The northeastern United States was cold but the northern latitudes were overall quite warm last month. From NASA:
Weekly Digest – April 26, 2015
Must Read
- Andy Lacis on what we actually know about global warming and why we know it [Ed.: I’m presuming he’s this Andy Lacis.]
- Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson, No Cost for Extremism
- Paul Krugman (NYT), Zombies of 2016
- Elise Gold and Alyssa Davis, Sluggish Wage Growth Over the Last Year Is Not Due to the Mix of Jobs Being Created
- Charlie Post, We’re All Precarious Now
Should Read
- Charlie Pierce, Trade Show, Part Deux: Imaginary Benefits vs. Real Costs [Ed.: The TPP. See also here]
- Larry Mishel, Heidi Shierholz, and John Schmitt, Wage Inequality: A Story of Policy Choices
- Pew Research Center, The Politics of Financial Insecurity
- Paul Krugman (NYT), Wingnut Welfare and Work Incentives
- Ezra Klein, The anti-Obamacare movement is making red states sicker and poorer
- Brian Beutler, Obamacare Is More Popular Than It Seems – If You Discount These People’s Opinions
- Beth Daley, Despite spread of Lyme disease, Mass. dedicates no money to prevention
Health Care Continue reading
Weekly Digest – April 19, 2015
Must Read/Watch
- Jared Bernstein, Raising the median wage: Policies that target the middle class
- Matthew Yglesias, Chris Christie says his Social Security plan hurts the rich, but it really hurts the poor
- Daniel Larison, Iran Hawks and the Logic of Arms Control
- William Saletan, Foreign Saboteurs: When it comes to a Democratic president’s foreign policy, Republicans often side with America’s enemies.
- Russia Today, Vladimir Putin’s annual Q&A session [Ed.: No, I didn’t watch all of it. NY Times’ summary here.]
Should Read
- Dave Johnson, The Fast Track Fight Begins In The Senate
- Dean Baker, Redistribution Can Involve Less Government Rather than More [Ed.: See also Mark Thoma’s comment]
- Matthew Yglesias, Elizabeth Warren has a game-changing idea that doesn’t require Congress
- Paul Krugman (NYT), It Takes a Party
Foreign Policy Continue reading
Thought for the Day: 19 April 2015
The one thing that [Sen. Elizabeth Warren] understands that [the chattering classes] don’t care to understand is that the interests of “average Americans” and the needs of “the business community” in the increasingly competitive global argle-bargle are in direct conflict, and will remain so as long as the “business community” continues to combine the essential patriotism of a potato blight with the business plan of the Barbary Pirates.
Thought for the Day: 18 April 2015
When you’re scientifically literate, the world looks different to you. It’s a particular way of questioning what you see and hear. When empowered by this state of mind, objective realities matter. These are the truths of the world that exist outside of whatever your belief system tells you.
One objective reality is that our government doesn’t work, not because we have dysfunctional politicians, but because we have dysfunctional voters. As a scientist and educator, my goal, then, is not to become President and lead a dysfunctional electorate, but to enlighten the electorate so they might choose the right leaders in the first place.
Music for Tuesday night
Former Gov. Patrick joins Bain Capital
I’ve said on numerous occasions that the Democratic party needs to nominate more multi-millionaires for high profile elected offices like we need a hole in the head. I said that on numerous occasions thinking specifically of our former governor, Deval Patrick. (To be fair, he turned out to be okay – not great but not bad either.) He leaves office and what does he do? He lines up a $7500/day gig to lobby for the 2024 summer olympics to come to Boston. That fell through but he’s landed on his feet. From WBUR:
The former Democratic Massachusetts governor has joined the Boston firm Bain Capital to develop a line of so-called “social impact” investing.
The business “will focus on delivering attractive financial returns by investing in projects with significant, measurable social impact,” according to a Tuesday morning press release from Bain announcing the hire.
“Significant, measurable social impact”… Yeah, Bain has a bit of a track record there.
“Bain Capital is widely recognized as both an innovative investment firm and a philanthropic and community leader,” Patrick said in the Bain release.
“A philanthropic and community leader”? Really? By whom? I can’t say I’ve ever heard “Bain Capital” and “philanthropy” or “community leader” in the same sentence. “Bain Capital” and “motherfuckers”, sure; “Bain Capital” and “parasitic bastards who give capitalism a bad name”, certainly; “Bain Capital” and “community leader”, no. Definitely not. Ah, but now that they’ve hired our socially-progressive former governor I’m sure everything will be wonderful and we’ll all get a pony and an ice cream.
Rich people can do great things with their wealth. Rich people can do good things for their fellow citizens which don’t involve them spending any money. Most don’t. I’m not expecting much from Gov. Patrick.
Music for Monday night
(Featuring Rich Gilbert)
Plant reviews: Blanket flower and Lobed tickseed
Last fall I took some notes on what worked and what didn’t in the garden. My focus is native plants and cultivars. (My wife handles the vegetable garden.) My first two reviews follow below. (Musical accompaniment here.)
Two things that have done well and I’d plant more of: Gaillardia ‘Arizona Sun’ and Coreopsis auriculata ‘Nana’. Gaillardia (NB: not to be confused with giardia) is also known as blanket flower. I didn’t snap any pictures of ours so here’s one gleaned from the web:
We’ve had ours for probably three seasons now. It has a long bloom season – at least two months – and the blooms are long lasting – didn’t write it down but I’d say at least a couple weeks before individual blooms fade. I originally planted them in a partly sunny area but then transplanted them to full sun two (?) years ago. They’re happier in full sun than part sun. I know, they’re not New England natives but they are native to the U.S. and the bees seem to like them. That’s good enough for me.
Weekly Digest – April 12, 2015
Must Listen/Read
- President Obama’s Full NPR Interview On Iran Nuclear Deal [Ed.: The President gets this one very right, I think.]
- Glenn Kessler, [Sen. Tom] Cotton’s misguided history lesson on the North Korean nuclear deal
- Matthew Yglesias, 12 years ago today, Donald Rumsfeld sent the greatest memo of all time
- Larry Mishel, The Opportunity Dodge
- Robert Reich, The Defining Moment, and Hillary Rodham Clinton
Should Read
- Economic Policy Institute, Missing Workers: The Missing Part of the Unemployment Story
- Danny Vinik, [Kansas Gov.] Brownback’s Right-Wing “Experiment” Is Bankrupting Kansas. His Solution: More Radical Cuts. [Ed.: See also Jon Stewart.]
- Tim Maughan, The dystopian lake filled by the world’s tech lust
- Eli Rabett, Andy Lacis Writes to Steve Koonin [Ed.: Essential climate science explained in detail to someone who shouldn’t need to have it explained to them in detail.]
- Andrew Gelman, A silly little error, of the sort that I make every day
- Eric Asimov (NYT), The Right Wine to Drink With a Sandwich
Work, Jobs, and Trade (Economics)