joshuago’s politics Bookmarks

A graceful survey of the delicate balance the United States must maintain in Central Asia. The war in Afghanistan means that America needs a transit route across the region, but it means making deals with autocratic leaders. All is not lost, however, because partnership with the U.S. also means counterbalancing Russian, Chinese, and Iranian influence, and greater safety from pro-Taliban elements.

The iPad is Steve Jobs' final victory over the company's co-founder Steve Wozniak. Centralized power and control in the pursuit of perfection completely won out over distributed tinkering and decentralized power.

When the ecosystem stops rewarding complexity, it is the people who figure out how to work simply in the present, rather than the people who mastered the complexities of the past, who get to say what happens in the future.

Interview with a Nobel economist who says the health-care bill will cause serious damage, but that the American people can be trusted to vote for limited government in November. Discusses the counterbalancing effect of competing interest groups, in-built suspicion of markets, and the historical intellectual shift on the view of growth from one that was state-centered to one that's market-centered.

Both movement conservatism and political journalism are in crisis. The intellectual coherence and public credibility of each has been breaking down for a generation.

Washington's paralysis is becoming intolerable, says Philip Howard. He says the government is burdened by too much law and too many entitlements. The health care system can't provide quality care efficiently. Legal reform would force officials to take responsibility for their actions.

The reason health care, cap and trade, and the other blocks of Obama’s New Foundation are unpopular isn’t public ignorance. It’s that the public sees them as counterproductive—and in many cases beside the point.

Most Americans would like the blue model to stick around and are nostalgic for the security it once provided, but they understand that the great task of our times isn’t to save the blue model but to move on. The Democratic wing of the Democratic Party believes exactly the opposite: that the blue social model is the only way to go.

Unified government makes the country virtually ungovernable. Reforms win broader acceptance and are more durable when both parties' fingerprints are on them. The two great domestic reforms of their respective eras, tax reform in 1986 and welfare reform in 1996, were products of divided control.

When McCain surrendered to Palin, it was his last - and unintended - blow to a sane or responsible conservatism. Non-believing people have a hard time swallowing all this. It seems so wacko. Religious people who have had any experience of fundamentalism in their lives know it all too well.