Containing carbon emissions:  A case for cap and trade

Forget trivial tax politics. When it comes to limiting pollution, cap and trade – not a carbon tax – has a record of success.

April 13, 2009

The great debate over how – and how much – to reduce the greenhouse gasses we emit while consuming energy is heating up. And in what passes for sport in Washington, wise policy is getting whomped by trivial tax politics.

Women and leadership

Male hubris has made a mess. We need more female qualities.

March 26, 2009

It is getting harder to escape the sense that most of the trouble in the world – whether it's coming out of the Senate, a mortgage lender, or a tank turret – can be traced to one overriding problem: too many men steering. Had our economic, domestic, and foreign policy been more informed by women, we might be enjoying a safer ride.

Market-driven healthcare reform:  What Medicare is trying to teach us

A Tumor at the Heart of Medicare

March 26, 2009

Generating efficiency in the health-care market will be one of President Obama’s greatest challenges. To do this, he will have to create meaningful competition between drug companies, and between public and private plans. Congress’s attempt at market-driven health care offers good instruction in what not to do.

American philanthropy and foreign assistance in hard times:  Give, but focus

Done wisely, we'll save lives – and wind up happier.

December 22, 2008

In normal times, American generosity is legendary. Between 65 and 85 percent of families make charitable donations every year. In 2003, the average donated was more than $1,800. But in the midst of a financial crisis, a seized-up economy, home foreclosures, and half a million jobs lost last month alone, how can Americans be expected to just … give money away?

Your brain on charity.  A neurological case for generosity

Giving can change your mind

December 25, 2008

Why would any rational American give to a charity this year?

Clean tech, job creation and subsidies

Obama needs troika of economy, ecology and jobs

December 14, 2008

With oil reserves getting tighter, resource-rich countries becoming more aggressive and climate change prompting louder and broader calls for action, President-elect Barack Obama has promised to invest $150 billion "strategically" to build a clean energy future for America over the next 10 years - and create 5 million new jobs.

An environmental and energy blueprint for the Obama team

Suggestions for the new administration

December 14, 2008

Instead of placing sketchy bets with public money, the next administration might consider…

A roadmap for Detroit & GM

Don't scrap the US auto industry. Overhaul it. Here's how.

November 19, 2008

When your car is burning oil, you have a few choices. Buy quart after quart and watch your money go up in smoke. Scrap it and try to manage without. Or overhaul the engine and keep it for the long run.

Getting derivatives and credit default swaps under control

What's really burning down the financial house

November 5, 2008

The most pressing business for the presidential transition team? Forget the customary interlude measuring the White House for drapes. Make it flights to Washington to meet with Treasury and Federal Reserve leadership, to begin restoring confidence in the financial system. 

Why Presidential candidates should engage the vital center

Obama, McCain must battle for the middle

September 2, 2008

With the Republicans wisely suspending political speechifying yesterday to focus on the impact of Hurricane Gustav, let's take advantage of this breather to step back and consider the state of these partisan parties.

Predatory and abusive practices in the credit card industry

The outrage in your credit card's fine print

August 13, 2008

Would you sign a contract that says, "Any term can be changed at any time for any reason, including no reason"? Anyone who uses a credit card already has. 

A wonder cure for 'Deficit Attention Disorder'

Restraint® can reduce the urge to spend money you don't have.

June 4, 2008

Have you ever wondered how the federal government can bail out banks and mortgage-holders, cut your taxes, try to protect Social Security, expand your Medicare benefits, and send you a stimulus check – all at the same time? These may be symptoms of an embarrassing condition afflicting political parties, banks, and households across America: Deficit Attention Disorder (DAD).

The only way to alter China’s hand in Darfur

Shame won't work. But enlisting its self-interest can.

April 30, 2008

China won't be shamed into submission on Darfur. "Genocide Olympics" branding is a waste of time that is being paid for with lives. The media loves a good street circus – this month, Jonathan Alter declared the Olympics "the world's last lever" to settle Darfur, as if TV stunts and Olympic ceremonies propel geopolitics. But Beijing's support for Sudan's Khartoum government won't be blunted by Western pressure. The West must constructively enlist China.

A five-part series on the prospect of eradicating extreme poverty

Part I:  A first step for the global poor – shatter six myths

Abject poverty takes a terrible toll. We can stop it. But we must start by separating fact from fiction.

March 10, 2008

Could it be possible to eradicate abject poverty in one lifetime? Ever since it was first asked, the question has seemed an improbable wish – a salve for the heart, untenable to the mind. But today, the answer is as clear as it is imperative: Yes.

Part II:  Why so much aid for the poor has made so little difference

Is poverty cultural or technical? Such debates shouldn't impede progress.

March 11, 2008

Is poverty a problem of policy or destiny? Experts tend to pull in one of two directions. Some focus on the social fundamentals for prosperity. Others, on the technical and financial requirements for sustainable growth.

Part III:  What it takes to open a door for the poor

Big levers are within reach, but tend to be overlooked or controversial.

March 12, 2008

The real work of lifting the last billion out of poverty, the experienced and the expert will tell you, happens country by country, village by village: Digging wells, delivering bed nets, building schools. Faced with this reality, the greatest asset anyone from a wealthy nation might bring to the challenge of eradicating extreme poverty is a healthy balance of audacity and humility. Not to mention a refusal to mistake cynicism for sophistication.

Part IV:  The risks of fighting poverty too well

China's example raises tough questions about the real-world consequences of getting it right.

March 13, 2008

It's not difficult to imagine a world without extreme poverty. It would seem natural in an age with more broad-gauged wealth than has ever been seen in human history. But as the recent history of China shows, the prospect raises some tough questions.

Are the world's institutions actually ready for the massive shift entailed by lifting the last 1 billion people out of poverty? Do we fully understand the political and resource implications of being "too successful," as many believe and some fear China has been?

Part V:  Practical steps to end poverty

Provided we have the will, where would we begin? How can you help?

March 13, 2008

In this series, we've unpacked popular myths about extreme poverty. We've looked at how we've gotten stuck. We've laid out some key levers for change. And we've considered the conseque nces of success. The developed world, well-motivated governments, and civil society among the last billion poor clearly have the means to eliminate extreme poverty in one lifetime.

Later response to series, “An End to Poverty”
(at thelastbillion.blogspot.com)

A political solution in Iraq

Candidates startlingly silent on solution

December 2, 2007

You would expect more from serious contenders for the U.S. presidency. Yet in outlining their plans for Iraq - the most difficult foreign policy challenge facing this country - all the major candidates have called for is some version of our current course, or withdrawal. Those are not answers - and the voters know it.

The best (or least worst) option in Iraq is a federation of three regions, based on internal migration patterns already under way - with a strong central government that gains meaningful authority through the distribution of oil revenues.

How to get the corruption of private money out of politics

For fairer campaigns: full, public funding

October 29, 2007

After Hillary Clinton fundraiser Norman Hsu was discovered to be a fugitive from justice, we could assume no candidate will ever again accept large donations from anyone who pleaded no contest to grand theft charges. But we'd be avoiding the real question.

Who compels fundraisers to launder and bundle money to win elections? We, the voters, do – by believing that money from political action committees (PACs) and private sources can fund honorable political campaigns. We've traded the overt bribery of the 19th-century political machine for a craven packaged politics where pay-to-play prospers under a respectable veneer. Until we overhaul our public financing system and get private money out of politics entirely, we will continue to sponsor the corruption of democracy.

How we're creating a Latino underclass -- with options for immigration reform

Immigrants’ Labors Lost

September 3, 2007

IMAGINE we wanted to create a huge Latino underclass in this country. We would induce more than 500,000 illegal immigrants to enter annually. We would see Latinos account for half of America’s population growth. We would turn a hardened eye toward all 44 million Latinos, because 12 million jumped our borders to meet our labor demand.

What's broken with the internet and what to do about it

Civilizing the Web's ethical wildness

September 3, 2007

Since the web began to spread in 1995, this exploding network of networks has grown 7,500-fold. Over a billion users worldwide now have access. That's more than 15 percent of the world's population. The Web is the perfect index of purely human priorities and affinities. It is a window into intensive social subcultures, from the sublime to the truly sad. Anyone who wonders which is winning may be heartened that, at least this week, the Web has 6.4 times as many websites devoted to "art" as to "porn."

Karl Rove’s departure, and the difference between politics and policy

Karl Rove's wrong turn

August 17, 2007

Even by Washington standards, the rise and fall of Karl Rove has been a tragicomedy of epic (if not exactly mythic) proportions.

Why Medicare Part D is a landmark in corporate welfare

A fiscal debacle – and a lobbyist's dream.

July 18, 2007

Medicare Part D makes it easier for America's elderly to buy prescription drugs. It also gives drug companies a free ride on the backs of the next generation.

Ethics reform – good politics is local

Get real on ethics reform

June 28, 2007

The Democrats won the 2006 congressional elections on two issues: Iraq and cleaning up corruption in Washington. Which problem seems tougher to you? For Congress, ending centuries of sectarian violence and launching democracy in a fractious Middle Eastern nation now looks more likely than agreeing on even modest ethics reform.

Gambling revenue, and the States' addiction to it

The gambling scam on America's poor

May 2, 2007

Some scandals don't involve illegal activity – they're just outrageous and unjust. Take gambling in America. Abetted by Congress, legislatures from 48 states now sponsor gambling operations and lottery monopolies to balance their budgets on the backs of their poorest and most vulnerable citizens – while basking in the virtue of fighting tax increases.

Environmental policy and economic development in Eastern Europe

How one mine could save a Romanian town

June 28, 2007

Can economic development enhance environmental quality? That's the big question being worked out in the tiny village of Rosia Montana in Romania - a place of enormous natural beauty and grinding poverty, atop one of the largest gold deposits in the world.

And that's the challenge, as mining practices employed from the regimes of Caesar through Ceaucescu have left the region's people washing their kitchen garden vegetables - and watching their children play - in a river running red with toxic tailings.