Angela Merkel is engaged in a standoff with Horst Seehofer, Germany's interior minister, who happens to be from her own party, the Christian Democratic Union. His objection to her immigration policy stems from stats like these:
A study published just this past January found that a more than ten percent increase in violent crime in Germany was almost entirely attributed to young Syrian migrants taking up residence in the southern part of the nation. At the same time, three-quarters of the refugees are projected to be unemployed and living off government benefits for years to come. Too many of the new arrivals are utterly failing to assimilate into German culture, learn the language or embrace the nation’s values.
This is worth considering:
The company with its roots in Alexander Graham Bell's invention is set, now that it has the unconditional green light from a federal judge, to take over the company with its roots in Henry Luce's news magazine and the house of Bugs Bunny, Humphrey Bogart and Bette Davis. Yup, AT&T is cleared to buy Time Warner.Reactions to President Trump’s unprecedented meeting with North Korean dictator Kim Jung-un played out in a very familiar and predictable way in the United States: The president’s critics lamented his military concessions and effusive praise for a despotic regime, and his allies praised him as an outside-the-box diplomatic mastermind. What should surprise us—and alarm us—was the reaction from South Korea.On Wednesday morning, Chosun Ilbo, South Korea’s paper of record, published a bleak editorial: “Kim Jong-un Got Everything He Wanted from Summit with Trump.”“Many South Koreans had a great deal of hope for the U.S.-North Korea summit in Singapore because they believed that the historic meeting could resolve the nuclear threat which had loomed over their heads over the last 25 years. U.S. President Donald Trump had been full of promises,” the editorial glumly observes. “The agreement signed by Trump and Kim therefore came as a shock, which only got worse as Trump rambled on during the ensuing press conference.”
According to Politico's Alex Isenstadt, it wasn't Mark Sanford's crummy record as a family man that did him in with South Carolina voters; it was the distance he put between himself and the Very Stable Genius. In a world full of tradeoffs, this has a palpable downside. Sanford's character flaw was huge, but he was a stalwart opponent of profligate government spending.
The Very Stable Genius's longtime personal attorney Michael Cohen just lost his own legal team.
A deal's a deal. The US has broken plenty of them in its history of dealing with its inferiors. Now our carrot on a stick is the prosperity of whatever they call modernization these days. Long commutes, impossible mortgage payments, credit crises, high divorce rates, children raised in daycare as both parents (almost a rarity these days) try to earn their daily bread, the cacophony of tribalism, the gated communities in the areas outlying the ghetto, an attitude of competition that often snuffs out cooperation, and the mesmerization of the consciousness by mass advertising and the keeping up or keeping out of the Joneses....
ReplyDeleteThat's actually not a bad comprehensive overview. What do you recommend as a remedy?
ReplyDeleteAlthough I might take exception to the "snuffs out cooperation" part. In my work as a journalist on a local scale, I can tell you that there are lots of committees and coalitions formed b y people from all manner of sectors of society working diligently on addressing community issues.
ReplyDeleteEverybody got to touch their God Spots.
ReplyDeleteI think I agree with that, although I've never seen it characterized quite that way.
ReplyDeleteDon't want to spout the J word too freely as it has been hijacked by the fundies who brought us Trump.We are hard wired for worship of some sort. Modern brain imaging is as revelatory as our telescopes.
ReplyDelete