The political and economic liberalization underway in Myanmar has been hailed as a major breakthrough by human rights groups, and rightfully so. After decades of repression, Myanmar’s military junta has surprised many by following through on its commitment to create an open society that is more tolerant of dissent. This startling about-face has less to do […]

Public pensions are not safe.Providence, Rhode Island, has embarked on a high-profile round of cuts to public employee pension plans, and voters in the much larger cities of San Diego and San Jose both passed referendums last week to do the same. But other municipalities, whose elected officials fear blowback from public employee unions or […]

The hundreds of millions of Americans who haven’t read Newsweek in years will not have noticed that former Bush speechwriter and respected commentator David Frum has a piece in the most recent issue arguing that Romney’s Mormonism, though currently a political problem, can be an asset to his campaign if it is framed properly for […]

It turns out that pornography and journalism have even more in common than media critics think: the Internet is wrecking business models in both industries in similar ways.The woes of journalism get the most ink. Lines upon lines have been written about the inexorable decline of the journalistic profession—most of them scribbled by nervous, hand-wringing […]

First it was Paul Krugman, denouncing the inadequacy of the Obama administration’s response to unemployment and slow growth. Then it was Maureen Dowd, unleashing a fiery salvo at what she sees as the President’s shortcomings.And now, it is “Et tu, Nick Kristof?” as the Times‘ most indefatigable voice for human rights and the protection of […]

Early news from Europe this morning: the relief from the Spanish weekend Spanish bank bailout has already begun to fade. Spanish bond yields are rising despite the bailout and Italian bond yields are also rising. (Rising bond yields mean that investors demand higher interest rates to hold the debt of a given country.)  In the […]

Reports that the public is losing “faith in science” have caused a lot of chin stroking, head wagging and even some and finger pointing among the intelligentsia — especially since the studies point to a particularly sharp decline among conservatives.Via Meadia isn’t so sure all this is on the right; the last time we looked, […]

Scott Walker’s victory in Wisconsin boldly underlined many of the trends we’ve been tracking here at Via Media for a long while now: the writing is on the wall for many blue institutions, which have grown increasingly unpopular and have proven to be unsustainable as the financial crisis has ground on.Walker’s victory dealt a severe […]

Argentina’s President did something so amazing today that it made the world news: she announced that she’s converting her last dollar bank account into pesos.But don’t worry; this isn’t a story about the decline of the dollar.Argentina wasted the 20th century lurching from one ill-considered economic experiment to the next. Many worked temporarily; the country’s […]

Dragged down by inclement weather in soybean producing regions of the country, recently published numbers from Brazil’s statistical agency were absolutely dismal: GDP grew only 0.2 per cent quarter-on-quarter and a meager 0.8 year-on-year. Still, the 7.3 per cent contraction in agricultural output is not what really bothers local and foreign analysts.The deeper problem is […]