Tom Kostigen:
Harvard Professor and author Niall Ferguson says John Maynard Keynes' economic philosophy was flawed and he didn't care about future generations because he was gay and didn't have children.
Speaking at the Tenth Annual Altegris Conference in Carlsbad, Calif., in front of a group of more than 500 investors, Ferguson responded to a question about Keynes' famous philosophy of self-interest versus the economic philosophy of Edmund Burke, who believed there was a social contract among the living, as well as the dead. Ferguson asked the audience how many children Keynes had. He explained that Keynes had none because he was a homosexual and was married to a ballerina, with whom he likely talked of "poetry" rather than procreated. The audience went quiet at the remark. Some attendees later said they found the remarks offensive.
It gets worse.
Wow. Just wow.
Update: For the record, the unqualified apology we all know had to come. Posted at approx 1:30 pm ET, Saturday.
Alex Seitz-Wald:
We’ve already seen some political fallout for senators who cast key votes either way on the compromise bill to expand background checks that the Senate killed two weeks ago — and it may bode well for the round-two push on gun control currently in the works.
While there’s already been downside for those who voted against the bill, today we learn that red state Democrats who voted in favor of the bill have been rewarded in the polls. In North Carolina, 52 percent of voters said they’re more likely to reelect Sens. Kay Hagan of North Carolina because of her vote, while just 26 percent said the opposite. Meanwhile, in Louisiana, 45 percent said Sen. Mary Landrieu’s vote boosted their likelihood of voting for the Democrat, compared to just 25 percent who said it makes them less likely to vote for her. She also saw her net approval rating tick up by six percentage points.
The poll is especially important because Hagen and Landrieu are up for reelection next year. Nationally, a CBS New poll found that 59 percent of Americans were upset about the Senate killing the background check bill.
Another Bob Dole legacy from
WaPo:
The modern tale of military-style weapons in America opens on Capitol Hill, in mid-1984, when Sen. Bob Dole (R-Kan.) introduced an amendment that would open a loophole in the long-standing restrictions on importing military firearms. Dole’s top aide on gun issues at the time, Richard “Pete” Velde, said the senator drafted and sponsored the legislation without any pressure from private interest groups.
FBI investigators, however, later noted that the NRA was at the center of efforts to open the U.S. market to military imports, and LaPierre said in a 1988 interview with The Washington Post that he had lobbied on the amendment personally. Former NRA executive vice president J. Warren Cassidy recalled that LaPierre’s work on Capitol Hill for NRA priorities was tireless. “His hobby was lobbying,” Cassidy recalled.
More politics and policy below the fold.
NBC News:
The NRA’s opponents are launching a coordinated effort ahead of the 2014 midterm elections. The groups claim they finally have the financial clout to challenge the NRA thanks to Super PACs backed by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and former Arizona congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords.
"We're simply losing too many loved ones to this epidemic and it's time for change," said Ladd Everitt, the spokesman for the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence. “And if people won't do the right thing, then we are going to work tirelessly to make sure their political careers come to an end.”
Gun control advocates argue that the NRA’s leadership cares more about the gun industry – and profit – than the rights of gun owners.
“I think the NRA leadership is wildly out of step with their own members on the issue of expanding background checks,” Everitt said.
Karen Greenberg on myths about Guantanimo:
It’s impossible to close Guantanamo.
Resettling the detainees in their home countries or in other nations is a matter of political will on the part of the president, realism on the part of Congress and trust in the nation’s sizable counterterrorism measures. But it is doable.
Jared Bernstein:
Though yesterday’s employment report revealed a slowly improving job market, the jobless rate is still elevated, at 7.5 percent, with 11.7 million people looking for work, including 4.4 million who have been doing so for at least half a year. About eight million more were stuck in underemployment (“involuntary” part-timers) last month, unable to find the hours of work they sought.
These measures persist amid an economic expansion continuing since mid-2009, a roaring stock market and a housing market that’s now reliably in recovery.
While the high jobless numbers are partly a legacy of the Great Recession, the fact is that our economy has generated too few jobs for most of the last 30 years and is likely to continue to do so.