Those who hoped the rise of Obama would signify a shift toward more respect for civil liberties must be disappointed about this: The new administration fully embraces the last administration’s stance on state secrets and foreign detainees in the war on terror. Rather than the “states secrets” privilege being introduced rarely and depending on...
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“Thank goodness” Mr. Robert Redford called House Speaker Nancy Pelosi last week to secure a $50 million allocation for the arts amongst the $800-something-billion approved on Friday. And here I was worried that art and culture would all but disappear from the American landscape. I feel better knowing that the federal government is doing...
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The February issue of Vanity Fair has an interesting article on the politicking associated with the Fannie/Freddie debacle. Toward the end of the story (p. 146), the author, Bethany McLean, describes a late-stage episode in this tale that nicely exemplifies the concept of regime uncertainty. I proposed the idea of regime uncertainty in a 1997 article...
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Reporting on a February 9 Business Week article by Pete Engardio on “State Capitalism,” the National Center for Policy Analysis summarizes: Across the United States, state governments are crafting economic strategies that blur the boundaries between the public and private sectors. They are targeting specific industries and intervening in ways that go far beyond...
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