A survey result raised our eyebrows this Saturday morning: Saudi Arabia apparently leads the world with 51% of its population being active Twitter users. The Riyadh Bureau blog notes that this is causing headaches for the Saudi government, who are finding censoring the flow of information too difficult. Saudi Arabia’s Grand Mufti, who last year issued […]

Illinois has finally taken the first halting steps toward resolving its pension crisis. On Wednesday the Illinois Senate passed a measure to reform teachers’ pensions, to the tune of $18–40 billion in savings over the next three decades, as Reuters reports.The bill doesn’t amount to full fiscal health, of course, and it came only after […]

There have been two significant breakthroughs as a result of President Obama’s trip to the Middle East. First, as most of the news outlets are reporting today, President Netanyahu picked up the phone to apologize to Turkish PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan over the flotilla issue. The New York Times writes: In the call, Mr. Netanyahu expressed regret […]

Watch out, Mexico: there’s a new sheriff in town, and he’s cleaning up. New President Enrique Peña Nieto’s bill to increase competition in the television and telecom industries (as well as allow more foreign ownership) has just sailed through Mexico’s lower house of Congress and is now one step closer to becoming a reality. The FT has […]

Stocks and currencies continued to see-saw today based on the latest news (or even rumors) coming out of Cyprus. Plan A (the EU led bailout with haircuts for depositors) was rejected by the Cypriot Parliament; Plan B (magic money from Russia) has been, so far, rejected in Moscow; and Plan C (magic money from the […]

Let’s not talk about sex, baby. That’s the message Tennessee lawmakers sent when they pulled most of the funding from the University of Tennessee’s “sex week.” Knoxnews reports: The weeklong series of events and panel discussions planned for the UT’s Knoxville campus, beginning April 5, has drawn unwanted attention from some state legislators, who have […]

In an effort to forestall an upcoming election defeat, an Australian government minister called for an internal election to oust Prime Minister Julia Gillard from power. The coup failed, but the party is still grappling with the political fallout.Kevin Rudd, a former Labor PM thrown out in a 2010 party coup, was widely regarded as […]

Scotland may gain independence from the UK in just over a year. Alex Salmond, Scotland’s First Minister and head of the Scottish National Party (SNP), finally set a date for a referendum: September 18, 2014. The announcement comes after two years of campaigning and negotiating by the SNP leader. The LA Times reported on Salmond’s speech: […]

Facing a $1 billion budget deficit and years of declining enrollment in its public education system, Chicago has announced plans to close 11 percent of its schools, or 54 in all. It’s one of the largest school closures to take place in a major American city.These changes have been a long time in coming. Enrollment in […]

Last year’s fight over Michigan’s right to work law was the biggest battle the state’s unions faced in generations, and the unions lost. But now they have figured out a way to stall for more time. One week before the law goes into effect, public sector unions are signing long-term contracts with their employers that […]