Starving Public Education - The New York Times

Starving Public Education - The New York Times:



"While most of us are focused on presidential politics — with good reason, to be sure — much of the work of government, for good and for ill, is done at the state and local level. In most cases, these days, that means Republican politicians are calling the shots; but there are some big states where Democrats still hold sway, and it’s really important for progressive values that these Democrats set a positive example about what good government can do."



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Donald Trump’s Rally in Chicago Canceled After Violent Scuffles - The New York Times

Donald Trump’s Rally in Chicago Canceled After Violent Scuffles - The New York Times:



"CHICAGO — Donald J. Trump abruptly canceled a large rally here on Friday night as scuffles and shouting matches erupted on the arena floor between large groups of his supporters and protesters angered by his campaign."



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The Superior Social Skills of Bilinguals - The New York Times

The Superior Social Skills of Bilinguals - The New York Times:



"BEING bilingual has some obvious advantages. Learning more than one language enables new conversations and new experiences. But in recent years, psychology researchers have demonstrated some less obvious advantages of bilingualism, too. For instance, bilingual children may enjoy certain cognitive benefits, such as improved executive function — which is critical for problem solving and other mentally demanding activities."



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Once Hopeful for Harmony, a Philosopher Voices Discord in France - The New York Times

Once Hopeful for Harmony, a Philosopher Voices Discord in France - The New York Times:



 "PARIS — He is the intellectual much of the French left loves to hate, the writer whose rumpled look has racked up multiple magazine covers, the bookish essayist turned omnipresent media star and boogeyman for proselytizers of painless multiculturalism. Alain Finkielkraut’s mere presence in a television studio raises temperatures and sends accusations of racism flying."



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Trade and Tribulation - The New York Times

Trade and Tribulation - The New York Times:



"Why did Bernie Sanders win a narrow victory in Michigan, when polls showed Hillary Clinton with a huge lead? Nobody really knows, but there’s a lot of speculation that Mr. Sanders may have gained traction by hammering on the evils of trade agreements. Meanwhile, Donald Trump, while directing most of his fire against immigrants, has also been bashing the supposedly unfair trading practices of China and other nations."



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Fundamentals, Polls, and the Primary - The New York Times

Fundamentals, Polls, and the Primary - The New York Times:



"The huge polling miss in Michigan was a cautionary tale: for all its excellence, FiveThirtyEight is only as good as the polls, which at least this time were way, way off. It’s too soon to dismiss them, but not too soon to explore other approaches, which is what Alan Abramowitz has just done. Using data for the Dem contests so far, he estimates a simple relationship based on just two factors — nonwhite share of the population, and north versus south — that accounts for the results quite well — and Michigan is not an outlier."



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Germany Obtains List of 22,000 Foreigners Suspected of Fighting for ISIS - The New York Times

Germany Obtains List of 22,000 Foreigners Suspected of Fighting for ISIS - The New York Times:



"BERLIN — The German authorities have obtained a list of the names of about 22,000 foreigners who have traveled to Syria to fight for the Islamic State, a trove of documents that officials say will help them prosecute fighters who return home and improve their efforts to prevent other Germans from joining the organization."



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Protesters in France Take to Streets Over Proposed Changes to Labor Law - The New York Times

Protesters in France Take to Streets Over Proposed Changes to Labor Law - The New York Times:



"PARIS — Firing an employee in France often means a court date, months of hearings and hefty payouts under the country’s 3,400-page labor code. Employers hate the thick book."



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A Protectionist Moment? - The New York Times

A Protectionist Moment? - The New York Times:



"Busy with real life, but yes, I know what happened in the primaries yesterday. Triumph for Trump, and big upset for Sanders — although it’s still very hard to see how he can catch Clinton. Anyway, a few thoughts, not about the horserace but about some deeper currents."



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Latinos’ Slow-Burn Anger - The New York Times

Latinos’ Slow-Burn Anger - The New York Times:



"Los Angeles — IN this great season of seething American rage, showmen and rabble-rousers have the floor."



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Only Trump Can Trump Trump - The New York Times

Only Trump Can Trump Trump - The New York Times:



"Donald Trump is a walking political science course. His meteoric rise is lesson No. 1 on leadership: Most voters do not listen through their ears. They listen through their stomachs. If a leader can connect with them on a gut level, their response is: “Don’t bother me with the details. I trust your instincts.” If a leader can’t connect on a gut level, he or she can’t show them enough particulars. They’ll just keep asking, “Can you show me the details one more time?”"



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Trade and Jobs Key to Victory For Bernie Sanders - The New York Times

Trade and Jobs Key to Victory For Bernie Sanders - The New York Times:



"No Democratic presidential candidate had campaigned in Traverse City, Mich., in decades until Senator Bernie Sanders pulled up to the concert hall near the Sears store on Friday. Some 2,000 people mobbed him when he arrived, roaring in approval as he called the country’s trade policies, and Hillary Clinton’s support for them, “disastrous.”"



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The Geometry of Progressive Trumpism - The New York Times

The Geometry of Progressive Trumpism - The New York Times:



"Should progressives fear a Trump nomination or cheer it on? The basic answer is, of course, who cares? While Ted Cruz may insist that the liberal media are conspiring to choose Trump so they can blow him up later — it’s all tinfoil hats over there, folks — the truth is that Republican primary voters don’t watch John Oliver, and an endorsement from the NY Times is probably the kiss of death. Still, it’s something people think about, and I found myself trying to clarify things with a silly diagram."



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More Latinos Seek Citizenship to Vote Against Trump - The New York Times

More Latinos Seek Citizenship to Vote Against Trump - The New York Times:



 "DENVER — Donald J. Trump’s harsh campaign rhetoric against Mexican immigrants has helped him win a substantial delegate lead in the Republican primary, but it is also mobilizing a different set of likely voters — six of them alone in the family of Hortensia Villegas."



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Oklahoma Puts Limits on Oil and Gas Wells to Fight Quakes - The New York Times

Oklahoma Puts Limits on Oil and Gas Wells to Fight Quakes - The New York Times:



"Faced with a six-year barrage of earthquakes that piecemeal responses have been powerless to stop, Oklahoma regulators are imposing sweeping restrictions on the oil and gas industry wells causing the tremors."



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Microsoft Opens Its Corporate Data Software to Linux - The New York Times

Microsoft Opens Its Corporate Data Software to Linux - The New York Times:



"SAN FRANCISCO — For years, Microsoft built walls between its products and the rest of the industry. Now it is tearing them down."



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When Fallacies Collide - The New York Times

When Fallacies Collide - The New York Times:



"The formal debates among the Republicans who would be president have exceeded all expectations. Even the most hardened cynics couldn’t have imagined that the candidates would sink so low, and stay so focused on personal insults. Yet last week, offstage, there was in effect a real debate about economic policy between Donald Trump and Mitt Romney, who is trying to block his nomination."



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The Kasich Con

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At this point, according to Predictwise, John Kasich has the fourth-best chance of getting the Republican nomination. It’s not a big chance — 5 percent — but you can imagine a scenario in which the stop Trump forces produce a hung convention, and Kasich emerges as the supposedly reasonable candidate. So an advance warning: he’s a con artist too.

For one thing, he engages in his own form of ludicrous self-aggrandizement, claiming to have been the “architect” of the briefly balanced federal budget of the late Clinton years — which is sheer fantasy:

That’s only true if by “chief architect,” you mean that he voted against the two bills that did the most to get the government in the black, and sponsored one thatsounded like it did a lot but actually didn’t.

But what provoked this post was his line, which he repeats often, about wanting to “Uberize” the federal government. Ask yourself: what is that supposed to mean?

Bear in mind that the federal government is best thought of as a giant insurance company with an army. Nondefense spending is dominated by Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and a few smaller social-insurance programs (now including the subsidies in the Affordable Care Act.) How, exactly, is an Uber-like model supposed to do anything to make that work better?

And don’t say it would remove the vast armies of bureaucrats. Administrative costs for those federal programs are actually quite low compared with the private sector, mainly because they’re not trying to deny coverage and don’t engage in competitive advertising.

If Kasich means anything, he means “privatize”, not Uberize — convert Social Security into a giant 401(k) plan, replace Medicare with vouchers. But that wouldn’t poll very well, would it?

The point is that Kasich is running on a false boast about his past and a nonsense slogan about the present. No, he’s not the grownup in the room.

Paul Krugman

Can Nicotine Be Good for You? - The New York Times

Can Nicotine Be Good for You? - The New York Times:



 "THERE was something odd about my new patient. She was elegantly dressed and self-possessed, and yet she was slowly, rhythmically chewing gum, something I rarely see in my psychiatry sessions. Was she trying to cover up anxiety about this first encounter, I wondered, or was she perhaps hoping to project a kind of cool, laid-back style?"



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Bernie Sanders to Run 5-Minute Documentary Ad on Univision to Court Hispanics - First Draft. Political News, Now. - The New York Times

Bernie Sanders to Run 5-Minute Documentary Ad on Univision to Court Hispanics - First Draft. Political News, Now. - The New York Times:



 "In an effort to reach millions of Hispanic voters, Bernie Sanders’s campaign is running a five-minute Spanish-language ad on Univision that calls attention to the plight of a female farm worker in Florida."



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