There will be no prayer service at this year’s 9/11 commemoration ceremony in New York. Mayor Bloomberg apparently wants to keep this a secular affair. Ten years after a city-sponsored interfaith remembrance service was held at Yankee Stadium, New York City officials apparently feel uncomfortable with allowing religious leaders to take the podium. From the […]

I’m not quite sure what time it is on my body clock; I woke up at 6 AM Moscow time, spent some time at Heathrow three time zones behind Moscow, and returned to glamorous Queens jetport JFK.I’ve had a feeling of disasters dodged on this trip; as readers know, my flight was one of the […]

China’s latest crop of migrant workers – young, fashionable, restless and ambitious – may want more from Beijing than they can hope to get. The FT writes: Li Feifei, a 19-year-old migrant factory worker from China’s Hubei province, dreams of becoming a clothes designer. Ms Li… got the idea of attending a fashion college and […]

In an insightful piece at The Atlantic, Derek Thompson argues that lack of productivity in the service sector is the main reason for the decline of the middle class: The reason why toasters are cheap and health insurance is not is that the productivity gains that made toasters — not to mention computers, media*, durable […]

Disturbing news out of Tripoli suggests that Qaddafi’s forces may have access to chemical weapons, including mustard gas and sarin nerve gas. From the Washington Post: Hundreds of large gas canisters are stacked in one warehouse, along with small glass bottles of yellow liquid and large plastic containers marked “shampoo” — but almost certainly not […]

Federal employees are about to find out how much protection their union dues buy.  The answer will probably be: not very much.The supercommittee is under pressure to deliver big savings without touching the programs voters love.  The easiest way out?Cut the civil servants.  Cue the Washington Post: …however you slice the numbers, federal agencies will […]

Over the past few months, “green energy” companies subsidized by the federal government encountered financial difficulties, causing one company to file for bankruptcy. These failures have not deterred the Energy Department, however, which has just announced two new loan guarantees totaling over $400 million. The New York Times reports: The department will announce Thursday that […]

Violent attacks by Pakistan-based radical groups now have China in their sights.   From the Wall Street Journal: A militant Muslim group claimed by video it carried out recent attacks in western China that killed at least three dozen people, a monitoring group said.The video was purportedly made by the Turkistan Islamic Party, which seeks […]

The twelve members of President Obama’s supercommittee on deficit reduction are open for business. Do you have piles of cash and an interest in making sure that the “wrong” federal programs don’t get cut?  The cash windows are open, and operators are standing by. …at least nine members of the 12-member supercommittee…have scheduled fundraisers this […]

Ambassador Ryan Crocker is a no-nonsense guy. In an interview with the WSJ today, the new ambassador to Afghanistan said: “The Taliban needs to feel more pain before you get to a real readiness to reconcile.”Ambassador Crocker doesn’t put much faith in the current negotiations between US forces, Kabul, and the Taliban. Of Mullah Omar’s […]