China can help west build economic growth
Central to international efforts towards promoting strong and balanced growth is the need to generate demand, not only in developing countries but, more importantly, in developed countries. The imperative poses a critical question: where is new demand to come from? The answer lies in boosting investment in infrastructure – and China is keen to get involved.
The narrative of infrastructure development in places such as the US indicates how such investment powers an economy forward. China’s growth story in recent years provides further proof. Now, infrastructure in Europe and the US badly needs more investment.
The narrative of infrastructure development in places such as the US indicates how such investment powers an economy forward. China’s growth story in recent years provides further proof. Now, infrastructure in Europe and the US badly needs more investment.
Too trivial a debate for our times
By Edward Luce
Matt Kenyon illustration
H.L. Mencken, America’s patron saint of sarcastic one-liners, said “democracy is the theory that common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard”. In this age of Twitter, Mencken would barely keep his thumb off his BlackBerry.
Matt Kenyon illustration
H.L. Mencken, America’s patron saint of sarcastic one-liners, said “democracy is the theory that common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard”. In this age of Twitter, Mencken would barely keep his thumb off his BlackBerry.
The eurozone really has only days to avoid collapse
By Wolfgang MünchauIn virtually all the debates about the eurozone I have been engaged in, someone usually makes the point that it is only when things get bad enough, the politicians finally act – eurobond, debt monetisation, quantitative easing, whatever. I am not so sure. The argument ignores the problem of acute collective action.
Last week, the crisis reached a new qualitative stage. With the spectacular flop of the German bond auction and the alarming rise in short-term rates in Spain and Italy, the government bond market across the eurozone has ceased to function.
Last week, the crisis reached a new qualitative stage. With the spectacular flop of the German bond auction and the alarming rise in short-term rates in Spain and Italy, the government bond market across the eurozone has ceased to function.
Our Spending Problem. Supercommittee, R.I.P.
The failure of the supercommittee marks a good time to highlight just how out of control our federal spending really is. To see the matter in a clearer light, let’s leave aside all disputes over tax revenues for the time being, and focus purely on spending.
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) says that federal spending has increased from $2.73 trillion in fiscal year 2007 to $3.60 trillion in fiscal year 2011. That’s a whopping 32 percent increase in just five years. (Americans should have been so lucky with their incomes.) That figure has nothing to do with diminishing tax revenues. It is strictly the amount by which federal outlays have increased.
Looking forward, the CBO projects (see table 1-1) that the federal government will spend $5.68 trillion in 2021. That’s an increase of 58 percent over 2011, and 108 percent over 2007. In other words, on our current trajectory, annual federal spending will more than double over the 15-year span from 2007 through 2021.
For President, Newt Gingrich
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This newspaper endorses Newt Gingrich in the New Hampshire Presidential Primary.
America is at a crucial crossroads. It is not going to be enough to merely replace Barack Obama next year. We are in critical need of the innovative, forward-looking strategy and positive leadership that Gingrich has shown he is capable of providing.
He did so with the Contract with America. He did it in bringing in the first Republican House in 40 years and by forging balanced budgets and even a surplus despite the political challenge of dealing with a Democratic President. A lot of candidates say they're going to improve Washington. Newt Gingrich has actually done that, and in this race he offers the best shot of doing it again.
America is at a crucial crossroads. It is not going to be enough to merely replace Barack Obama next year. We are in critical need of the innovative, forward-looking strategy and positive leadership that Gingrich has shown he is capable of providing.
He did so with the Contract with America. He did it in bringing in the first Republican House in 40 years and by forging balanced budgets and even a surplus despite the political challenge of dealing with a Democratic President. A lot of candidates say they're going to improve Washington. Newt Gingrich has actually done that, and in this race he offers the best shot of doing it again.
We need a holiday from stimulus
Illustration: The stimulus box by Alexander Hunter for The Washington Times.Privatize the nation’s mail delivery
By George F. Will,
The Jacksonian-era movement to keep the Sabbath pure deplored Sunday mail delivery. Said one evangelical: “We have always viewed it as a national evil of great magnitude, and one which calls for national repentance and reformation, that the mails are carried, and the post offices kept open, on that holy day in every part of our country.”
Others, however, including Saturday-Sabbath keepers, said ending Sunday mail deliveries would amount to the government deciding what day is holy and therefore would violate the separation of church and state. And Richard M. Johnson, the chairman of the congressional committee with jurisdiction, warned of calamity:
The Jacksonian-era movement to keep the Sabbath pure deplored Sunday mail delivery. Said one evangelical: “We have always viewed it as a national evil of great magnitude, and one which calls for national repentance and reformation, that the mails are carried, and the post offices kept open, on that holy day in every part of our country.”
Others, however, including Saturday-Sabbath keepers, said ending Sunday mail deliveries would amount to the government deciding what day is holy and therefore would violate the separation of church and state. And Richard M. Johnson, the chairman of the congressional committee with jurisdiction, warned of calamity:
Gingrich Bounce Shows Geek Love Can Still Blossom: Amity Shlaes
Whether his recent rise in the polls is lasting or not, Newt Gingrich has already shifted Campaign 2012 for the better. The feisty former speaker of the House has reminded us through his debate performances that knowledge is an important part of a president’s work.
That a president must know something seems obvious. But our nation’s opinion writers (myself included) have often ranked knowledge behind a candidate’s character, electability or even, simply, novelty. And in the past voters have often done the same.
That a president must know something seems obvious. But our nation’s opinion writers (myself included) have often ranked knowledge behind a candidate’s character, electability or even, simply, novelty. And in the past voters have often done the same.
What Is Constitutional Conservatism?
This fall, liberals from the president on down have begun to grasp the scope of the political and intellectual disaster that the past three years have been for the Left. Their various responses to the calamity have tended to have one thing in common: immense frustration. But the different expressions of that frustration have been deeply revealing. They should help Americans better understand this complicated moment in our politics, and, in particular, help conservatives frame their responses.
An Alternative Manifesto For The Durban Environmental Summit. by Rachel Marsden
Global leaders are set to meet in Durban, South Africa, from November 28th until December 9th, in an attempt to figure out how to continue their global fight against “climate change” when the first Kyoto Protocol commitment period ends in 2012. As someone currently sitting here in the dark with the heat off, perhaps they’d permit me the temporary moral authority to offer a few suggestions for their agenda.
* Don’t waste any time fiddling with the planet’s thermostat. So the big achievement of the previous summit in Cancun was agreeing that the Earth’s temperature must not be permitted to increase by 2 percent? Look, I’ve been in European gyms with air conditioning that can’t even be controlled within the space of a few thousand square feet, despite regular intervention by head-scratching specialists. Usually the excuse is that the “ceiling is too high”. Well guess what, fools? The Earth’s ceiling is really, really high. Give it up already and move on to something you can realistically control.
* Don’t waste any time fiddling with the planet’s thermostat. So the big achievement of the previous summit in Cancun was agreeing that the Earth’s temperature must not be permitted to increase by 2 percent? Look, I’ve been in European gyms with air conditioning that can’t even be controlled within the space of a few thousand square feet, despite regular intervention by head-scratching specialists. Usually the excuse is that the “ceiling is too high”. Well guess what, fools? The Earth’s ceiling is really, really high. Give it up already and move on to something you can realistically control.
U.S. Declares Cold War With China. by Robert Maginnis
Last week, President Barack Obama was in Asia to declare a cold war with China. Hopefully the U.S.-China cold war won’t be like the one fought with the Soviet Union that brought the world to the brink of nuclear annihilation and cost trillions of dollars over 60 years.
The crux of the conflict is China’s attempt to assert its sovereignty over the South China Sea, a resource-rich conduit for roughly $5 trillion in annual global trade, of which $1.2 trillion is American, which U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declared last year a matter of “national interest.”
The crux of the conflict is China’s attempt to assert its sovereignty over the South China Sea, a resource-rich conduit for roughly $5 trillion in annual global trade, of which $1.2 trillion is American, which U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declared last year a matter of “national interest.”
The Iron Lady by Daniel Hannan
*Special note from the Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute: These rankings are meant to highlight influential conservative women in America. However, we would be remiss to overlook Lady Thatcher’s leadership in the United Kingdom, as she is an undoubtedly influential woman and has truly been an inspiration to conservatives in the U.S. and abroad.To understand the magnitude of Margaret Thatcher’s achievement, you have to recall the calamity that preceded it. It is difficult, these days, to convey the unremitting awfulness of 1970s Britain: the pessimism, the rancour, the double-digit inflation, the power cuts, the three-day working week, the regulation of prices and incomes, the IMF bailout.
It felt as if we were finished as a country. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, we had been outperformed by every European economy. “Britain is a tragedy, it has sunk to borrowing, begging, stealing until North Sea oil comes in,” said Henry Kissinger. The Wall Street Journal was blunter: “Goodbye, Great Britain: it was nice knowing you”.
The Norquist Myth. by Charles Krauthammer
WASHINGTON -- Democrats are unanimous in charging that the debt-reduction supercommittee collapsed because Republicans refused to raise taxes. Apparently, Republicans are in the thrall of one Grover Norquist, the anti-tax campaigner, whom Sen. John Kerry called "the 13th member of this committee without being there." Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid helpfully suggested "maybe they should impeach Grover Norquist."
With that, Norquist officially replaces the Koch brothers as the great malevolent manipulator that controls the republic by pulling unseen strings on behalf of the plutocracy.
With that, Norquist officially replaces the Koch brothers as the great malevolent manipulator that controls the republic by pulling unseen strings on behalf of the plutocracy.
Gingrich Gets Endorsement of Influential Conservative Newspaper In New Hampshire. by Tony Lee
The influential New Hampshire conservative newspaper, the Union Leader, endorsed former House Speaker Newt Gingrich for president a month before the nation's "first-in-the-nation" primary on Jan. 10, one week after the nation's first nominating contest in Iowa on Jan. 3.
"A lot of candidates say they're going to improve Washington," wrote Joseph McQuaid, publisher of the Union Leader. "Newt Gingrich has actually done that, and in this race he offers the best shot of doing it again."
On C-SPAN's "Washington Journal," McQuaid said that the editorial board came to the conclusion weeks ago in choosing Gingrich that America needed a candidate that would "grab the moment" and "not be a manager," which is a shot at Mitt Romney, whose opponents and critics have said he would be a manager of the status quo without offering the bold change conservatives are looking for in their nominee.
"A lot of candidates say they're going to improve Washington," wrote Joseph McQuaid, publisher of the Union Leader. "Newt Gingrich has actually done that, and in this race he offers the best shot of doing it again."
On C-SPAN's "Washington Journal," McQuaid said that the editorial board came to the conclusion weeks ago in choosing Gingrich that America needed a candidate that would "grab the moment" and "not be a manager," which is a shot at Mitt Romney, whose opponents and critics have said he would be a manager of the status quo without offering the bold change conservatives are looking for in their nominee.
Who will benefit from the chaos?
Egypt’s turmoil
The obtuse generals may have dished the electoral chances of Egypt’s secular liberal democrats
CAIRO |
The sinking euro
Charlemagne
Denial and delusion in Brussels, as the single currency founders
Accessories after the fact
Policing internet piracy
Tougher laws against online pirates are needed, but a proposal in Congress could hit law-abiding businesses
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