Duncan Blasts "Useless" Air Marshal Service
“Actually, there have been many more arrests of Federal air marshals than that story reported, quite a few for felony offenses. In fact, more air marshals have been arrested than the number of people arrested by air marshals. We now have approximately 4,000 in the Federal Air Marshals Service, yet they have made an average of just 4.2 arrests a year since 2001. This comes out to an average of about one arrest a year per 1,000 employees. Now, let me make that clear. Their thousands of employees are not making one arrest per year each. They are averaging slightly over four arrests each year by the entire agency. In other words, we are spending approximately $200 million per arrest. Let me repeat that: we are spending approximately $200 million per arrest.”
Source: duncan.house.gov
Op-Ed Columnist - Relax, We’ll Be Fine - NYTimes.com
“This column is a great luscious orgy of optimism. Because the fact is, despite all the problems, America’s future is exceedingly bright.”
Source: The New York Times
Experts Explain Psychology of Iraq Airstrike on Video - NYTimes.com
““You don’t want combat soldiers to be foolish or to jump the gun, but their job is to destroy the enemy, and one way they’re able to do that is to see it as a game, so that the people don’t seem real,” said Bret A. Moore, a former Army psychologist and co-author of the forthcoming book “Wheels Down: Adjusting to Life After Deployment.”
I don’t judge the soldier’s deadly actions because it is easy to criticize when you aren’t in danger yourself. However any cover up is inexcusable in my opinion.
I thought this was particularly insightful too:
“Military training is fundamentally an exercise in overcoming a fear of killing another human, said Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, author of the book “On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society,” who is a former Army Ranger.”
Source: The New York Times
The Recent Health Care Bill - Freakonomics Blog - NYTimes.com
Wes sent me this link.
I agree completely with Levitt. The main problem is that people don’t care how much something costs, if they are not directly paying for it. That is why health care is so expensive.
And we are going to have to limit care at some point.
“That is more or less the situation we now have with health care. It isn’t pretty to talk about, but if it costs $200,000 to keep an octogenarian alive for a month, someone has to pay for it. If it were the children of that octogenarian who had to cover part of the bill, and paying for that last month of life was the difference between being able to pay for the octogenarian’s grandchildren to go to college or not, there would be some hard choices to make. With health care expenditures approaching 20% of GDP, there are going to be tough choices. Markets cannot function when the people who receive the benefits of a good or a service are not the ones who are paying for it.”
Source: The New York Times
Op-Ed Columnist - Taking On China and Its Currency - NYTimes.com
“It’s true that if China dumped its U.S. assets the value of the dollar would fall against other major currencies, such as the euro. But that would be a good thing for the United States, since it would make our goods more competitive and reduce our trade deficit. On the other hand, it would be a bad thing for China, which would suffer large losses on its dollar holdings. In short, right now America has China over a barrel, not the other way around.”
Source: The New York Times
How America Can Rise Again - Magazine - The Atlantic
“Through the entirety of my conscious life, America has been on the brink of ruination, or so we have heard, from the launch of Sputnikthrough whatever is the latest indication of national falling apart or falling behind. Pick a year over the past half century, and I will supply an indicator of what at the time seemed a major turning point for the worse.”
Source: The Atlantic
“These salary figures do not include the value of health, pension and other benefits, which averaged $40,785 per federal employee in 2008 vs. $9,882 per private worker, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis.” So now when you put your kids to bed and they tell you that when they grow up they want to be a doctor and a veterinarian, your answer should be: “Honey, these are all great choices, but what you really want to be is a bureaucrat.”
Source: biggovernment.com
US Healthcare Image
I think we should just outlaw insurance companies.
Source: The New York Times
C’mon China, pick up the pace!
Source: static.globalissues.org
Washington Memo - Supreme Court Gets a Rare Rebuke, in Front of a Nation - NYTimes.com
“The court’s legitimacy is derived from the persuasiveness of its opinions and the expectation that those opinions are rendered free of partisan, political influences,” Mr. Verniero said. “The more that individual justices are drawn into public debates, the more the court as an institution will be seen in political terms, which was not the intent of the founders.”
Apparently anytime the Supreme Court has a judgment the president doesn’t like, they are obviously partisan.
Source: The New York Times
Class War - Reason Magazine
“People who are supposed to serve the public have become a privileged elite that exploits political power for financial gain and special perks. Because of its political power, this interest group has rigged the game so there are few meaningful checks on its demands. Government employees now receive far higher pay, benefits, and pensions than the vast majority of Americans working in the private sector. Even when they are incompetent or abusive, they can be fired only after a long process and only for the most grievous offenses.”
Source: reason.com
US Foreign Policy: Obama's Nice Guy Act Gets Him Nowhere on the World Stage - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News - International
“When he entered office, US President Barack Obama promised to inject US foreign policy with a new tone of respect and diplomacy. His recent trip to Asia, however, showed that it’s not working. A shift to Bush-style bluntness may be coming.”
Source: spiegel.de
