Will GOP Official's Self-Outing Help Gay Rights?
Thu, 26 Aug 2010 02:53 am PDT
 The Atlantic Wire - Ken Mehlman, a former Republican National Committee chairman and the manager of George W. Bush's 2004 campaign, has announced that he is gay. The news, reported by The Atlantic's Marc Ambinder, has provoked strong reaction in gossip-hungry Washington and especially among liberals who are wondering why Mehlman worked so hard for a campaign and political party that have been less than receptive to gay-rights issues. Many observers write that Mehlman's sexuality was long an open secret. Here's what people have to say. Full Story | Top |
Price of August naps: history's rudest awakenings
Wed, 25 Aug 2010 06:16 pm PDT
 The Christian Science Monitor - The world sometimes falls asleep in August. And when it wakes in September it sorely rues the nap. Some of the most consequential events in modern Western history happened in August. Yet many people still think “not much happens†this month. Full Story | Top |
Why the Housing Market Is Plummeting So Rapidly
Tue, 24 Aug 2010 10:03 am PDT
 The Atlantic Wire - The sales of existing homes dropped 27.2 percent in July, accelerating the recent decline in the already frail housing market. This brings the number of existing houses sold to an annual rate of only 3.83 million units, the lowest figure since 1999. The number of single-family home sales hit its lowest level since 1995. Some economists even fear that this signals the end of housing as an investment. How bad is this and what does it mean? Full Story | Top |
Why Is Jimmy Carter Going to North Korea?
Tue, 24 Aug 2010 09:12 am PDT
 The Atlantic Wire - In a development first reported by Foreign Policy, it appears that Jimmy Carter will be informally dispatched to North Korea in hopes of securing the release of a United States citizen who crossed the border and was caught by authorities. The ex-president, who has remade himself into one of the nation's highest-profile diplomats after a single term in office, has previously engaged with North Korea during the Clinton years and most recently spearheaded house-building projects in Thailand and Vietnam. Full Story | Top |
Rubio's Great Test Ahead
Tue, 24 Aug 2010 10:00 pm PDT
RealClearPolitics.com - Marco Rubio's real test begins today. He is the GOP's great Cuban hope. A potential Republican bridge to Hispanic voters. The most likely Republican VP nominee in 2012. Even the presidency is attainable someday. It's all within reach for Rubio. Full Story | Top |
Can South Africa keep tapping World Cup spirit?
Thu, 26 Aug 2010 12:39 pm PDT
The Christian Science Monitor - In 2007, the US State Department asked me to go to South Africa to meet with leading newspaper editors. With the 2010 World Cup looming, they wanted to hear the experience of an editor who had managed coverage of a major sports event, as I had in Salt Lake City with the 2002 Winter Olympics. Full Story | Top |
US Dodges Obligation to Help Iraqi Women Trafficked into Sexual Slavery
Thu, 19 Aug 2010 11:08 am PDT
The Nation - The Nation -- Two months ago, the State Department released its 2010 Trafficking in Persons Report (TiP Report), laying out a picture of human trafficking across the globe. In it, the United States reaffirmed its commitment to ending this scourge—and for the first time, included an evaluation of anti-trafficking measures in our own country. Full Story | Top |
Glenn Beck 8/28 rally: It's a matter of honor
Thu, 26 Aug 2010 12:30 pm PDT
The Christian Science Monitor - In front of the Lincoln Memorial in June, a group of students caught up in a moment of spontaneous patriotism broke into song. But the US Park Police were quick to shush the members of the Young America’s Foundation, saying singing is not allowed at the memorial. The song that was stifled? “The Star-Spangled Banner.†Full Story | Top |
A tough economy toughens up America
Thu, 26 Aug 2010 11:43 am PDT
The Christian Science Monitor - “No pain, no gain†is the exercise motto. It might also apply in some ways to economic health. For as this difficult economy grinds on, the pounding is reshaping important players, strengthening them for the long run. Full Story | Top |
ABC News Hidden Camera Shows 'How Muslims Are Treated in America'
Thu, 26 Aug 2010 10:23 am PDT
The Atlantic Wire - Bloggers are circulating a video from 2008, produced by an ABC News hidden camera team, called "How Muslims Are Treated in America." The segment shows the reactions of bystanders as two actors stage a racially charged scene, with one actor portraying a deli owner who refuses service to a hijab-wearing Muslim woman, also played by an actor. The video is making the rounds as a means of shedding light on the ongoing and increasingly ugly battle over the Cordoba center, called the "Ground Zero Mosque" by critics, which has since spread to a handful of nationwide protests against Muslim-American centers. Setting aside concerns about the morality of such "hidden camera" journalism, which some critics say tricks and emotionally manipulates innocent people, it provides a brief window into American attitudes towards Islam. Full Story | Top |
39 Seats Away: Republicans Hungry to Take Back the House
Thu, 26 Aug 2010 09:48 am PDT
The Atlantic Wire - Expectations of a 2010 GOP tsunami have peaked in the days after the primaries, but the essential question is still up for debate: will Republicans take control of the House of Representatives? The House is widely viewed as vulnerable, and Republicans are aggressively positioning themselves to pull off a political coup, with Representative John Boehner angling to become House Majority Leader. Democrats, for their part, have amassed a sizable financial advantage and appear to be hoping the ideological divide between Tea Partiers and the traditional Republican establishment will send independent voters back to the president's party. Pollsters and data-crunching pundits weigh in with their (early) November prognostications. Full Story | Top |
In the Tea Party Era, Should Libertarians Ditch the Right?
Thu, 26 Aug 2010 09:35 am PDT
The Atlantic Wire - Between big-government Democrats and populist Republicans, where should libertarians look for allies? Reason magazine recently kicked off a debate on this subject by hosting three different opinions: one from the Cato Institute's Brink Lindsey, one from National Review's Jonah Goldberg, and one from Tea Party organization FreedomWorks's Matt Kibbe. Here's what they had to say and what others said in response. Full Story | Top |
Mexico Discovers Mass Grave, Yielding 4 Hard Lessons
Thu, 26 Aug 2010 09:19 am PDT
The Atlantic Wire - Mexican police have uncovered a mass grave of 72 people on a ranch in the north of Mexico. The victims, 58 men and 14 women who are thought to come from various countries across Central and South America, are presumed to have been migrants who were killed by Mexico's brutal drug cartels as they attempted to travel to the U.S. A survivor told CNN they were shot for refusing to work on behalf of the cartels. It is still unknown whether the cartels had kidnapped the victims or whether they had been attempting to smuggle them into the U.S. Both kidnapping and human trafficking are common behavior for the Mexican cartels. The situation is still developing and the full story remains unclear, but here are lessons we can draw from the episode as we understand it so far. Full Story | Top |
In the Tea Party Era, Which Way Should Libertarians Lean?
Thu, 26 Aug 2010 09:14 am PDT
The Atlantic Wire - Between big-government Democrats and populist Republicans, where should libertarians look for allies? Reason magazine recently kicked off a debate on this subject by hosting three different opinions: one from the Cato Institute's Brink Lindsey, one from National Review's Jonah Goldberg, and one from Tea Party organization FreedomWorks's Matt Kibbe. Here's what they had to say and what others said in response. Full Story | Top |
Is the Mortgage Crisis Finally Improving?
Thu, 26 Aug 2010 09:10 am PDT
The Atlantic Wire - The proportion of mortgaged U.S. households 90 or more days behind on payments has had its biggest drop since the mortgage crisis began four years ago, though the figure still remains high. The Mortgage Bankers Association reports that the percentage of mortgages that are seriously delinquent declined from 9.5 to 9.1 percent between the first and second quarters of 2010. That's still alarmingly high, however. Delinquent mortgages accounted for less than 5 percent of all mortgages in 2005 before the crisis began and hit a record high of 9.64 in late 2009. But this recent decrease could signal the beginning of improvement in the long-troubled mortgage market. The rate of foreclosures remained about the same, declining slightly from 4.63 to 4.57 percent. Here's what experts have to say. Full Story | Top |
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