Bob Mackey

by Jacob Davies From an FP post discussing village destruction in Afghanistan: Well, it’s a good thing we decided to take our campaign against the Taliban to the village of Tarok Kolache. I mean, if we hadn’t gone there and fought off the Taliban – and improved the design of their village with our urban … Read more

by Jacob Davies (Transcript.) “So sudden loss causes us to look backward – but it also forces us to look forward; to reflect on the present and the future, on the manner in which we live our lives and nurture our relationships with those who are still with us. We may ask ourselves if we’ve … Read more

by Jacob Davies And for once, it looks like I might get what I want: The Senate voted 66 to 32 to bring the treaty to the floor in a procedural vote that fell one short of the 67 required under the Constitution for approval once it comes to a final vote. Since one Democrat … Read more

by Jacob Davies Just a quick link to a nifty mapping tool at the New York Times that illustrates how and where people of different races live; a little like the ones I posted a while back, but scalable. One thing apparent in the Bay Area maps – I suspect elsewhere too, but I only … Read more

by Jacob Davies Via Mark Thoma, the USDA reports that 42.9 million Americans collected food stamps last month, or 14% of the US population. In 2001, the number collecting food stamps averaged (pdf) 17.3 million. Between 2001 and 2010, the US economy grew from $39,773 per-capita to $42,247 per-capita (both in 2010 dollars), or $2,474. … Read more

by Jacob Davies What do the two major parties in the United States stand for? What priorities do they put higher than anything else, so high that they are willing to compromise on things they really don’t like if that’s the only way to make it pass? Let’s see: Republican Party Democratic Party Tax cuts for households … Read more

by Jacob Davies Well, I sure complain a lot. But I'm an optimist – long-term, planet-wide – even if the day to day politics of the US are wearying. I also like visualizations, and this one describes why I'm an optimist: (5 minute video. If you're impatient, skip to a runthrough of the animation at … Read more

by Jacob Davies The cables tell a tale of America being taken for a ride by Georgia’s President Saakashvili in 2008: A 2008 batch of American cables from another country once in the cold war’s grip — Georgia — showed a much different sort of access. In Tbilisi, Georgia’s capital, American officials had all but … Read more

by Jacob Davies I’ve been meaning to write something about the Wikileaks leak of diplomatic cables, but Tom Levenson at Balloon Juice pretty much sums up what I wanted to say: What I do know is that this leak is a reminder of what it means to live in a national security state. Not in … Read more