American Prospect, The

Back to Deadlock

Democrats need a government capable of social, economic, and environmental remedy, but except for cutting taxes and gutting social outlay and regulation, Republican presidents are often content to do little domestically and to turn their attention to foreign affairs. The outcome will have important consequences on critical tax issues and spending priorities, judicial nominations, the implementation of health-care and financial reform, and the administrations ability to address climate, energ...

Changing Faiths

The social science of many chapters takes on flesh and blood in congregational profiles that range from Episcopal churches in Massachusetts to a venerable African American church in Baltimore and booming "megachurches" in Minnesota and California, from Chicago Catholic parishes tomiing Hispanic to a liberal suburban synagogue and a Utah Mormon ward incorporating an unusual number (for Mormons) of Democrats. [...] the book comes with more than a hundred striking graphs. [...] having family o...

Dialogue the Locavore's Dilemma

If I were, say, trying to raise a family on a household income of $80,000, 1 wouldn't be poor, but the difference between $3 eggs at my corner store and $5.50 eggs from the local farmers market might be a big deal to me. There is a difference between thinking alcohol is bad- which is really just pietism- and wanting to make a difference in the treatment of animals, i don't think government should mandate that people buy sustainable animal products, but just like you should donate to charity ...

From the Executive Editor

In the short term, though, if Republicans gain control of one or both legislative chambers in November, we are in for another long period of political stalemate.

Higher Expectations

Yet Cole sees trouble ahead, with challenges coming from an overreaching government that, in the post-September 11 era, has constricted academic freedom in the name of national security, as well as from within the gates, where the intolerance of those who regard themselves as enlightened undermines intellectual life. According to a largescale 2008 study cited by Hacker and Dreifus, the more students are taught by itinerants, the more likely they are to drop out.

In the Loophole

According to the Internal Revenue Service, some 13,142 taxpayers with incomes of more than $200,000 reported owing no income tax at all in 2007, the most recent year with data. According to economists Emmanuel Saez and Thomas Piketty, the actual tax burden on the wealthy is the lowest it's ever been. tax rate has been plunging for years; in 1995, the effective tax rate for the wealthy was 41 percent, a levy no one has dared suggest matching today.

Lucky Louie

TELEVISION Lucky Louie Why liberals love the maladjusted but socially conscious comedian Louis C.K. In one of the most talked-about scenes from Louie, the cable show from the comedian known as Louis C.K., a group of comics playing poker segue from a particularly raunchy conversation about male genitalia to one about gay sex. In a re-enactment of a real conversation the two comedians had years before, Louis asks, "Rick, does it offend you when I say that word?" What follows is a dissertation,...

Noted

According to Indian government estimates, the number of people living with HIV/ AIDS has declined 13 percent since 2004. [...] surveys conducted in Avahan's target areas suggest that a large proportion of those most at risk of contracting HIV have received HIV prevention services (between 68 percent and 87 percent), and condom use too has increased.

Put to the Test

According to one report, 58 percent of graduate medical education slots in clinical genetics went unfilled. First and most obvious, from an economic perspective, we are overly focused on the declining direct costs of laboratory tests when we should be worried about the overall cost of newborn screening, especially if informed parental consent is required. [...] our society places a great burden on prenatal and newborn screening to address issues that prospective parents should tackle long b...

Repeat Performance

Margaret Raymond, director of the Center for Research on Education Outcomes at Stanford University, which conducted a major national study on charter-school performance, says she's observed that charter schools tend to hold students back at higher rates than regular public schools. (New York City did not end social promotion for sixth-graders until the 2009-2010 school year.) High retention rates can help to boost test scores at charter schools, at least in the short term.

Steal This Author

In trying to sell a book, though, you're burdened with the ulterior motive of hawking a product, and that product isn't just your ideas. While many of my friends bemoan the loss of their local bookstores and personal relationships with owners who look out for books they may find appealing, my friends eagerly and happily order or download books they want to read. Maybe I'll be able to offer sequences of reports spread over time, or a series of interactive postings based on an unfolding publi...

The Enforcement Paradox

Democrats may score some shortterm political points with smaller-scale immigration bills like the DREAM Act, which would grant a path to citizenship to some children of undocumented immigrants, but passing comprehensive reform is the only way to secure the kind of generational realignment they are seeking. There will be some variables- the number of visas for low-skilled workers, the size of a potential guest-worker program, the path to citizenship for America's undocumented- but at this poi...

The Experience Gap

Democrats bracing for disappointing results in the midterm election cite "the enthusiasm gap"- the fact that conservatives are palpably more excited about politics right now than liberals are. If, though, as the IBM brief posits, it's not the ity of the merchandise that matters- the lack of a public option in the health-care bill, the failure to pass immigration reform or repeal "don't ask, don't tell," the ongoing stagnation of the economy- then it all comes down to recreating the "memorabl...

The Question: What Does Joe Biden Like to Give the Kids On Halloween?

The Return of Keynes

A "great" recession, therefore, is a contradiction. [...] a recession technically ends when durable growth turns positive.

The Stalemate State

Recall that the last time energized congressional Republicans faced down a Democratic White House, we got government shutdowns and impeachment proceedings. According to Frenzel or, for example, the two former Justice Department officials from the George H.W. Bush era who recently wrote a Wall Street Journal op-ed titled "Why Gridlock in Washington is Good," the only real losers are inflexible partisans, and the only real cost is having to wait until they come to their senses and find the mid...

Winning Ugly

[...] Paul Krugman, like Wilentz an Obama skeptic of long standing, argues that the administrations political failures derive from an excess of pragmatism and compromise: "a strategy of playing it safe: never put forward proposals that might fail to pass, avoid highlighting the philosophical differences between the parties." The public came to perceive health-care reform, which looked a lot like classic Republican proposals, as the fulfillment of a far-left wish list, and younger voters beca...