The Dallas Morning News

Reihan Salam's book in Dallas Morning News | 'Why GOP is Losing the Working Class'

Communications — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 10:41:00 -0400

New America in the News:

...In their thoughtful and important new book, Grand New Party: How Republicans Can Win the Working Class and Save the American Dream, young conservative journalists Ross Douthat and Reihan Salam point out that while Democrats are clueless about why cultural values can produce material suffering, Republicans fail to grasp how economics can affect cultural decline.

Liberals correctly call out conservatives, they write, for "diagnosing the working class' cultural problems and then pretending that those problems are the only ones there are."

"In reality, you can't disentangle the sociological trends that have created familial instability from the economic trends, at home and worldwide, that have increased financial insecurity for working-class voters," they continue. "Divorce and illegitimacy lead to economic disadvantage, but the reverse is also true..." LINK

Ted Widmer's book in Dallas Morning News | 'Ark of The Liberties' Review: 'America's Virtues and Missteps'

Communications — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 08:11:00 -0400

New America in the News:

If you think our country has engaged in shameful wars of choice, drifted from our Constitutional moorings and generally failed to live up to our self-proclaimed role as the world's guarantor of liberty, you may be right. But which century are you talking about?

According to historian Ted Widmer, a former adviser and speechwriter for President Bill Clinton, the America of lofty ideals about freedom and human rights has always had one stubborn enemy: itself.

Throughout this valuable history of the ideas that have shaped American foreign policy, Mr. Widmer reminds us that the errand into Iraq, which opponents consider a nightmarish aberration, is not without precedent in the nation's history. Our country "always had tendencies working against our best ideals," he writes. "It was never accurate to see America as the embodiment of pure virtue. . . LINK

Steve Clemons in Dallas Morning News | 'Joshua Kurlantzick: It's Time to End the Cuban Embargo'

Communications — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 15:27:00 -0500

New America in the News:

Joshua Kurlantzick: It's Time to End the Cuban Embargo (Dallas Morning News opinion piece)

...John McCain has indicated he would continue the current policy. And as Washington policy analyst Steve Clemons notes, Mike Huckabee, who backed greater engagement with Cuba when he was governor of Arkansas, now says he wants to put still more pressure on Havana.

So, even as Cuba and the world changes, the candidates seem stuck in the past, keeping a shrinking number of Cuban-American voters happy – and leaving the rest of us less safe.

Motivation for Mayhem

Articles — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 02:37:00 -0500

While there are deep and divisive fissures across the political spectrum over how to combat terrorism, there is a surprising level of agreement as to its cause.

"We fight against poverty because hope is an answer to terror," President Bush told an audience in Mexico in 2002.

Kim Dae Jung, the former dissident who became the president of South Korea and won the Nobel Peace Prize, agrees: "At the bottom of terrorism is poverty."

This sort of analysis, at its root, is optimistic.

It holds out the prospect that widespread prosperity can be a universal solvent for political violence employed… more

Len Nichols in The Dallas Morning News on the Healthcare System

Communications — Sun, 12 Nov 2006 17:46:00 -0500

New America in the News:

Patients, health economists and even some doctors agree: Our health care system is a breathtakingly expensive, bewildering mess...

One in four Texas residents has no health insurance. Parkland Hospital spent more than $410 million last year treating the uninsured...

Health care costs are breaking budgets across the world, spurring cost-cutting ideas ranging from better information technology to rationing. But no one else spends as much as the United States, where health care absorbs $2.2 trillion a year, or more than 16 percent of the economy...

If consumers pay more for their own health care, they are expected to be more critical shoppers. Ultimately, consumers will ration their own health care consumption instead of having insurers, employers or government do it for them.

Len Nichols, a health economist who worked on the Clinton administration's failed 1994 health care initiative, says all of the cost-saving ideas are needed, regardless of ideology.

"This beast is so big, it's been untamed for so long, we need every tool we can get," he said...

For the complete article, please visit The Dallas Morning News website.

Saudi Renaissance

Articles — Mon, 13 Feb 2006 00:00:00 -0500

King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz quietly ascended the throne in August after the death of his long ailing brother. Though his rise was expected and captured little media attention, he just may be one of the most important and little-known world leaders today.

Here's why: Saudi Arabia remains the central bank of oil. Its role as a moderating price influence on OPEC in an environment of price volatility is more important than ever. As home to Islam's two holiest mosques and a financier of Muslim causes around the world, Saudi Arabia also matters deeply to the future of a turbulent Muslim… more