Washington, D.C. has managed to take the most basic state and local responsibility—K-12 education—and federalize it at breathtaking speed over the last 12 years. Now, with the signature piece of federalizing legislation, No Child Left Behind, up for reauthorization in Congress, it is time to put the brakes on this failed and misguided federal experiment.
Steve Williamson has an excellent blog post "Pining for the Fjords" Point 1, the Phillips curve is dead, UK version. (And, too many are cheering, "Long live the Phillips curve!"). Point 2, Steve seems to have signed on to the new-Fisher view that a zero rate fixed for a long time, with apparently credible fiscal policy, will drag inflation slowly down, not up.
According to the Washington Post, the Obama administration is establishing a new agency to fuse intelligence from around the government when a cyber crisis occurs. Lisa Monaco, assistant to the president for homeland security and counterterrorism, is quoted as saying that “policymakers and operators will benefit from having a rapid source of intelligence [about incoming cyberattacks],” and that policymakers will have an “integrated, all-tools approach to the cyberthreat.”
Plugging personalized, or precision, medicine, President Obama recently announced funding for a new “research consortium” that would collect a variety of information from large numbers of people for a database. He failed to acknowledge, however, that the risk-averse posture and policies of his administration’s FDA create significant obstacles to the ultimate success of personalized medicine.
I was talking to a fellow academic economist today who is also a strong critic of military conscription. He had read my post in which I discussed my disagreement with the late W. Allen Wallis about amnesty for draft dodgers.
Over at Just Security, Steve Vladeck and a group of scholars have posted a letter to President Obama asking him to include in his AUMF proposal not merely a sunset for the new ISIS AUMF but one for the underlying 2001 AUMF too.
"Contract manufacturers make products for other companies that prefer to focus on product design and marketing. In China, "you can find a specialist in any product," said Stephen Maurer, a Shanghai-based managing director at consulting firm AlixPartners.
In Syria, the besieged government of the Assad regime clings to about half of the territory, while Sunni factions fight over the other half. In Iraq, the Shiites control the south, the Kurds control the northeast, and the Sunnis in the northwest are controlled by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). The Sykes-Picot division of Mesopotamia no longer exists, except in the minds of Obama White House operatives who will leave a full-scale disaster to the next administration.
The following is a statement by Lindsey M. Burke, Williamson Evers, Theodor Rebarber, Sandra Stotsky, and Ze’ev Wurman that they asked me to post. I have not yet had a chance to think carefully about ESEA re-authorization, but I think their views are worth consideration:
interview with George P. Shultzvia United States Institute of Peace
Tuesday, February 10, 2015
Distinguished Fellow George Shultz discusses Iran's nuclear program. This is an excerpt from the 2015 Dean Acheson Lecture at the U.S. Institute of Peace.
Stanford University professor Michael McFaul drew on his experiences as former U.S. ambassador to Russia and special assistant to President Barack Obama on the National Security Council to analyze the “Causes and Consequences of Our Conflict with Russia” for a Morning Forum of Los Altos audience Feb. 3.
interview with Michael McFaulvia Center for International Security And Cooperation (CISAC)
Tuesday, February 10, 2015
Michael McFaul, former United States Ambassador to Russia and Director of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, explains why the White House chose Stanford University for a summit on cybersecurity.
President Obama says he is weighing the growing calls for U.S. military aid to badly outgunned Ukraine in its nearly yearlong struggle against separatists armed and instigated by Russia.
The White House is creating a new federal agency to combat cyber attacks in an effort to improve communication between the government and private companies that might be targeted.
Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders is hoping the third rail of American politics—Social Security benefit cuts, which Republicans have yet to propose—will give a charge to his long-shot 2016 presidential campaign.
