UPDATE: Somehow, a rough draft got posted. Below is the official LT#3
Cities:
[C1] Lyman Stone says that, contrary to what you may have heard about urban and rural revivals, they don’t seem to be happening.
[C2] Allastair Bonnett has written a book about ghost cities and secret cities that sounds quite interesting.
[C3] Were cities undone by the loss of hometown banks?
[C4] Aaron Renn praises the boring city, which he argues is mostly code for “stuff I don’t like.”
[C5] Joel Kotkin writes about The Battle of the Upstarts, the Bay Areas of Texas (Houston) and California (San Francisco), and their very different models for recent success.
[C6] Kelsey Campbell-Dollaghan looks at the sad fates of the world’s tallest unfinished buildings.
Europe:
[E1] The Spanish government demanded that Google pay news services for their linkage and excerpts. Google News left, and now Spanish newspapers want to revise the policy.
[E2] Britain is expanding the definition of child abuse. Widely. As skeptical as I sometimes am of our own system, I can always say “At least we’re not Britain.”
[E3] What’s up with the electrical field outside Google’s London office?
[E4] Sweden has a lot of the laws (and culture) that people here say we need to help women in the workplace, and the result isn’t all that different than here. Ditto Norway.
[E5] Is science in Europe going in the wrong direction?
[E6] Eurozone membership isn’t free.
Russia:
[R1] Don’t expect Russian oligarchs to come to Russia’s aid, because according to Masha Gessen, there aren’t any.
[R2] A sign of the times: When a German MP who is a critic of Russia dies of a heart attack, they feel the need to perform an autopsy. (Nothing untoward was discovered.)
[R3] Russia: Depopulation by low birth rates and high death ones. Or not.
[R4] Amit Singh looks at the Russian invasion of the Ukraine and asks what about Hawaii? I find the comparison lacking, but do believe that of all our various states, Hawaii should get a more full hearing.
Asia:
[A1] I was asking Nob about this just a few weeks ago. As Shinzo Abe sails to re-election despite a faltering economy, where are the other parties? Incidentally, I feel pretty vindicated in my comments on this OTB thread regarding the ability of parliamentary systems in allowing prime ministers to call snap elections.
[A2] Vulture wonders how North Korean films portray Americans.
[A3] Before our movie studios started nixing anything with North Korea as the bad guys, it made North Korea the villain to avoid antagonizing the Chinese.
[A4] India has a lot of universities, so another one opening isn’t a big deal. Except that it’s re-opening the world’s oldest.
[A5] South Korea takes its university exams very, very seriously.
[A6] In order to smooth relations with the Uighurs (an ethnic minority group covering the northwest), China is offering money for ethnic-majority Chinese to marry them.
Middle East:
[M1] Charles Hill introduces readers to Batman, Turkey.
[M2] Israel gets a lot of criticism for searching pregnant Palenstinian women, but they have a reason to do so.
[M3] A couple of sales later, a Texas plumber’s Ford F-250 pickup ended up fighting in a war in Syria. {Fun comments here}
[M4] Masdar City is Abu Dhabi’s own (green!) ghost town!
USA:
[U1] So apparently there is a thing where American Jews commonly eat Chinese food on Christmas. Adam Chandler explores the phenomenon.
[U2] How a police cruiser dashboard camera saved a man from prison and put some cops in hot water.
[U3] Can a wife with dementia consent to sex with her husband?
[U4] This is one free speech issue on which I side with the government. Of California, no less! I have no opinions on a law requiring porn actors to wear condoms, but it seems to me that you can prohibit things in the making of art, provided a rationale, even if you shouldn’t be able to prohibit the appearance of such things. Having someone pretend to be sixteen while having sex on camera versus putting an actual sixteen year old in porn.
[U5] Single-payer in Vermont is dead. Avik Roy and Sarah Kliff comment. Vermont was actually always a poor test case. I’d like to see it tried somewhere. I hope someone in California campaigns on it.
[U6] Unsurprisingly, I suppose, Obama’s immigration executive amnesty is very popular among the foreign-born, though less popular among native-born Hispanics.
[U7] If you want to find the Hollywood sign in LA, there are people going to great lengths to make it as difficult as possible, and they’ve enlisted Google Maps.
Not surprised about the whole Spanish/Google flap. People saw this coming with their eyes closed. I’m just curious if they’ll square that circle with an exception in the law, or by trying to force Google to play ball.Report
Re single payer, “The California Universal Healthcare Act” was passed in both 2006 and 2008, but was vetoed by Gov. Schwarzenegger both times. In 2011, then-Governor Schweitzer of Montana proposed a single-payer plan but pointed out — correctly, IMO, when I have my budget hat on — that the state needed the feds to contribute not only their Medicaid share, but the Medicare money they collect in Montana in order to make it financially feasible. Vermont’s plan’s financial problems would probably be addressed by the same fix — that is, the state single-payer system gets the Medicare tax collections.Report
Now [U5]: Very much worth saying that the PPACA has made it more difficult for individual states to try implementing single-payer on their own — there are a lot more federal laws and regulations that would have to be waived now.Report
Yeah, Vermont is too small to drive prices down.Report
Except for Maple Syrup of course.Report
Here are the best Christmas songs written by Jews.
You wouldn’t have either variant of Christmas without us! 😉
http://tabletmag.com/scroll/187941/the-five-best-versions-of-christmas-songs-written-by-jews?utm_source=fb&utm_medium=post&utm_content=The+Five+Best+Versions+of+Christmas+Songs+Written+By+Jews&utm_campaign=dec2014Report
Hey everybody, sorry about the screwup. Apparently a rough draft got posted. Almost all of the previous links are included), plus a whole lot more and a fair amount of organization.Report
It’s always seemed really odd how Kim Jong Un was sent to a boarding school in Switzerland. I can see the value of a western education for the Kim’s and i’m also sure it was a super richy rich school so he was treated like a true special snowflake. But how did he get along with other kids? I’d assume he had plenty of staff to guide/control/protect him. What did the other kiddies think of him? Even in a ritzy private school where everybodies parents are rich and powerful the child of cartoonishly evil dictator must have stood out a little. Now that would be a setting for a movie or tv show. Lil Kim’s school daze in the Alps.Report
The story as I understand it is that he was groomed for power rather late (perhaps as late as 2010-2011) and only after his two older brothers completely flaked out, so he might have more or less a “normal” upbringingReport
C4- I’m not sure boring cities get all the basics right. That seems to be an unearned statement and would vary by boring city. However i agree about the issue with “soulless” cities. I don’t’ think people have souls so i don’t think cities do. Cities can have all sorts of great aspects but they are in the eye of the beholder. All sorts of, to my eye, drab places are loved by some residents. Good for them. Go Quad Cities!!!
What i think people mean is more generic cities which they find boring. I would agree that generic is boring but few places are 100% with unique stores, shops and places. Lord knows you can drive across the US, as i have, finding nearly identical strips malls all across this generic land. Boring yes, very rarely actually convenient but that is the world. It doesn’t mean those same places don’t have cool, fun, unique places.Report
The Hawaii independence movement is the fringe of the fringe (both Puerto Rican nationalists and Confederate Lost Causers have a more substantial political presence) and in any case, the events of 1896 have been mooted by Japanese economic power and the political power of Japanese, Chinese, and Filipino immigrants in the 20th century.Report
Yeah, the lack of actual popular support is Reason #1 that I find the comparison lacking.Report
The coup d’etat that overthrew the Hawaiian Monarchy occurred on January 17, 1893 not in 1896. It took until 1898 to annex Hawaii because Cleveland was elected to his second term and wanted nothing to do with the sordid business. He realized the coup for what it was. The haole oligarchs of Hawaii had to wait until the Republicans seized power again to achieve annexation.Report
No less sordid than driving your enemies over a cliff.Report
until the Republicans seized power
“Seized”?Report
Fine, won the 1896 Presidency.Report
Those Republicans would be Democrats today.Report
C4: I roughly agree that the calling something boring/soulless can usually function as a short hand for “stuff I don’t like”. I also agree that with 300 million plus people in the U.S., there is no reason why their can’t be something for everyone. I will stick with the Northeast or Northwest. There is probably something psychological about this and it probably fuels a need to have us v. them tribalism.
C5: I think calling San Francisco and Houston “upstart” cities is odd. These are two of the oldest and most important cities in their respective states/regions. San Francisco has a longer history of dominating California economically than Los Angeles or San Diego.Report
It’s like when Rick Reilly called Bonds “joyless”, which meant only that Reilly disliked him. Bonds can be a huge jerk, but there is no doubt that he completely loved playing baseball.Report
Yeah the last thing i’d say about Bonds is joyless. I’d bet his dog thinks he is a jerk but he loved playing. There is very much a “right way” to be good at something for many people. You shouldn’t be to efficient with your effort, or else you are just a “machine.” You should be giddy and child like, not cool and collected even if that works much better for you.Report
Bonds was “joyless” in dealing with the media. But Reilly extrapolated that to how he played the game… which was ridiculous.Report
I think Bonds took great pleasure in being rude to the media.Report
That might be the understatement of the decade.Report
The U2 link through the word “camera” is actually a link to U1.Report
FixedReport
U6 [native born (in the US) latinos support “amnesty” in smaller numbers than foreign born]: I’ve long thought it was a mistake to assume that IMMIGRATION REFORM is automatically the way to get support from THE HISPANICS. For one thing, IMMIGRATION REFORM can mean too many things to too many people, and it can go into a more liberal or a more restrictive direction, and perhaps both directions at the same time, with a sprinkling of some repressive features. For another, as the linked to article argues, it’s a mistake to assume that all Latinos are the same.Report
TWITTER FEED
I have been getting a kick out of the twitter feed of Male Feminist.
While the feed is tongue in cheek, I can think of at least one OT poster who might post such things sincerely.Report
Topical video regarding North Korea. This is a time lapse of Pyong Yang i was on the Nat Geo site. Well done and interesting. So much looks normal and peaceful, which made me feel sad at the end. Plenty of large scale communist monumental architecture and stuff like that.
Its the third video:
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/12/141226-top-five-videos-2014-year-review/Report
People bitch about the idiots who like suburbs because those spendthrifts are living in a tax-shelter. And who the fuck doesn’t hate thieves?
If you want to live in a low density part of the city, it’s probably possible. Well, except for San Fran and NYC (though there is that treehouse in Manhattan. )Report
c3,
This link is crap. And not JUST because it’s missing any mention of PNC and Pittsburgh, but because it fails to understand that wall street is perfectly happy to ride the rise of a city just as much as it’s decline.
Today’s example is Detroit.Report
I agree. This country was founded on shady land development deals; there’s nothing terribly unique about the most recent land speculation bust. And if anything, the large impersonal corporate banks are more disinterested in municipal level politics than their community bank brethren (whose ownership groups definitely do give to the local political machines)Report