These are tough times for state governments. Huge deficits loom almost everywhere, from California to New York, from New Jersey to Texas.
Wait—Texas? Wasn't Texas supposed to be thriving even as the rest of America suffered? Didn't its governor declare, during his re-election campaign, that 'we have billions in surplus'? Yes, it was, and yes, he did. But reality has now intruded, in the form of a deficit expected to run as high as $25 billion over the next two years.
And that reality has implications for the nation as a whole. For Texas is where the modern conservative theory of budgeting—the belief that you should never raise taxes under any circumstances, that you can always balance the budget by cutting wasteful spending—has been implemented most completely. If the theory can't make it there, it can't make it anywhere.
Tag: politics economics united-states new-york taxes california deficit-spending texas new-jersey 2010 2011 balanced-budget budgets economy-of-california economy-of-new-jersey economy-of-new-york economy-of-texas economy-of-the-united-states financial-crisis-of-2007-2011 governor-of-texas rick-perry state-governments-of-the-us texas-elections-2010 united-states-elections-2010
The great cause of the new Republican intake is the reduction of the deficit but to anyone seeking evidence of sincere attempts at deficit-reduction the evidence is baffling.
The Republicans showed before Christmas that they would seek to reduce the deficit but not when it came to a matter of the tax breaks that had aggravated the deficit in the first place.
Now there's a date set for the abolition of Barack Obama's healthcare plan, parts of which only came into operation at the start of this month. The Republicans are out to destroy the plan. Or, more precisely, to pretend to destroy the plan in the name of making good on election pledges. The measure won't get past the Senate.
But suppose it did get past the Senate, what effect would this have on the deficit? The answer is it would aggravate the deficit. Somehow, somewhere, there's an override mechanism that makes destroying Obamacare more important than destroying the deficit. If only one could figure out how it works.
Tag: politics united-states christmas barack-obama 2010 united-states-senate republican-party-united-states bush-tax-cuts 2011 united-states-elections-2010 healthcare-reform healthcare-reform-in-the-us presidency-of-barack-obama united-states-public-debt
The Labour party on the whole has not been a very effective opposition since the election, partly because it spent months and months electing its new leader. I think the Labour party should, for one thing, stress much more that for most people in the past 13 years, the period was not one of collapse into chaos but actually one where the situation improved, and particularly in areas such as schools, hospitals and a variety of other cultural achievements—so the idea that somehow or other it all needs to be taken down and ground into the dust is not valid. I think we need to defend what most people think basically needs defending and that is the provision of some form of welfare from the cradle to the grave.
Eric J. HobsbawmTag: schools culture leftism welfare hospitals 2010 1990s labour-party-uk welfare-state 2011 2000s 2010s ed-miliband uk-general-election-2010
The Aussies have spent so much time basking in the glory of the last generation that they have forgotten to plan for this one. It's just like the West Indies again; once their great names from the 1970s and 80s retired, the whole thing fell apart.
The way things are going, the next Ashes series cannot come too quickly for England. What a shame that we have to wait until 2013 to play this lot again.
Tag: australia england 1970s cricket england-cricket-team 1980s australia-national-cricket-team the-ashes 2010-11-ashes-series 2011 2010s 2013-ashes-series west-indies-cricket-team
Memo to extreme partisans: If you can't bring yourselves to love your enemies, can you at least learn to hate your friends?
Walter KirnTag: politics friends enemies twitter 2011 2011-tuscon-shooting partisanship
Everyone loves a witch hunt as long as it's someone else's witch being hunted.
Walter KirnTag: hypocrisy twitter witch-hunts 2011 2011-tuscon-shooting blame-game
Given Loughner's obsession with meaninglessness and language, maybe Foucault
Walter KirnTag: language twitter 2011 2011-tuscon-shooting blame-game jared-lee-loughner jacques-derrida michel-foucault
@bobbybaird i'm a writer, so are you. we try to compose our thoughts and words for effect as well as sense. vain of us? a bit.
Walter KirnTag: writing vanity twitter 2011 robert-l-baird
When Loughner himself speaks and we find out his real influences are Spiderman, 'Gnome Chomsky,' Taylor Swift, and Dr. Bronner, then what?
Walter KirnTag: politics presumption taylor-swift twitter spiderman noam-chomsky 2011 2011-tuscon-shooting blame-game emanuel-bronner jared-lee-loughner
This is how it works now with the news: the story begins with a moral, then a narrative is fashioned to support it.
Walter KirnTag: media news twitter 2011 2011-tuscon-shooting
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