The GOP's McCarthy gene

The GOP's McCarthy gene - Los Angeles Times: "the real father of modern Republicanism is Sen. Joe McCarthy, and the line doesn't run from Goldwater to Reagan to George W. Bush; it runs from McCarthy to Nixon to Bush and possibly now to Sarah Palin."

Paul Samuelson: The Dynamic Moving Center - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News - International

Paul Samuelson: The Dynamic Moving Center - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News - International: "Libertarians are not just bad emotional cripples. They are also bad advice givers. I refer of course to the views of both Milton Friedman and Friedrich Hayek. The “serfdom” they warn against is not that of Genghis Khan or Lenin-Stalin-Mao or Hitler-Mussolini. Rather, they warn against the centrist states of the modern world. Think only of Switzerland, Britain, the US, the Scandinavian countries, and the Pacific Rim. Why do citizenries there report high indexes of “happiness” and enjoy broad freedoms of speech and belief?"

The decline of the Republican Party | Ship of fools | The Economist

The decline of the Republican Party | Ship of fools | The Economist: "JOHN STUART MILL once dismissed the British Conservative Party as the stupid party. Today the Conservative Party is run by Oxford-educated high-fliers who have been busy reinventing conservatism for a new era. As Lexington sees it, the title of the “stupid party” now belongs to the Tories’ transatlantic cousins, the Republicans."

"Republicanism’s anti-intellectual turn is devastating for its future."

GOP Moderates 'will be cheerfully ignored'

As long as the Republican Party remains chained to the twin anchors of religious and (club for growth) economic extremists, it will continue to sink as a national political party.

What Toyota knows that GM doesn’t |

When you hear conservatives attributing the Big 3's problems to their unions and suggest that they should act more like the non-union Japanese automakers in the US, this is the bit they usually ignore.

"The lesson here: Unlike their counterparts GM and Ford, Toyota has always taken a long-term strategic view about their employees. Toyota understands that laying off thousands of employees for slowdowns or plant retooling is counter productive. They wisely utilize the time to redistribute their workforce to understaffed plants, provide additional training for the new products, and leverage their workforce to speed the transition for newer products. Their philosophy has avoided labor disputes and staffing shortages. It has kept the company as a leader in quality and profitability over its shortsighted competitors."

Officials: Israeli mob boss killed in car bombing - Yahoo! News

Officials: Israeli mob boss killed in car bombing - Yahoo! News: "The mob violence has underscored police's inability — and even unwillingness — to stop organized crime.

Policemen have been caught feeding information to the mob, and last year, the national police chief was forced to resign after a government commission found he ignored ties between senior officers and underworld figures."