicans submitted with the petition a photograph of a note inside the mailbox that said, "Tim Percico and Paul Hampel only pick up mail." Tim Persico is Murphy's campaign manager, although his name is misspelled in the note. Hampel is a volunteer for the Democratic state committee who said he collects mail from the box.

While county and state Democratic officials denied involvement in the letter campaign or refused to discuss it, Persico said Tuesday that the "PA Vote 2010" project that paid for the letters is a partnership between Murphy's campaign and the state Democrats.

Persico said the goal of the project is to help eligible Democratic voters obtain and cast absentee ballots.

He dismissed assertions by Republican critics that the letters were misleadingly worded and noted that the Democratic state committee clearly takes credit for the mailings, which comply with all election laws.

"The only reason the Republican Party is mad is working parents and college kids are sending in an application because they want to vote," Persico said.

Neither Murphy nor a spokeswoman for his campaign returned calls Tuesday.

Ben McAdams is neat, he’s helpful, he’s unfailingly polite. The 35-year-old is a family man, one of six siblings and a father of three. People warm quickly to him, and talk of his modesty and strong work ethic. He neither drinks nor smokes. And when we meet for breakfast in a sparsely decorated canteen in Salt Lake City, he is wearing a dark suit and a tie.

In other words, McAdams is what the world expects of Mormons.

In other ways, however, he is less typical. Until recently, he was a fast-rising star at Davis Polk, a prestigious New York law firm – a job he won straight from Columbia University’s law school. He then worked for both Bill and Hillary Clinton, before becoming, at 35, Utah’s youngest state senator. His is the most conservative state in the US, and yet he’s a moderate Democrat who won his district – and his reputation – by helping to broker a deal over gay rights. This, mind you, from a man whose church was pilloried for bank-rolling California’s successful 2009 “Proposition 8” referendum against gay marriage. Whose faith was a headache to Mitt Romney throughout Romney’s 2008 presidential run. And whose religion has been unable to shake a reputation for “plural marriage”, officially abandoned in 1890.

CBO Director Says ObamaCare Will Drive People From the Workforce

Congressional Budget Office Director Douglas Elmendorf said the most significant economic effect of President Barack Obama’s health care reform package will be to drive people out of the job market.

“For the economy outside the health sector, the most significant impact of the legislation will be through the labor market,” Elmendorf said on Oct. 22. “We estimated that the legislation, on net, will reduce the amount of labor used in the economy by roughly half a percent, primarily by reducing the amount that people choose to work.”

Elmendorf made the remarks at a conference sponsored by the Leonard D. Schaeffer Center for Health Policy and Economics at the University of Southern California.

He explained that people would choose not to work because they could subsist on the generous federal insurance subsidies and Medicaid payments contained in the health care overhaul.

It Ain’t So, Joe

Vice President Joe Biden is an affable fellow, which sometimes makes his tendency to exaggerate the truth somewhat amusing. However, Biden’s latest tall tale is as unamusing as it is wrong.

From the New York Daily News:

“Every single great idea that has marked the 21st century, the 20th century and the 19th century has required government vision and government incentive,” he said. “In the middle of the Civil War you had a guy named Lincoln paying people $16,000 for every 40 miles of track they laid across the continental United States. … No private enterprise would have done that for another 35 years.”

I’ll go straight to the 19th century railroads issue by referencing the work of two Cato scholars who probably know a little bit more about the topic than Joe Biden.

First, Randal O’Toole discusses railroads and land grants in his book Gridlock: Why We’re Stuck in Traffic and What to Do About It:

Who is the largest single political contributor in the 2010 campaign cycle? You can be pardoned if you answer, erroneously, that it's some new conservative group organized by Karl Rove. That's campaign spin by the Obama Democrats, obediently relayed by certain elements of the so-called mainstream media.

The real answer is AFSCME, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. The union's president, Gerald McEntee, reports proudly that AFSCME will be contributing $87.5 million in this cycle, entirely or almost entirely to Democrats. "We're spending big," he told the Wall Street Journal. "And we're damn happy it's big."

The mainstream press hasn't shown much interest in reporting on unions' campaign spending, which amounted to some $400 million in the 2008 cycle. And it hasn't seen fit to run long investigative stories on why public employee unions -- the large majority of which work for state and local governments -- contribute so much more to campaigns for federal office.

When Harry Reid, the No. 1 Democrat in the Senate, began his re-election campaign last year, he ran ads touting his ability to bring hundreds of millions of dollars in federal largess back to Nevada.

"From Vegas to Reno, Carson City to Elko, he's helped build roads, hospitals and schools," said an early television ad.

His poll numbers barely moved. Now, Reid's running an ad boasting that he's brought more than 1,300 "green jobs" to the state. He's still neck and neck with tea party favorite Sharron Angle.

Republicans are betting that Nevada's angry electorate--infused with many tea party insurgents eager to vote for Angle--is not nearly as receptive to the old-fashioned politics of pork as it was when Reid easily won re-election six years ago.

Isn’t it amazing that, whenever there is some sort of controversy involving voter registration fraud, or other election shenanigans, somewhere lurking in the shadows is the Purple Hand of the SEIU? Of course, it could be merely a coincidence…if one believes in coincidences. Or, it could be something bigger, and much more nefarious.

Over the past several weeks, we’ve been cataloging some of the “coincidences” leading up to next week’s mid-term elections. Here’s the recap:

In Milwaukee, a SEIU lobbyist brags about a hatchet job the union is planning on Republican Scott Walker on behalf of Democrat Tom Barrett, with media cooperation.
In Washington state, an SEIU member was arrested for allegedly forging signatures on petitions
In Harris County, TX a group run by a former SEIU staffer allegedly turned in over 23,000 fraudulent voter registrations [Video of said former SEIU staffer here.]
- Note: The situation seems to have deteriorated further as actual voting has begun.
In Arizona, the SEIU (and affiliated groups) allegedly signed up 20,000 voters and was involved in get out the vote early rallies where it is possible that ballots from undocumented immigrants were sent in.
- Ironically, on Tuesday, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals threw out Arizona’s requirement that citizen’s show proof of citizenship in order to vote.

Baltimore Hands Out First Trans Fat Citation

BALTIMORE -- The Baltimore City Health Department issued its first environmental citation for repeat violations of the city's trans fat ban.

The Health Department issued Healthy Choice, a food facility in the 400 block of Lexington Street, a $100 fine on Thursday.

"It was the second time they were found with a high trans fat level in their ingredients," said Health Department agent Juan Gutierrez.

Officials said that during inspections in July and this month, the facility was found to be using a margarine product with trans fat levels in excess of what the law allows.

Al Gore: Tea Party making climate science a ‘political football’

Al Gore is on the political offensive against global warming skepticism in the Tea Party movement.

“Unfortunately the Tea Party movement seems to want to make belief in science a political football,” the former vice president wrote on his website Tuesday afternoon (and tweeted about today).

Gore, a longtime advocate of capping greenhouse gases, points to a New York Times story this month that said, “Skepticism and outright denial of global warming are among the articles of faith of the Tea Party movement.”

The story cites a recent New York Times/CBS News poll showing that only 14 percent of Tea Party supporters say global warming is having an effect now, and more than half say it won’t have a serious effect in the future.

Gore and former President Jimmy Carter (along with liberal activists) are highlighting ties between the Tea Party movement and fossil fuel interests — including the conservative group Americans for Prosperity, which is backed by billionaire David Koch of the energy company Koch Industries.

“It’s not a surprise that the groups supporting the Tea Party are funded by the fossil fuel industry,” Gore wrote on his website.