TEA LEAVES UNDER STONES

A few days ago, in its latest “Budget and Economic Outlook”, the normally staid non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) put out a political bombshell analysis – see quote above. It said the Affordable Care Act (ACA) – a..k.a. Obamacare – would reduce the U.S. work force by two and a half million jobs by 2024. Of course, this was instantly seized upon by Republicans and other opponents to show that Obamacare really is the “job-killer” they had always said it was. Equally predictably, the Tea Party set high on its agenda for 2014 the “dismantling” of Obamacare along with other measures to “unshackle” free markets and preserve liberty. Continue reading →

Listening this week to President Obama’s 2014 State of the Union Address, like you perhaps, I was impressed how much and how little has changed in America’s approach to the world. To be sure, Pres. Obama made the case for using all tools of international relations not just military power. Continue reading →

As I watched and read commentaries in the U.S. press and media on the January 11 passing of Ariel Sharon, former prime minister of Israel, I wondered how it was so much that is vital to understanding this complex and brutal man was air-brushed almost out of existence, or simply omitted. Continue reading →

Looking back, the past year has been a rather bruising and challenging time, both here in the U.S.A. and abroad. There can be little doubt we live in a time of mounting change and political and economic disorder, even though no single major conflict casts its shadow across the world. Coming out of the 2009 Great Recession, economic growth has gradually come back but still not recovered – either here in the U.S.A. or elsewhere. Continue reading →

HE WAS ONE OF THE WORLD’S LEADING MORAL FIGURES. HIS LIFE SHOWS HOW ONE MAN CAN CHANGE THE WORLD! WE’LL MISS HIM. BUT LET’S HOPE HIS SPIRITUAL SUCCESSORS ARE ALREADY IN THE WINGS. WE NEED THEM.
Watching the outpouring of grief mingled with celebration at the news of Mandela’s passing, made me recall poignant stories, including personal ones, telling me how much Mandela achieved :
Johannesburg, South Africa, 1979: In 1979, I was working for the World Bank and was on mission in Kenya. I was asked unexpectedly to re-route to do another assignment in Congo – then Zaire – before returning to Washington D.C. To get to Kinshasa from Nairobi, I had to fly first to Johannesburg, South Africa, stay overnight, then catch an onward flight to Kinshasa. Arriving in Johannesburg, I booked in to an airport hotel. But it was midday. So I decided to take a bus in to downtown to see the city. Continue reading →

Watching the negotiations over the nuclear deal with Iran, I was struck by how tentative and narrow the focus and tone were. It seemed as if the Iran being negotiated with was the alien incomprehensible “rogue” state caricatured in the hit movie “Argo” recounting how six American captives secretly escaped in 1979, Continue reading →

As I watched like you, over the past five days, appalled and terribly saddened by the horrific sights of damage and destruction from Typhoon Yolanda, I wondered more and more what could have been done, if anything, to reduce its awful impact. To bring relief assistance quicker. Continue reading →

In the seemingly interminable budget battles in Washington between Republicans and Democrats, there is a seventy ton gorilla in the room no-one wants really to talk about. This is the by now inevitable aging of our society. By 2050, Americans over age 65 will more than double from 41 million to over 85 million, rising from ten to over twenty per cent of our society. Continue reading →

The past weeks in Washington D.C. I watched hundreds of thousands of furloughed Federal workers trying to stay busy – a scientist friend is writing folk songs! And I read about the mayhem caused by the Federal Government shutdown. I was struck by the irony of seeing our elected national politicians shooting our country – and potentially the whole world – in the foot. Just as America is poised to enjoy a period of greater prosperity, after five years of recovery from the Great Recession. Continue reading →

Watching the fervor of Republican efforts to “defund” the Affordable Care Act (ACA – or Obamacare), I have been wondering : is it just ‘kabuki’ theater – acting out a ritual attack on Pres. Obama? Or, do they actually have teeth to undo the reform in U.S. health care ? Last November, Speaker Boehner said Obamacare is now the “law of the land”. It’s worth recalling, in 2003, Democrats supported implementation of the Republicans’ Medicare Prescription Drug legislation, after they had opposed its design. In 2013, should we not expect Republican legislators to do the same for Obamacare? Listening to Sen. Ted Cruz tell bed-time stories to us all from the Senate floor, it was difficult to see what practical impact Republican opposition may have on the ACA. He has made no specific proposals to “lower health care costs without growing government”. Continue reading →