Two Presidents

With Bush being the lamest of lame ducks, WaPo columnist Eugene Robinson is getting concerned:
Bush could and should do it — he is still president, and preventing economic collapse is part of the job description. But he won’t. It’s ironic that after being so aggressive and proactive in other areas, the Decider is so indecisive [...]

Like 1947, Only Tougher

The National Intelligence Council sees the entire international system, in both the economic and security realms, being revamped between now and 2025. Worth a read, just in case you thought the stakes involved in Obama’s presidency were low.

It’ll Never Happen

The Chinese buying one or two of the Detroit 3, that is. Congress will never allow it, for fear of the national-security ramifications. It’ll let the carmakers go belly-up first.

Climate Change: “Partner … Ally”

Obama had a message for the country’s governors on Tuesday:

The Union Label

Kevin Drum thinks the GOP will fight any liberalization of union-organizing regs:
You can certainly make the case that a serious obsession with Roe is a minority position even within the conservative movement. … Union busting, conversely, strikes me as being so deeply embedded in conservative DNA that it’s virtually impossible to imagine an American conservative movement that didn’t [...]

Detroit Bailout

Some sort of bailout of the Big 3 carmarkers appears inevitable, most likely in the opening days of the Obama administration, for reasons Jonathan Cohn lays out at TNR. With even Obama himself telling 60 Minutes that the package needs to be conditioned on an industry restructuring, talk is turning to what Congress and the [...]

G-20, Assessed

The Economist offers its first cut on the weekend G-20 summit:
Whatever the tactical reasons, the success of this weekend’s gathering has permanently changed the machinery of international economic co-operation. The centre of global economic summitry has shifted from the G7 (the rich countries’ club) to a broader group. A follow-up meeting has been scheduled for [...]

G-20 Summit Results

Bush or no, there’s consensus among the leaders of the world’s most important powers on the causes of the meltdown:
3. During a period of strong global growth, growing capital flows, and prolonged stability earlier this decade, market participants sought higher yields without an adequate appreciation of the risks and failed to exercise proper due diligence. [...]

The Libertarian Core

Ezra Klein:
Libertarianism, for all its pretensions, isn’t an economics department dressed up as an ideology. Rather, it’s a belief — anti-statism — that gets dressed up as an economics department. Fundamentally, it’s about battling government, not supporting markets.
In some versions, yes. In others, not so much.

Josh Whedon Was There First

All due respect to Niall Ferguson and Tom Barnett, but they’re hardly the only guys to posit a convergence between China and the US. Firefly major domo Josh Whedon has too — and he clearly doesn’t like the idea.