The U.S. spends more for war annually than all state governments combined spend for the health, education, welfare, and safety of 308 million Americans. Joseph Henchman, director of state projects for the Tax Foundation of Washington, D.C. says the states collected a total of $781 billion in taxes in 2008. For a rough comparison, according to Wikipedia data, the total budget for defense in fiscal year 2010 will be at least $880 billion and could possibly top $1 trillion. That’s more than all the state governments collect.
December 23, 2009 | Filed under
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Last Tuesday, in a letter to Illinois governor Pat Quinn, five senior Obama administration officials — Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Attorney General Eric Holder, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair, and Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano — announced that “the President has directed, with our unanimous support, that the Federal Government proceed with the acquisition” of Thomson Correctional Center, a maximum-security prison about 150 miles north-west of Chicago, to house prisoners from Guantánamo.
December 22, 2009 | Filed under
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If you google “recession easing,” you will find articles all the way back to April quoting Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke as saying that the recession is easing, and that the economy is “improving modestly.” Newspapers too, on their own, have written rosy-tinged stories about how things are bad but getting better.
December 22, 2009 | Filed under
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Dick Wolf, who created “Law & Order” and its two successful spin-offs, “Law & Order: SVU” and “Law & Order: Criminal Intent,” should probably consider establishing a branch office in Pennsylvania. It seems that whenever any of the New York City cops take a road trip to find a fugitive or track down a witness, they go to Pennsylvania. Apparently, New Jersey is only a buffer zone.
December 21, 2009 | Filed under
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During the turbulent days after Hurricane Katrina made landfall, New Orleans police shot 10 civilians, at least four of whom died, according to interviews and internal police documents. Some incidents involving police were widely publicized and have prompted a U.S. Justice Department inquiry into the conduct of the New Orleans Police Department that has brought dozens of officers before federal grand juries to testify.
December 13, 2009 | Filed under
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A disturbing new study released last month by the Army Mental Health Advisory Team has found that an increasing number of soldiers serving in Afghanistan are suffering from some type of mental health related injury and “significantly lower morale” compared with previous years due to an uptick in violence and multiple deployments.
December 8, 2009 | Filed under
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The total number of Americans shot dead each year is three times that of all U.S. troops killed in Iraq in six years of fighting. There is rage in our hearts; there is war in our streets. A big factor in the homicide rate is the availability of guns. In a typical year, guns are responsible for two of every three murders. There are 238 million privately-owned firearms in the United States.
November 17, 2009 | Filed under
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Much has occurred today with regards to Guantanamo Bay and many decisions are yet to come. But there is another milestone worthy of note: Today marks the eighth anniversary of the creation of the legal foundation for the prison and the second-tier justice system established to try terrorism suspects there.
November 13, 2009 | Filed under
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The recent reporting on Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, who is accused of killing 13 people at Fort Hood, is a classic run-and-gun investigative story in which dozens of reporters badger officials to disclose a new fact (which gets you on page one) or two new facts (which is enough to snag the coveted lead-of-the-paper slot on a slow day). This wolf-pack approach to reporting almost invariably produces stories that lack context, which is hardly surprising.
November 13, 2009 | Filed under
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Seven million Americans have been arrested since 1995 on marijuana charges and 41,000 of them are rotting in federal and state prisons. Thousands of other pot users and sellers are confined in local jails. But the public is starting to rebel against “the preposterous war on pot,” two political scientists say.
November 12, 2009 | Filed under
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