Liberal Talk Radio

I feel like the opening paragraph in this NYT piece on housing can barely contain the snark:
Driven largely by the surge in foreclosures and an unsettled housing market, Americans are renting apartments and houses at the highest level since President Bush started a campaign to expand homeownership in 2002.

Smart words from the farmer-turned-President:
It is embarrassing to note that, from 1995 to 2005, the richest 10 percent of cotton growers received more than 80 percent of total subsidies. The wealthiest 1 percent of American cotton farmers continues to receive over 25 percent of payouts for cotton, while more than half of America’s cotton [...]

If you didn’t catch Bill Cosby and Dr. Alvin Poussaint on Meet the Press this weekend, Bob Herbert gives a good summary of what’s in their book:
The most important step toward ending the tragic cycles of violence and poverty among African-Americans also happens to be the heaviest lift — reconnecting black fathers to their [...]

Back before Bush’s blunder, I fondly remember a time when Congress pretended to make “policy”, and we citizens would sit ’round the campfire (or, a few candles in our living rooms) debating the merits of said policies.
These days it’s about all we can do to get a little attention for “business critical” things like health [...]

I’ve been blessfully out of cell phone, email, and blog range for the last three days, celebrating the Declaration of Independence in a way that I think its author Thomas Jefferson would have approved of: exploring his Louisiana Purchase.
The above picture is from North Cascades National Park.
Blogging will now resume forthwith.

In the wake of the recent Supreme Court ruling, the Seattle Public Schools are wrestling with the idea of using income instead of race as a “tiebraker” when deciding high school admission:
Currently, Seattle’s Open Choice system allows students to choose their schools. Several popular — and mostly white — high schools have waiting lists while [...]

Good op-ed in the Times this weekend on reforming the farm bill. The farm bill is one of those famous pieces of pork(!) that no one likes except big agriculture. It’s a travesty, but — and this is the ultra-cynic in me coming out — it will never get any attention so long [...]

Krugman disses the compromise bill. Richardson comes out against it, too.
Looks like Mickey Kaus is right: if the bill goes down it will be because the support from the left erodes.

George Will has a column in yesterday’s Post that’s engagingly written, but I can’t really figure out what the point of it is. Ostensibly it’s about how overfarming caused the Dust bowl, and it contains some vivid imagery:
The late 1920s had been wet years, and people assumed that the climate had changed permanently for [...]

This Bush proposal seems like a good thing:
The administration is seeking to eliminate farm payments for wealthy producers, limiting subsidy payments to those making less than $200,000 in adjusted gross income annually. The current income cap is $2.5 million.
Farm subsidies are on the order of $20B/year, and they’re largely a