PJ: Bravo! Herr Klingst has written a much needed response to the false and hateful claims made by the GOP against Europe. While I have no doubt that each of the current GOP presidential contenders have accepted the hospitality of European countries, all of them have painted a false unfair and unflattering portrait of them. Having traveled and lived there, I can asure you that the horrible image that these candidates like to portray is a fantasy (or a nightmare). People in many European countries enjoy much better upward mobility than people in the US and the wealth gap is much narrower. People in Europe have more freedoms than their US cousins. They have a wonderful lifestyle that celebrates joie de vie (joy of life) and the freedoms that allow them to do so. They do not worry about paying for their health care or fret that they'll have to mortgage their future to pay for education. And, yes, many countries are suffering during this global recession (that stemmed from the greed on Wall Street I might add) and many have over-extended on their debt. But you will still see a celebration of life at every village fait (Fairs held several times a year in most small towns), every bank holiday and just about every special day of their lives. A person's happiness is not dependent on the wealth they amass, the number of televisions they own or what kind of car they drive. Life there is not to be endured but to be celebrated.
Washington Post
Martin Klingst is Washington bureau chief of the weekly German newspaper Die Zeit.
The GOP’s ‘Europe’ is a land of make-believe
By Martin Klingst
Lately it seems that not a day goes by without a Republican presidential candidate portraying Europe as a socialist nightmare. Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum paint a picture of the Old World as unfree, strangulated by bureaucratic and inefficient welfare systems, and unable to reform and modernize. To these Republicans, Europe seems to be the antipode to everything America is meant to be.
I understand that stump speeches are coarse and that, to Republican candidates, Europe must be bad because President Obama occasionally praises some of its achievements, such as universal health care or the “green” revolution.
I also know there is an American tradition of holding up the Old World as an example of all that is wrong and corrupt. There is, unfortunately, a more recent European custom of blaming the United States for all that is perverse and profane. Moreover, there are good reasons to worry about Europe’s fiscal calamities, which stem in part from the unaffordable benefits for its citizens. It is understandable that some on this side of the Atlantic fear that the European debt crisis could drag the slowly recovering U.S. economy under.
But when Romney, Gingrich and Santorum warn about “socialist Europe,” they sound as though they are talking about the Soviet empire, which vanished long ago. Europe is the European Union, a modern entity of 27 democratic countries that, despite many commonalities, greatly differ in history, culture, language, sociology and politics. Europe is difficult to comprehend, but viewing it through a single lens is like calling the United States a Third World nation because there are very poor areas in the South where some people live in shacks or have little access to health care or where some schools are corridors of shame.
My problem as a European living in the United States is that it is not Joe the Plumber who is bashing Europe but three longtime politicians who want to be president — people who should know better. Wasn’t Mitt Romney a missionary in France? Hasn’t he spoken fluent French since the late 1960s? I do not recall any important European politician who ran for prime minister or president and pilloried the United States in the same manner. Even when German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder came out against the imminent Iraq war before seeking reelection in 2002, the rhetoric was muted in comparison.
It is not necessary here to define socialism or to detail the many distinctions between a state-run economy and a social democracy based on a free-market system. But those who seek to be president of a global superpower — and may perhaps one day sit at a table with leaders of the Old World — should know a few things:
All 27 E.U. members believe, more or less, in mandatory health-care insurance and public education. They believe that government should offer a helping hand to struggling businesses and people during economic downturns. That is why we pay high taxes. It is also true that a number of E.U. countries have irresponsibly expanded their welfare systems and can no longer afford their bills.
But some countries have carried out necessary economic reforms, engineered their comeback and managed the storm of the Great Recession quite well. To some extent they can now present better results than the United States. Germany, for example, raised its retirement age to 67 and drastically reformed its social safety net, lowering labor costs to businesses. Thanks to government subsidies, German enterprises were able to keep their skilled workers employed during the recession. When business picked up again, the labor force was in place and the economy more competitive. Unemployment is at a 20-year low of about 6 percent.
Several European states run their mandatory health-care systems more efficiently and at lower cost than the United States while guaranteeing every citizen access to affordable and up-to-date services. The population’s health remains an important economic factor. Moreover, while the national debt is disastrous in Greece or Italy, debt remains at a much more responsible level in Germany, Denmark and Sweden.
Romney pointed out in New Hampshire last month that, despite the economic downturn, the average U.S. worker still takes home a bigger monthly paycheck than the average European (and even the average German, who makes more than, say, Romanians). That’s true, but the comparison doesn’t take into account the much greater wealth gap in the United States nor the fact that Americans have to spend larger portions of their income on medical care and education.
A college education is still free in most Old World countries and produces generally better results than in the United States. The Program for International Student Assessment study by the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development, released in December, shows that high school students in a number of E.U. countries scored better in reading, math and science than their U.S. counterparts. Another OECD report shows that it is much easier for Germans, Swedes, Danes, Norwegians and Spaniards to climb the socioeconomic ladder than Americans. That’s a stark reversal from the time when greater social mobility was a main reason so many Europeans flocked to the land of opportunity.
Comparing data across societies is risky because cultural and social differences may not be reflected. Yes, pendulums swing. But framing Europe simply as inflexible and outdated, or backward and socialistic, is shortsightedand wrong. Romney, Gingrich and Santorum should know as well as anyone that the globe is no longer flat.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-gops-europe-is-a-land-of-make-believe/2012/02/01/gIQA46m1nQ_story_1.html
Saturday, February 4, 2012
Friday, February 3, 2012
For the GOP, surprisingly strong job report "Not good enough"
PJ: I had written earlier today that the unexpected positive jobs report would likely be greeted with criticsm by the GOP and that anything positive they had to say would be about credit they were due (http://politico-junkie.blogspot.com/2012/02/uk-us-jobless-rate-falls-to-83-lowest.html). After posting my thoughts, I suspected that I would be proven wrong. After all, how could anyone in the US look at the 5th straight month of improving employment as a negative? How could anyone, right or left, not acknowledge that the higher than expected job numbers was anything but positive? I knew that I was being cynical suggesting that the GOP would spin the progress in the US economy as a negative. And now I'm sorry to say that I was right.
For the other side of the coin, take a look at this post by Andrew Sullivan http://andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/2012/02/83-reax-that-sound-you-hear-is-champagne-corks-in-the-west-wing.html
And for a balanced take on the political consequences and spin from both camps, take a look at CNN's report: http://www.cnn.com/2012/02/03/politics/obama-gop-jobs/index.html
Politico
John Boehner: Jobs report not good enough
President Barack Obama has no shortage of advisers, but he got some unsolicited advice from an unlikely source on Friday: Speaker John Boehner.
Republicans insisted at a news conference that the 8.3 percent unemployment rate is still too high — and the Ohio Republican offered Obama a pointer on how to win another term.
“If the president really wants to get the economy moving again, really wants to improve his own chances for reelection, maybe he’ll pick up the phone and call Senator [Harry] Reid and ask Senate Democrats to get off their rear ends,” Boehner said, urging the passage of a few dozen House bills that the upper chamber has ignored.
That wasn’t exactly the overarching message from GOP lawmakers. They tried to position the above 8 percent unemployment as good, but not good enough. America “can do better,” they said.
“The jobs numbers today are certainly welcome news,” Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) said. “I think all of us want to see more Americans get back to work. But as my colleagues have laid out, we could do a lot better.”
Boehner said that still-too-high unemployment rate is the “story now for 36 straight months.”
“While there are flickers of hope in our recovery and certainly they’re welcome,” the speaker said. “But the American people were promised by the president that unemployment would not exceed 8 percent. And here we are 36 straight months with unemployment over 8 percent.”
Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0212/72415.html#ixzz1lKl1l9Xn
For the other side of the coin, take a look at this post by Andrew Sullivan http://andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/2012/02/83-reax-that-sound-you-hear-is-champagne-corks-in-the-west-wing.html
And for a balanced take on the political consequences and spin from both camps, take a look at CNN's report: http://www.cnn.com/2012/02/03/politics/obama-gop-jobs/index.html
Politico
John Boehner: Jobs report not good enough
President Barack Obama has no shortage of advisers, but he got some unsolicited advice from an unlikely source on Friday: Speaker John Boehner.
Republicans insisted at a news conference that the 8.3 percent unemployment rate is still too high — and the Ohio Republican offered Obama a pointer on how to win another term.
“If the president really wants to get the economy moving again, really wants to improve his own chances for reelection, maybe he’ll pick up the phone and call Senator [Harry] Reid and ask Senate Democrats to get off their rear ends,” Boehner said, urging the passage of a few dozen House bills that the upper chamber has ignored.
That wasn’t exactly the overarching message from GOP lawmakers. They tried to position the above 8 percent unemployment as good, but not good enough. America “can do better,” they said.
“The jobs numbers today are certainly welcome news,” Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) said. “I think all of us want to see more Americans get back to work. But as my colleagues have laid out, we could do a lot better.”
Boehner said that still-too-high unemployment rate is the “story now for 36 straight months.”
“While there are flickers of hope in our recovery and certainly they’re welcome,” the speaker said. “But the American people were promised by the president that unemployment would not exceed 8 percent. And here we are 36 straight months with unemployment over 8 percent.”
Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0212/72415.html#ixzz1lKl1l9Xn
Middle East: US committed to leave Afghanistan
Al Jazeera
US remains committed to Afghan exit in 2014
US military chiefs downplay remarks by defence secretary that Washington could end combat role a year early, in 2014.
Military chiefs in the US say the country's commitment to Afghanistan has not changed after an earlier suggestion that their combat role might end earlier than previously thought.
Intelligence officials were trying to clarify remarks from Leon Panetta, the US defence secretary, who said that combat operations could end in 2013, a year early.
Speaking before a Congressional Committee, CIA director David Petraeus, once the commander of ISAF and US forces in Afghanistan, said: "The conversation Secretary Panetta had with some press on his plan was more than a bit over analyzed shall we say.
"The policy adopted by the leaders of the coalition, of the ISAF coalition with Afghan President Karzai was that by the end of 2014 ISAF will have transitioned all security tasks to Afghan forces."
Last month, a leaked National Intelligence estimate said the situation in Afghanistan was mired in stalemate.
It reported that the Taliban was not in retreat, and was more resilient and determined than ever to wait out the US withdrawal timeline.
Al Jazeera's Kimberly Halkett, reporting from Washington, says the mixed messages being sent by senior members of the Obama administration are not new.
For Video:
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/americas/2012/02/201223507425979.html
US remains committed to Afghan exit in 2014
US military chiefs downplay remarks by defence secretary that Washington could end combat role a year early, in 2014.
Military chiefs in the US say the country's commitment to Afghanistan has not changed after an earlier suggestion that their combat role might end earlier than previously thought.
Intelligence officials were trying to clarify remarks from Leon Panetta, the US defence secretary, who said that combat operations could end in 2013, a year early.
Speaking before a Congressional Committee, CIA director David Petraeus, once the commander of ISAF and US forces in Afghanistan, said: "The conversation Secretary Panetta had with some press on his plan was more than a bit over analyzed shall we say.
"The policy adopted by the leaders of the coalition, of the ISAF coalition with Afghan President Karzai was that by the end of 2014 ISAF will have transitioned all security tasks to Afghan forces."
Last month, a leaked National Intelligence estimate said the situation in Afghanistan was mired in stalemate.
It reported that the Taliban was not in retreat, and was more resilient and determined than ever to wait out the US withdrawal timeline.
Al Jazeera's Kimberly Halkett, reporting from Washington, says the mixed messages being sent by senior members of the Obama administration are not new.
For Video:
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/americas/2012/02/201223507425979.html
Canada: US employment surges, improves for the 5th straight month
The Globe and Mail
U.S. job growth surges, jobless rate drops to 8.3%
By Lucia Mutikani
The U.S. economy created jobs at the fastest pace in nine months in January and the unemployment rate dropped to a near three-year low of 8.3 per cent, indicating last quarter’s growth carried into early 2012.
Non-farm payrolls jumped 243,000, the Labor Department said on Friday, the most since April and beating economists’ expectations for a gain of only 150,000.
Economists had expected the jobless rate to hold steady at 8.5 per cent. The rate has dropped 0.8 percentage point since August.
The decline last month reflected large gains in employment in the separate household survey from which the unemployment rate is derived. Fewer people left the labour force.
Job gains last month were widespread, with even the transportation and warehousing sector increasing payrolls.
The tenor of the report was further strengthened by revisions to November and December payrolls data, which showed 60,000 more jobs created than previously reported.
In addition, average hourly earnings rose four cents, which should help to support spending. The report suggested that expectations of a slowdown in U.S. economic growth in the first quarter were not yet impacting on companies’ hiring decisions.
The continued labour market improvement could be a relief for President Barack Obama who faces a tough re-election.
The U.S. Federal Reserve last week said it would probably hold interest rates near zero at least through 2014, citing still-high unemployment.
Chairman Ben Bernanke said the Fed was mulling further purchases to speed up the recovery, but the last employment numbers could cause policy makers to step back. The U.S. central bank has already bought $2.3 trillion in bonds to keep rates low and spur the economy.
Employment in the private sector surged 257,000 - the largest gain since April. Government payrolls fell 14,000, the least amount since September.
The U.S. economy grew at a 2.8 per cent annual rate in the final three months of 2011, quickening from 1.8 per cent in the third quarter. However, the rebuilding of stocks by businesses accounted for two-thirds of the rise, setting the economy up for a slower growth pace this quarter.
Growth is also seen moderating as the European debt crisis, which has already pushed some economies in the region into recession, takes an edge off U.S. exports.
Still, there are signs that the economy continues to have momentum. Auto sales were buoyant in January, factory activity hit a seven-month high and the four-week average of new jobless claims fall through the month.
While job growth has quickened there are no jobs for three out of every four unemployed people and 19.3 million Americans are either out of work or underemployed.
But there is reason for cautious optimism. The unemployment rate has declined for five straight months, partly because of unemployed workers giving up the hunt for a job and people actually finding work.
A broad measure of unemployment, which includes people who want to work but have stopped looking and those working only part time but who want more work, slipped to 15.1 per cent in January from 15.2 per cent in December.
The January household survey data incorporated new population controls. The department also released annual revisions to the payrolls data from the survey of employers and introduced new factors to adjust for seasonal fluctuations.
It said the level of employment in March of last year was 165,000 higher than it had reported, on a seasonally adjusted basis.
Mild winter weather boosted construction employment last month, which added 21,000 after a 31,000 increase in December. Manufacturing surged 50,000, the largest rise in a year, after rising 32,000 the prior month.
That contributed to the goods-producing sector posting 81,000 jobs last month, the most since January 2006.
Transportation and warehousing employment increased 13,100 and courier jobs only fell 1,500, defying expectations of a large drop.
Retail employment rose 10,500 after gaining 6,200 in December. Temporary help services jumped 20,100 after rising 8,300.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/economy/jobs/us-job-growth-surges-jobless-rate-drops-to-83/article2325258/
U.S. job growth surges, jobless rate drops to 8.3%
By Lucia Mutikani
The U.S. economy created jobs at the fastest pace in nine months in January and the unemployment rate dropped to a near three-year low of 8.3 per cent, indicating last quarter’s growth carried into early 2012.
Non-farm payrolls jumped 243,000, the Labor Department said on Friday, the most since April and beating economists’ expectations for a gain of only 150,000.
Economists had expected the jobless rate to hold steady at 8.5 per cent. The rate has dropped 0.8 percentage point since August.
The decline last month reflected large gains in employment in the separate household survey from which the unemployment rate is derived. Fewer people left the labour force.
Job gains last month were widespread, with even the transportation and warehousing sector increasing payrolls.
The tenor of the report was further strengthened by revisions to November and December payrolls data, which showed 60,000 more jobs created than previously reported.
In addition, average hourly earnings rose four cents, which should help to support spending. The report suggested that expectations of a slowdown in U.S. economic growth in the first quarter were not yet impacting on companies’ hiring decisions.
The continued labour market improvement could be a relief for President Barack Obama who faces a tough re-election.
The U.S. Federal Reserve last week said it would probably hold interest rates near zero at least through 2014, citing still-high unemployment.
Chairman Ben Bernanke said the Fed was mulling further purchases to speed up the recovery, but the last employment numbers could cause policy makers to step back. The U.S. central bank has already bought $2.3 trillion in bonds to keep rates low and spur the economy.
Employment in the private sector surged 257,000 - the largest gain since April. Government payrolls fell 14,000, the least amount since September.
The U.S. economy grew at a 2.8 per cent annual rate in the final three months of 2011, quickening from 1.8 per cent in the third quarter. However, the rebuilding of stocks by businesses accounted for two-thirds of the rise, setting the economy up for a slower growth pace this quarter.
Growth is also seen moderating as the European debt crisis, which has already pushed some economies in the region into recession, takes an edge off U.S. exports.
Still, there are signs that the economy continues to have momentum. Auto sales were buoyant in January, factory activity hit a seven-month high and the four-week average of new jobless claims fall through the month.
While job growth has quickened there are no jobs for three out of every four unemployed people and 19.3 million Americans are either out of work or underemployed.
But there is reason for cautious optimism. The unemployment rate has declined for five straight months, partly because of unemployed workers giving up the hunt for a job and people actually finding work.
A broad measure of unemployment, which includes people who want to work but have stopped looking and those working only part time but who want more work, slipped to 15.1 per cent in January from 15.2 per cent in December.
The January household survey data incorporated new population controls. The department also released annual revisions to the payrolls data from the survey of employers and introduced new factors to adjust for seasonal fluctuations.
It said the level of employment in March of last year was 165,000 higher than it had reported, on a seasonally adjusted basis.
Mild winter weather boosted construction employment last month, which added 21,000 after a 31,000 increase in December. Manufacturing surged 50,000, the largest rise in a year, after rising 32,000 the prior month.
That contributed to the goods-producing sector posting 81,000 jobs last month, the most since January 2006.
Transportation and warehousing employment increased 13,100 and courier jobs only fell 1,500, defying expectations of a large drop.
Retail employment rose 10,500 after gaining 6,200 in December. Temporary help services jumped 20,100 after rising 8,300.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/economy/jobs/us-job-growth-surges-jobless-rate-drops-to-83/article2325258/
UK: US Jobless rate falls to 8.3%--lowest level in 3 years--Update
PJ: Sadly, and synically, I can imagine the GOP cursing these positive numbers (see: http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/01/morning-in-america-the-rapid-economic-recovery-conservatives-are-praying-against.php). No doubt they will at least spin the news to be either bad news for America or they'll take credit for the improvement as they have done before: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/01/24/938483/-GOP-takes-credit-for-job-growth
Update: Here is Cantor's reaction to the jobs report. He is acknowledging that it is good news BUT it is not good enough. He is also giving credit to the GOP by inferring that President Obama has finally come around to the GOP's way of thinking: http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entries/cantor-on-jobs-report-we-should-aim-even
The Guardian
US unemployment down to 8.3% as 243,00 jobs added in January
More good news for Obama as surge of hirings in January means economy created jobs at fastest pace in nine months
The US economy created jobs at the fastest pace in nine months in January and the unemployment rate dropped to a near three-year low of 8.3%, indicating last quarter's growth carried into early 2012.
Nonfarm payrolls jumped 243,000, the Department of Labor said on Friday, the most since April and beating economists' expectations for a gain of only 150,000.
Economists had expected the jobless rate to hold steady at 8.5%. The rate has dropped 0.8% since August.
The decline last month reflected large gains in employment in the separate household survey from which the unemployment rate is derived. Fewer people left the labour force.
Jobs gains last month were widespread, with even the transportation and warehousing sector increasing payrolls.
The tenor of the report was further strengthened by revisions to November and December payrolls data, which showed 60,000 more jobs created than previously reported.
In addition, average hourly earnings rose 4¢, which should help to support spending. The report suggested that expectations of a slowdown in US economic growth in the first quarter were not yet impacting on companies' hiring decisions.
The continued labuor market improvement could be a relief for President Barack Obama, who faces a tough re-election.
The US Federal Reserve last week said it would probably hold interest rates near zero at least through 2014, citing still-high unemployment.
Chairman Ben Bernanke said the Fed was mulling further purchases to speed up the recovery, but the last employment numbers could cause policymakers to step back. The U.S. central bank has already bought $2.3tn in bonds to keep rates low and spur the economy.
Employment in the private sector surged 257,000 - the largest gain since April. Government payrolls fell 14,000, the least amount since September.
The US economy grew at a 2.8% annual rate in the final three months of 2011, quickening from 1.8% in the third quarter. However, the rebuilding of stocks by businesses accounted for two-thirds of the rise, setting the economy up for a slower growth pace this quarter.
Growth is also seen moderating as the European debt crisis, which has already pushed some economies in the region into recession, takes an edge off US exports.
Still, there are signs that the economy continues to have momentum. Auto sales were buoyant in January, factory activity hit a seven-month high and the four-week average of new jobless claims fall through the month.
While job growth has quickened there are no jobs for three out of every four unemployed people and 19.3 million Americans are either out of work or underemployed.
But there is reason for cautious optimism. The unemployment rate has declined for five straight months, partly because of unemployed workers giving up the hunt for a job and people actually finding work.
A broad measure of unemployment, which includes people who want to work but have stopped looking and those working only part time but who want more work, slipped to 15.1% in January from 15.2% in December.
The January household survey data incorporated new population controls. The department also released annual revisions to the payrolls data from the survey of employers and introduced new factors to adjust for seasonal fluctuations.
It said the level of employment in March of last year was 165,000 higher than it had reported, on a seasonally adjusted basis.
Mild winter weather boosted construction employment last month, which added 21,000 after a 31,000 increase in December. Manufacturing surged 50,000, the largest rise in a year, after rising 32,000 the prior month.
That contributed to the goods-producing sector posting 81,000 jobs last month, the most since January 2006.
Transportation and warehousing employment increased 13,100 and courier jobs only fell 1,500, defying expectations of a large drop.
\Retail employment rose 10,500 after gaining 6,200 in December. Temporary help services jumped 20,100 after rising 8,300.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/feb/03/us-unemployment-243000-jobs-added-january
Update: Here is Cantor's reaction to the jobs report. He is acknowledging that it is good news BUT it is not good enough. He is also giving credit to the GOP by inferring that President Obama has finally come around to the GOP's way of thinking: http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entries/cantor-on-jobs-report-we-should-aim-even
The Guardian
US unemployment down to 8.3% as 243,00 jobs added in January
More good news for Obama as surge of hirings in January means economy created jobs at fastest pace in nine months
The US economy created jobs at the fastest pace in nine months in January and the unemployment rate dropped to a near three-year low of 8.3%, indicating last quarter's growth carried into early 2012.
Nonfarm payrolls jumped 243,000, the Department of Labor said on Friday, the most since April and beating economists' expectations for a gain of only 150,000.
Economists had expected the jobless rate to hold steady at 8.5%. The rate has dropped 0.8% since August.
The decline last month reflected large gains in employment in the separate household survey from which the unemployment rate is derived. Fewer people left the labour force.
Jobs gains last month were widespread, with even the transportation and warehousing sector increasing payrolls.
The tenor of the report was further strengthened by revisions to November and December payrolls data, which showed 60,000 more jobs created than previously reported.
In addition, average hourly earnings rose 4¢, which should help to support spending. The report suggested that expectations of a slowdown in US economic growth in the first quarter were not yet impacting on companies' hiring decisions.
The continued labuor market improvement could be a relief for President Barack Obama, who faces a tough re-election.
The US Federal Reserve last week said it would probably hold interest rates near zero at least through 2014, citing still-high unemployment.
Chairman Ben Bernanke said the Fed was mulling further purchases to speed up the recovery, but the last employment numbers could cause policymakers to step back. The U.S. central bank has already bought $2.3tn in bonds to keep rates low and spur the economy.
Employment in the private sector surged 257,000 - the largest gain since April. Government payrolls fell 14,000, the least amount since September.
The US economy grew at a 2.8% annual rate in the final three months of 2011, quickening from 1.8% in the third quarter. However, the rebuilding of stocks by businesses accounted for two-thirds of the rise, setting the economy up for a slower growth pace this quarter.
Growth is also seen moderating as the European debt crisis, which has already pushed some economies in the region into recession, takes an edge off US exports.
Still, there are signs that the economy continues to have momentum. Auto sales were buoyant in January, factory activity hit a seven-month high and the four-week average of new jobless claims fall through the month.
While job growth has quickened there are no jobs for three out of every four unemployed people and 19.3 million Americans are either out of work or underemployed.
But there is reason for cautious optimism. The unemployment rate has declined for five straight months, partly because of unemployed workers giving up the hunt for a job and people actually finding work.
A broad measure of unemployment, which includes people who want to work but have stopped looking and those working only part time but who want more work, slipped to 15.1% in January from 15.2% in December.
The January household survey data incorporated new population controls. The department also released annual revisions to the payrolls data from the survey of employers and introduced new factors to adjust for seasonal fluctuations.
It said the level of employment in March of last year was 165,000 higher than it had reported, on a seasonally adjusted basis.
Mild winter weather boosted construction employment last month, which added 21,000 after a 31,000 increase in December. Manufacturing surged 50,000, the largest rise in a year, after rising 32,000 the prior month.
That contributed to the goods-producing sector posting 81,000 jobs last month, the most since January 2006.
Transportation and warehousing employment increased 13,100 and courier jobs only fell 1,500, defying expectations of a large drop.
\Retail employment rose 10,500 after gaining 6,200 in December. Temporary help services jumped 20,100 after rising 8,300.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/feb/03/us-unemployment-243000-jobs-added-january
Israel: Wait a minute...who owns the right to be pro- Israel-- right wing Fox News or the NY TimesÉ
Haaretz
Don’t knock the media’s bias and double standards on Israel: you’ll miss them when they’re gone
Disproportionate coverage is the flip side of disproportionate support for Israel, and thus a critical element in its national security.
By Chemi Shalev
The cover story of the New York Times Sunday Magazine this week was written by Israeli journalist Ronen Bergman and it gave a detailed summary of Israel’s strategy and motivation regarding a possible attack on Iran, which, the article concluded, is more likely than not.
Then the blogosphere exploded with irate pundits and enraged commentators accusing the New York Times of being biased, employing double standards and serving as a mouthpiece for Israeli propagandists. The adjectives “pro-Israel” and “pro-Zionist” were tossed around freely as was their obvious connection to the well-known fact that the owners of the newspaper are Jewish, even though they’re not.
All of which, of course, would come as a great surprise to the legions of harsh critics of the newspaper, both in America and in Israel, including, first and foremost, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, who refused to pen an opinion article for the so-called “Old Gray Lady” and who reportedly described the Times as one of Israel’s two worst enemies in the world, (the other being the one that you are reading right now.)
Double standards are sometimes a matter of opinion and media bias is often in the eye of the beholder. To hear Arabs and Muslims say it, the American media consistently ignores the ordeals of the Israeli occupation, routinely downplays the significance of Jewish settlements overlooks the Israeli government’s rejectionist peace policies and barely makes an effort to disguise its blatantly obvious anti-Muslim, anti-Arab and anti-Palestinian prejudices.
These claims, of course, would be considered preposterous by many Israelis and American Jews who consistently lambast the same media’s unbalanced, disproportionate and yes, quite often anti-Semitic portrayal of the Jewish state. In America, these sentiments are fortified and amplified by conservative and Evangelical leaders who have their own axe to grind with the “elitist liberal media.”
It’s not only that supporters of Israel are feeling increasingly victimized, - with, but usually without just cause - or that they tend to view every harshly critical comment as part of a grand conspiracy to delegitimize Israel or even that they are participating in the defense of Israel in the only way they can – by knocking the media; they are also constantly lowering the bar in order to prove their point.
Criticism of settlement activity, for example, is no longer acceptable if it is not accompanied in the next paragraph by a much harsher blast of some Palestinian transgression, lest the writer stand accused of the cardinal sin of “moral equivalency.” Talk of a negotiated settlement based on modified 1967 borders and a division of Jerusalem is no longer a rational blueprint advanced by two American presidents and two Israeli prime ministers, at the very least, but rather a sinister formula for Israel’s destruction, or “throwing Israel under a bus,” as Mitt Romney describes it. It’s only a small jump from there to branding commentators who advocate such an agreement as aiders, abetters and avowed anti-Semites.
Another favorite gripe against the media is that Israel gets an inordinate amount of coverage compared to other countries, and this, in and of itself, is a form of double standard and bias. And while the number of foreign correspondents stationed in Israel has gone down by the hundreds in the past decade, there is no denying that Israel punches way above its weight in newspaper inches, broadcast minutes and web pages, as a simple calculation can prove.
When you take the population of various countries and divide it by the number of times they are mentioned in Google News, you get a measurable index of media coverage per number of people. A random check carried out this week showed that there is one citation on Google News for every 50,000 Chinese or Indians, 20,000 Bangladeshis, 8,000 Pakistanis, 5,000 Russians, 3,400 Egyptians (in the midst of horrific soccer riots) or 1200 Syrians (although the regime in Damascus is doing its best to improve its rankings by steadily decreasing the number of living Syrians). But it takes only 300 Israelis for each Google News item on Israel, clear proof that the country is being singled out for disproportionate coverage.
But is this disproportion really such a bad thing? Is it something to be fought, or rather cherished and preserved? And while Natan Sharansky has brilliantly copyrighted “three D’s” that define the “new anti-Semitism”, do “double standards” really belong up there together with demonization and delegitimization?
Because disproportionate coverage of Israel is, in many ways, the flip side and the natural outgrowth of the disproportionate support that Israel enjoys, especially in America. And the “double standards” are but a consequence, aren’t they, of the “shared values” that Americans and Israelis love to boast about. And bias, you must admit, can cut both ways.
After all, the very same people who detect no bias when Republican presidential hopefuls fall all over themselves swearing their undying love for Israel, who sense no double standards when Palestinians are suddenly cast as “invented people” and who see nothing disproportionate in the fact that the time and attention devoted to Israel in the Republican debates usually corresponds to two and a half Chinas, with a Europe and India thrown in for good measure – these are usually the very same people who go bananas over a random sentence in a Tom Friedman article, who a man the battle stations when a critical Roger Cohen column is published, who cry Eureka! over each and every anti-Israeli citation, in the process drawing attention to often obscure publications that no one would have heard of otherwise.
And it’s not even clear which is the chicken and where is the egg in this equation, because there is a strong case to be made that the disproportionate coverage and the media double standards are not only the result but also a direct cause of what is, after all, the truly amazing phenomenon that brings Republicans and Democrats, who can’t agree on anything anymore, to declare in perfect unison that tiny Israel is “America’s greatest ally in the world.”
And if that is true, then bias, disproportion and double standards are no threats, but rather critical building blocks of Israel’s national security. People who zealously combat the bias and the double standards and the disproportionate should be careful what they wish for, lest it come true.
Israel and its supporters increasingly prefer to shoot the messengers rather than listen to what they may have to say, to focus on the people holding the mirror rather than look at it directly; this see-no-evil, hear-no-evil attitude has now spread from the international to the Israeli media as well. In a classic case of cognitive dissonance, instead of facing up to the rather obvious and inherent contradiction between settlement activity, for example, and the pursuit of peace, sinister motives are ascribed to anyone who tries to point it out.
Israelis once viewed themselves not only as a “chosen people” in the religious sense but as a unique and admirable phenomenon on the secular world stage as well. When the book “Siah Lohamim” came out after the Six Day War (published in English as “The Seventh Day: Soldiers Talk About the Six Day War) Israelis wore the soul-searching angst of kibbutznik soldiers as a badge of honor. They promoted the unique and rather oxymoronic term “tohar haneshek” - purity of arms – as proof of their morally superior attitude towards their “wars of no choice.” They used to think of the media as an ally. They were self-assured and confident of their just cause. They looked media bias and double standards straight in the eye; they didn’t blink and rarely complained either.
It’s true that times have changed, that much water has flowed in the Jordan River and that Israel and Israelis of 40 years ago are significantly different than the Israelis of today. Still, there is something profoundly post-Zionist and even “unJewish,” if you will, in the demand that Israel be held to the same standards as Syria or Egypt or Sudan or France or Britain or even the United States for that matter. Israelis used to have higher expectations and to demand better of themselves but are now becoming increasingly resigned to being just like everyone else, no worse, perhaps, but not much better either. Israel wants to be treated as “a nation like all other nations,” which, Jews know better than most, is nothing to be proud of.
http://www.haaretz.com/blogs/west-of-eden/don-t-knock-the-media-s-bias-and-double-standards-on-israel-you-ll-miss-them-when-they-re-gone-1.410895
Don’t knock the media’s bias and double standards on Israel: you’ll miss them when they’re gone
Disproportionate coverage is the flip side of disproportionate support for Israel, and thus a critical element in its national security.
By Chemi Shalev
The cover story of the New York Times Sunday Magazine this week was written by Israeli journalist Ronen Bergman and it gave a detailed summary of Israel’s strategy and motivation regarding a possible attack on Iran, which, the article concluded, is more likely than not.
Then the blogosphere exploded with irate pundits and enraged commentators accusing the New York Times of being biased, employing double standards and serving as a mouthpiece for Israeli propagandists. The adjectives “pro-Israel” and “pro-Zionist” were tossed around freely as was their obvious connection to the well-known fact that the owners of the newspaper are Jewish, even though they’re not.
All of which, of course, would come as a great surprise to the legions of harsh critics of the newspaper, both in America and in Israel, including, first and foremost, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, who refused to pen an opinion article for the so-called “Old Gray Lady” and who reportedly described the Times as one of Israel’s two worst enemies in the world, (the other being the one that you are reading right now.)
Double standards are sometimes a matter of opinion and media bias is often in the eye of the beholder. To hear Arabs and Muslims say it, the American media consistently ignores the ordeals of the Israeli occupation, routinely downplays the significance of Jewish settlements overlooks the Israeli government’s rejectionist peace policies and barely makes an effort to disguise its blatantly obvious anti-Muslim, anti-Arab and anti-Palestinian prejudices.
These claims, of course, would be considered preposterous by many Israelis and American Jews who consistently lambast the same media’s unbalanced, disproportionate and yes, quite often anti-Semitic portrayal of the Jewish state. In America, these sentiments are fortified and amplified by conservative and Evangelical leaders who have their own axe to grind with the “elitist liberal media.”
It’s not only that supporters of Israel are feeling increasingly victimized, - with, but usually without just cause - or that they tend to view every harshly critical comment as part of a grand conspiracy to delegitimize Israel or even that they are participating in the defense of Israel in the only way they can – by knocking the media; they are also constantly lowering the bar in order to prove their point.
Criticism of settlement activity, for example, is no longer acceptable if it is not accompanied in the next paragraph by a much harsher blast of some Palestinian transgression, lest the writer stand accused of the cardinal sin of “moral equivalency.” Talk of a negotiated settlement based on modified 1967 borders and a division of Jerusalem is no longer a rational blueprint advanced by two American presidents and two Israeli prime ministers, at the very least, but rather a sinister formula for Israel’s destruction, or “throwing Israel under a bus,” as Mitt Romney describes it. It’s only a small jump from there to branding commentators who advocate such an agreement as aiders, abetters and avowed anti-Semites.
Another favorite gripe against the media is that Israel gets an inordinate amount of coverage compared to other countries, and this, in and of itself, is a form of double standard and bias. And while the number of foreign correspondents stationed in Israel has gone down by the hundreds in the past decade, there is no denying that Israel punches way above its weight in newspaper inches, broadcast minutes and web pages, as a simple calculation can prove.
When you take the population of various countries and divide it by the number of times they are mentioned in Google News, you get a measurable index of media coverage per number of people. A random check carried out this week showed that there is one citation on Google News for every 50,000 Chinese or Indians, 20,000 Bangladeshis, 8,000 Pakistanis, 5,000 Russians, 3,400 Egyptians (in the midst of horrific soccer riots) or 1200 Syrians (although the regime in Damascus is doing its best to improve its rankings by steadily decreasing the number of living Syrians). But it takes only 300 Israelis for each Google News item on Israel, clear proof that the country is being singled out for disproportionate coverage.
But is this disproportion really such a bad thing? Is it something to be fought, or rather cherished and preserved? And while Natan Sharansky has brilliantly copyrighted “three D’s” that define the “new anti-Semitism”, do “double standards” really belong up there together with demonization and delegitimization?
Because disproportionate coverage of Israel is, in many ways, the flip side and the natural outgrowth of the disproportionate support that Israel enjoys, especially in America. And the “double standards” are but a consequence, aren’t they, of the “shared values” that Americans and Israelis love to boast about. And bias, you must admit, can cut both ways.
After all, the very same people who detect no bias when Republican presidential hopefuls fall all over themselves swearing their undying love for Israel, who sense no double standards when Palestinians are suddenly cast as “invented people” and who see nothing disproportionate in the fact that the time and attention devoted to Israel in the Republican debates usually corresponds to two and a half Chinas, with a Europe and India thrown in for good measure – these are usually the very same people who go bananas over a random sentence in a Tom Friedman article, who a man the battle stations when a critical Roger Cohen column is published, who cry Eureka! over each and every anti-Israeli citation, in the process drawing attention to often obscure publications that no one would have heard of otherwise.
And it’s not even clear which is the chicken and where is the egg in this equation, because there is a strong case to be made that the disproportionate coverage and the media double standards are not only the result but also a direct cause of what is, after all, the truly amazing phenomenon that brings Republicans and Democrats, who can’t agree on anything anymore, to declare in perfect unison that tiny Israel is “America’s greatest ally in the world.”
And if that is true, then bias, disproportion and double standards are no threats, but rather critical building blocks of Israel’s national security. People who zealously combat the bias and the double standards and the disproportionate should be careful what they wish for, lest it come true.
Israel and its supporters increasingly prefer to shoot the messengers rather than listen to what they may have to say, to focus on the people holding the mirror rather than look at it directly; this see-no-evil, hear-no-evil attitude has now spread from the international to the Israeli media as well. In a classic case of cognitive dissonance, instead of facing up to the rather obvious and inherent contradiction between settlement activity, for example, and the pursuit of peace, sinister motives are ascribed to anyone who tries to point it out.
Israelis once viewed themselves not only as a “chosen people” in the religious sense but as a unique and admirable phenomenon on the secular world stage as well. When the book “Siah Lohamim” came out after the Six Day War (published in English as “The Seventh Day: Soldiers Talk About the Six Day War) Israelis wore the soul-searching angst of kibbutznik soldiers as a badge of honor. They promoted the unique and rather oxymoronic term “tohar haneshek” - purity of arms – as proof of their morally superior attitude towards their “wars of no choice.” They used to think of the media as an ally. They were self-assured and confident of their just cause. They looked media bias and double standards straight in the eye; they didn’t blink and rarely complained either.
It’s true that times have changed, that much water has flowed in the Jordan River and that Israel and Israelis of 40 years ago are significantly different than the Israelis of today. Still, there is something profoundly post-Zionist and even “unJewish,” if you will, in the demand that Israel be held to the same standards as Syria or Egypt or Sudan or France or Britain or even the United States for that matter. Israelis used to have higher expectations and to demand better of themselves but are now becoming increasingly resigned to being just like everyone else, no worse, perhaps, but not much better either. Israel wants to be treated as “a nation like all other nations,” which, Jews know better than most, is nothing to be proud of.
http://www.haaretz.com/blogs/west-of-eden/don-t-knock-the-media-s-bias-and-double-standards-on-israel-you-ll-miss-them-when-they-re-gone-1.410895
Thursday, February 2, 2012
The politics of making (lots of) money
The Atlantic
If the Republicans Lose in 2012, Expect Business As Usual
By Conor Friedersdorf
Feb 2 2012, 10:41 AM ET 2
Predicting the GOP's future is the parlor game of the moment. My crystal ball is freshly polished, and I see the profit motive enduring.
Parents of spoiled children are known to dread Christmas morning on years when it isn't certain that the present inside the box is what little Chase or Caitlin wants. "Are we in for a tantrum?" they think to themselves. It is with similar trepidation that George Packer is observing Election 2012. If Mitt Romney wins the nomination but loses the general election, the GOP "will continue down into the same dark hole where Palin, Bachmann, Perry, Cain, Santorum, and now Gingrich all lurk," he writes, drawing on lessons he gleaned from Election 1972.
All plausible! So are the rebuttals that Noah Millman and Daniel Larison offer. But my theory about what happens if the GOP loses is based on the proposition that the future of the conservative movement and its influence on Republicans is a business story as much as a political one.
Think of it this way. If Mitt Romney loses, these are all things that you can count on happening:
Fox News is going to keep stoking the cultural resentments and victimhood pathology of white conservatives, and rewarding politicians who appeal to that ethos with lucrative commentator contracts politicians. Put another way, the incentives for more Sarah Palins and Michele Bachmanns will be there.
Rush Limbaugh is going to keep attracting a sizable audience with his talent for the medium, his schtick implying that the Obama "regime" is illegitimate, and his endless ability to flatter the prejudices of his audience.
The conservative publishing market will keep rewarding Mark Levin-style books that proceed as if America is engaged in a simple binary struggle, with liberty on one side and a series of interchangeable bogeymen on the other: tyranny, utopia, radical Islam, political correctness, liberals, secularists, etc.
See, all the commentary you see about the right and its future takes as its starting point the notion of 2008 as a historic defeat. For folks whose highest priority is conservative governance, that's what it was -- eight years of frustration, betrayal, and disillusionment, culminating in a huge defeat.
But the period from 2000 to 2012 has been lucrative as hell if you're Roger Ailes or Rush Limbaugh or Mark Levin or Andrew Breitbart or Sarah Palin. That isn't to say they don't earnestly want Republicans to win, or that they're faking their preference for conservative governance. It's just to say that advancing their careers or enterprises is seemingly their priority. As swimmingly as that project is proceeding, why would anyone expect them to change course?
It isn't their reality that's come crashing down. They've never been so successful before in their lives!
This is what happens when an ideological movement basically merges with a collection of for-profit ventures. Incentives no longer align. Ends and means get mixed up. Herman Cain book tours turn into seemingly viable presidential campaigns. And Donald Trump is asked to host a debate.
Movement conservatism's entertainers aren't the only people influencing the Republican Party, as is evident at four year intervals, when the GOP electorate chooses a champion the entertainers hate. But most GOP voters aren't political junkies. In between elections, when most Republicans stop paying attention to politics, the relatively sizable Fox News and talk radio audiences can wield disproportionate influence on everything from legislative agendas to off-year elections. And TV personalities, talk-radio hosts, and ideological Web sites serve as the right's intellectuals, determining what ideas get out to the junkies, and later to the rank-and-file.
The right has other intellectuals who actually care about things like policy, governing, and intellectual honesty. What many of them don't realize is that until they meaningfully challenge the Conservative Entertainment Complex, their ideas and the direction they hope to push the conservative movement is always going to be overshadowed: by Birthers, or a righteous Andrew Breitbart/James O'Keefe crusade against ACORN, or the Glenn Beck show, or months of speculation about whether Sarah Palin will run for president. That is to say, they'll be overshadowed by what looks like a part of the political movement, but is largely a moneymaking venture.
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2012/02/if-the-republicans-lose-in-2012-expect-business-as-usual/252406/
If the Republicans Lose in 2012, Expect Business As Usual
By Conor Friedersdorf
Feb 2 2012, 10:41 AM ET 2
Predicting the GOP's future is the parlor game of the moment. My crystal ball is freshly polished, and I see the profit motive enduring.
Parents of spoiled children are known to dread Christmas morning on years when it isn't certain that the present inside the box is what little Chase or Caitlin wants. "Are we in for a tantrum?" they think to themselves. It is with similar trepidation that George Packer is observing Election 2012. If Mitt Romney wins the nomination but loses the general election, the GOP "will continue down into the same dark hole where Palin, Bachmann, Perry, Cain, Santorum, and now Gingrich all lurk," he writes, drawing on lessons he gleaned from Election 1972.
All plausible! So are the rebuttals that Noah Millman and Daniel Larison offer. But my theory about what happens if the GOP loses is based on the proposition that the future of the conservative movement and its influence on Republicans is a business story as much as a political one.
Think of it this way. If Mitt Romney loses, these are all things that you can count on happening:
Fox News is going to keep stoking the cultural resentments and victimhood pathology of white conservatives, and rewarding politicians who appeal to that ethos with lucrative commentator contracts politicians. Put another way, the incentives for more Sarah Palins and Michele Bachmanns will be there.
Rush Limbaugh is going to keep attracting a sizable audience with his talent for the medium, his schtick implying that the Obama "regime" is illegitimate, and his endless ability to flatter the prejudices of his audience.
The conservative publishing market will keep rewarding Mark Levin-style books that proceed as if America is engaged in a simple binary struggle, with liberty on one side and a series of interchangeable bogeymen on the other: tyranny, utopia, radical Islam, political correctness, liberals, secularists, etc.
See, all the commentary you see about the right and its future takes as its starting point the notion of 2008 as a historic defeat. For folks whose highest priority is conservative governance, that's what it was -- eight years of frustration, betrayal, and disillusionment, culminating in a huge defeat.
But the period from 2000 to 2012 has been lucrative as hell if you're Roger Ailes or Rush Limbaugh or Mark Levin or Andrew Breitbart or Sarah Palin. That isn't to say they don't earnestly want Republicans to win, or that they're faking their preference for conservative governance. It's just to say that advancing their careers or enterprises is seemingly their priority. As swimmingly as that project is proceeding, why would anyone expect them to change course?
It isn't their reality that's come crashing down. They've never been so successful before in their lives!
This is what happens when an ideological movement basically merges with a collection of for-profit ventures. Incentives no longer align. Ends and means get mixed up. Herman Cain book tours turn into seemingly viable presidential campaigns. And Donald Trump is asked to host a debate.
Movement conservatism's entertainers aren't the only people influencing the Republican Party, as is evident at four year intervals, when the GOP electorate chooses a champion the entertainers hate. But most GOP voters aren't political junkies. In between elections, when most Republicans stop paying attention to politics, the relatively sizable Fox News and talk radio audiences can wield disproportionate influence on everything from legislative agendas to off-year elections. And TV personalities, talk-radio hosts, and ideological Web sites serve as the right's intellectuals, determining what ideas get out to the junkies, and later to the rank-and-file.
The right has other intellectuals who actually care about things like policy, governing, and intellectual honesty. What many of them don't realize is that until they meaningfully challenge the Conservative Entertainment Complex, their ideas and the direction they hope to push the conservative movement is always going to be overshadowed: by Birthers, or a righteous Andrew Breitbart/James O'Keefe crusade against ACORN, or the Glenn Beck show, or months of speculation about whether Sarah Palin will run for president. That is to say, they'll be overshadowed by what looks like a part of the political movement, but is largely a moneymaking venture.
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2012/02/if-the-republicans-lose-in-2012-expect-business-as-usual/252406/
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