A peek into modern science (and its problems), and a fun story.
Left Field →
Looking at the Democratic primary as a movie, a film critic might say that Sen. Bernie Sanders is a little “on-the-nose” as an antagonist to Hillary Clinton. He is her reverse. Where Hillary is well-known (and to many women, an icon), he is obscure. Where she embodies the establishment, he is on its outskirts, a self-identified “socialist” from the liberal enclave of Burlington, Vermont. Where she gives six-figure speeches, he is among the “poorest” members of the Senate with a net worth of roughly $460,000. She plans to run a $2 billion campaign; he hopes to raise $50 million.
And where Clinton is in the middle of the mainstream, Sanders has been an iconoclast for decades. As a House member, he co-founded the Congressional Progressive Caucus, opposed both wars in Iraq, and voted against the Patriot Act. As a senator for Vermont since 2007, he’s criticized the bank bailouts, voted against Tim Geithner’s nomination for Treasury Secretary, and gave a nearly nine-hour speech against a partial extension of the Bush tax cuts.
Now, as a candidate in the Democratic nomination race, he’s an advocate for the left wing of the party. “I am not running against Hillary Clinton,” he said in a recent interview with the Washington Post. Instead, he’s launching a crusade—against inequality, against Wall Street, and against the “billionaire class” that he claims dominates American politics. “Billionaire families are now able to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to buy the candidates of their choice,” he says on his campaign website. “These people own most of the economy. Now they want to own our government as well.”
Polish Voters Elect Eurosceptic President; Disenchantment with Brussels Spreads →
Andrzej Duda outed president Bronisław Komorowski, the pro-Brussels incumbent centrist Civic Platform party president, in an election over the weekend. Komorowski was expected to win.
The Duda Victory Sent Shockwaves Through Polish Politics, and no doubt Brussels as well.
The win for the socially conservative, nationalist, eurosceptic party, which saw Mr Duda oust Bronisław Komorowski, the government-backed incumbent from the presidential palace, represents a significant lurch to the right in Polish politics. It has sent shockwaves through the country’s political establishment that could ultimately topple the ruling party in October after eight years in power.
Backed by both the country’s restless, anti-establishment youth and its conservative pensioners, Mr Duda’s election, which was unthinkable just a few months ago, represents a significant and far-reaching rejection of the ruling Civic Platform party.
The Latest on IS: Militia name for Anbar fight draws ire →
The name Shiite militias are using to describe the Iraqi operation to retake Anbar province from the Islamic State group is drawing ire from the Pentagon over its sectarian tilt.
The Popular Mobilization Units have named the battle that began Tuesday in Arabic: "Labaik Ya Hussein." That means "I am here, Hussein" in English. It refers to a grandson of the Prophet Muhammad and one of the most revered figures of Shiite Islam.
That has added to the worries about the Shiite militias operating in Anbar, a predominantly Sunni province long suspicious of the Shiite-led government in Baghdad.
Whatever Happened to Antitrust? →
Last week’s settlement between the Justice Department and five giant banks reveals the appalling weakness of modern antitrust.
The banks had engaged in the biggest price-fixing conspiracy in modern history. Their self-described “cartel” used an exclusive electronic chat room and coded language to manipulate the $5.3 trillion-a-day currency exchange market. It was a “brazen display of collusion” that went on for years, said Attorney General Loretta Lynch.
But there will be no trial, no executive will go to jail, the banks can continue to gamble in the same currency markets, and the fines – although large – are a fraction of the banks’ potential gains and will be treated by the banks as costs of doing business.
America used to have antitrust laws that permanently stopped corporations from monopolizing markets, and often broke up the biggest culprits.
No longer. Now, giant corporations are taking over the economy – and they’re busily weakening antitrust enforcement.
The result has been higher prices for the many, and higher profits for the few. It’s a hidden upward redistribution from the majority of Americans to corporate executives and wealthy shareholders.
Wall Street’s five largest banks now account for 44 percent of America’s banking assets – up from about 25 percent before the crash of 2008 and 10 percent in 1990. That means higher fees and interest rates on loans, as well as a greater risk of another “too-big-to-fail” bailout.
But politicians don’t dare bust them up because Wall Street pays part of their campaign expenses.
Similar upward distributions are occurring elsewhere in the economy...
Nebraska abolishes the death penalty →
Nebraska just became the latest US state to abolish the death penalty. State lawmakers today defeated a veto from Nebraska Governor Pete Ricketts, joining Washington, D.C. and 18 states where capital punishment is already banned.
Though it is a solidly Republican state, lawmakers were able to overturn the governor's veto with a 30 to 19 vote that reached across party lines...
Taco Bell is dropping artificial colors and flavors from its menu this year →
If your Taco Bell order tastes a little funky next year, it might not be from the questionable quality of the meat. Today, everyone's favorite provider of FourthMeal announced that it will remove artificial colors and flavors, high fructose corn syrup, and added trans fats from its menu by the end of 2015.
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While the company's latest move sounds bold, the taco chain isn't necessarily blazing a trail here — many leading fast food chains have been changing their menus lately because of consumer pressure. In the last few months alone, Panera dropped more than 150 artificial ingredients from its foods, McDonald's abandoned antibiotics in its chickens, and Chipotle completely removed GMOs from its menu.
The Big Meh →
...Everyone knows that we live in an era of incredibly rapid technological change, which is changing everything. But what if what everyone knows is wrong? And I’m not being wildly contrarian here. A growing number of economists, looking at the data on productivity and incomes, are wondering if the technological revolution has been greatly overhyped — and some technologists share their concern.
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One possibility is that the numbers are missing the reality, especially the benefits of new products and services. I get a lot of pleasure from technology that lets me watch streamed performances by my favorite musicians, but that doesn’t get counted in G.D.P. Still, new technology is supposed to serve businesses as well as consumers, and should be boosting the production of traditional as well as new goods. The big productivity gains of the period from 1995 to 2005 came largely in things like inventory control, and showed up as much or more in nontechnology businesses like retail as in high-technology industries themselves. Nothing like that is happening now.
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So what do I think is going on with technology? The answer is that I don’t know — but neither does anyone else. Maybe my friends at Google are right, and Big Data will soon transform everything. Maybe 3-D printing will bring the information revolution into the material world. Or maybe we’re on track for another big meh.
What I’m pretty sure about, however, is that we ought to scale back the hype.
You see, writing and talking breathlessly about how technology changes everything might seem harmless, but, in practice, it acts as a distraction from more mundane issues — and an excuse for handling those issues badly...