1. Much less ice for polar bears, expert says 6 hours ago   permalink

Much less ice for polar bears, expert says
Www.msnbc.msn.com

Arctic sea ice conditions are even worse than feared after a survey found that ice detected as older and thicker by satellites is actually thin and fragile, a prominent Canadian researcher reported Friday.

discussions

2. Taxing the Speculators 8 hours ago   permalink

Taxing the Speculators
Www.nytimes.com

Should we use taxes to deter financial speculation? Yes, say top British officials, who oversee the City of London, one of the world’s two great banking centers. Other European governments agree — and they’re right.

discussions

3. First Read: The Mutualized Future is Bright 8 hours ago   permalink

Www.cjr.org

Recently, I was confronted with a legal obstacle that—possibly for the first time since we were founded in 1821—prevented The Guardian from reporting something that had happened in Parliament. We wrote a bafflingly cryptic front-page piece and I left the office feeling pretty fed up. But before sitting down to eat, I borrowed the restaurant’ ...

discussions

4. Chart Of The Day 9 hours ago   permalink

Chart Of The Day
Andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com

The St. Louis Fed has a good graph that shows the outstanding private credit (consumer debt) since the end of World War II.  I believe you are justified in your "two decades" comment although it was actually about two and half decades ago that it really started to explode after starting to ramp up in the 70's. Between about ...

5. Weekly Tracking Poll: New Feature Paints Ugly 2010 Picture 10 hours ago   permalink

Www.dailykos.com

Full crosstabs here. This poll is updated every Friday morning, and you can see trendline graphs here. There is a little bit that one can divine from the numbers above. The President's numbers continue to soften (a trajectory that has been confirmed by numerous other pollsters). Meanwhile, on balance, this is a weak tracking poll for Democrats ...

discussions

6. Marshalling A New Era Of Ownership, Ctd 10 hours ago   permalink

Andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com

I think it's more aptly put that the new age of publishing has made it possible for small, opinionated news publications to have viable, market-based business models because they can cut the overhead that print requires. These publications have always existed in the print and web worlds, just with subsidies, witness: The Nation, The National ...

7. Does 'cash for appliances' make sense? 10 hours ago   permalink

Www.americablog.com

On the heals of the 'cash for clunkers' campaign that boosted car sales, the administration is now looking at a new program to boost the energy efficiency of American households. It's an ugly truth that US households are among the least efficient in the industrialized world. Even using the best numbers, US households use at least twice the amount ...

8. Get Your Wikipedia Fix 11 hours ago   permalink

Andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com

In October 1937, Dominican President Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina ordered the execution of the Haitian population living within the borderlands with Haiti. The violence resulted in the killing of 20,000 to 30,000 Haitian civilians over a span of approximately five days, which would later become known as the Parsley Massacre due to the ...

9. Please don't pass health care reform, lest we be healthier and have more 12 hours ago   permalink

Www.americablog.com

From conservative economist Greg Mankiw:Put simply, the healthcare reform bill would make the United States more like western Europe. That may mean more security about healthcare, but it also means that future generations of Americans will likely spend more time enjoying leisure.Yeah, wouldn't want that to happen.

10. Hardware thread 15 hours ago   permalink

Hardware thread
Wcvarones / PoliPundit.com

Given the last few comments in the last thread, I think we should open up a thread to talk about yer favorite guns ‘n ammo. The best gun I ever had was an AR-15 I had in high school. I regret having to sell it when I had no place to store it during my [...]

11. Blue Cross sends another love letter to its members 15 hours ago   permalink

Www.americablog.com

From a friend:The day after Thanksgiving and I get a " Love Letter " in the mail from the crooks at Blue Shield of CaLeeforneahA notification to announce that as of 1-1-2010 :

12. Holiday Gift: Lin-Manuel Miranda Raps About Alexander Hamilton For The Obamas 1 day ago   permalink

Tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com

Right after Thanksgiving dinner, my son, Nick, asked if I had seen Lin-Manuel Miranda (the Latino creator, writer, and star of "In The Heights") perform his rap about Alexander Hamilton at the White House in front of the first family.