Month: October 2011

Public gender-segregation spreads in Israel.

Jim DeMint's:

[W]ho matters, the way that Ted Kennedy mattered when he endorsed Barack Obama? I agree with Steve Benen and Ed Kilgore: the one person poised to make a difference is South Carolina Senator Jim DeMint.

DeMint is one of very few Republicans who is absolutely safe from accusations of RINO-dom, and therefore would be risking little if he decides to go with Romney. He’s also someone who could send a strong signal to conservative politicians and activists that Perry is the one to rally around to stop Romney. Now, I’m not saying (nor are others) that DeMint can single-handedly deliver the nomination, but only that his decision is almost certainly a very important one. And that he has a lot more freedom to maneuver here than many other GOP leaders.

A new report (from the IMF!) argues that the former inhibits the latter:

We discovered that when growth is looked at over the long term, the trade-off between efficiency and equality may not exist. In fact equality appears to be an important ingredient in promoting and sustaining growth. The difference between countries that can sustain rapid growth for many years or even decades and the many others that see growth spurts fade quickly may be the level of inequality. Countries may find that improving equality may also improve efficiency, understood as more sustainable long-run growth.

Via Politicalprof, who snarks:

It turns out that the biggest advocates of restraining wealth concentration at the top should be CAPITALISTS! The only chance CAPITALISTS have to succeed is if they have access to capital, which they don’t get in wealth-concentrated societies … So I look forward to seeing signs that say "Capitalists for the Revolution" soon!

I don't quite get the hilarity. It's perfectly clear to me – and has been perfectly clear to political theorists throughout the ages – that extreme concentration of wealth hurts economic growth and destroys political comity. Conservatism has long sought to keep this inequality in balance – between the inevitable and beneficial inequalities that come with a free market and the structural, harmful inequality that comes from one tiny segment of the society wielding such massive power over the rest. I think this recession, its causes and effects, combined with 30 years of middle-class decline and uber-class enrichment, are what has brought us to this impasse.

Bonus high-brow analysis after the jump:

Question? askandrew@thedailybeast.com

"At this moment, when our politics appear so sharply polarized, faith in our institutions so greatly diminished, we need more than ever to take heed to Dr. King’s teachings. If he were alive today, I believe that he would remind us that the unemployed worker can rightly challenge the excesses of Wall Street without demonizing all who work there. That the businessman can enter tough negotiations with his company’s unions without vilifying the right to collectively bargain. He would want us to know that we can argue fiercely about the proper size and role of government without questioning each other’s love for this country," – president Barack Obama.

"On the off chance they were intending to arrest him for injuring the captain's fist with his jaw, I strongly suggest that you decide not to add insult to injury and avoid such a retaliatory move," – Ronald Kuby, attorney for OWS demonstrator Felix Rivera-Pitre, who was clocked seemingly without merit by an NYPD officer. Video via TDW.

A new ad from the House Majority PAC, a Democratic outfit, channels the Wall Street protests into a targeted populist attack on a freshman Republican:

… and an Amish dilemma.

He won't say.