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Soap Hitlist: Victor & Nikki Remarry, Katie Calls Out Brooke, Daniel & Jennifer Remain a Disappointment
Ryan White-Nobles @sourceryan March 25, 2013 / 8:30 AM May 31, 2016 2
The highs and lows from the previous week in soaps. What did TVSource Magazine's executive editor enjoy the most, and the least about your favorite soaps for the week of March 18? Find out in the new edition of the soap hitlist!
In TVSource Magazine's newest feature, we take a look back at the hits and misses from The Bold and the Beautiful, Days of our Lives, General Hospital and The Young and the Restless. Discussion is encouraged, even if you disagree. If you feel like we missed something or should cover a story, feel free to tweet me directly at @SourceRyan or @TVSource.
General Hospital had a strong week, keeping the momentum going as the show heads towards its 50th anniversary. The returns of familiar faces, sad goodbyes and heart-to-hearts should have led to an easy selection for soap of the week. Instead, I'm going with The Young and the Restless. Victor and Nikki's wedding was beautifully done and reminded me of why I became a fan of soaps. Their storied love affair is one for the ages – both the good and bad. Y&R doesn't drop the emotional beats of a story; they don't play it for one day and then fill the rest of the week with plot driven excitement. There's no perfect recipe for creating good soap, but as Y&R continues to tweak the ingredients for an already successful dish, and I love it.
[label style="2″]The Hits[/label]
B&B: Katie Puts Brooke (and Bill) on Notice
After months of being oblivious to Brooke and Bill's growing attachment, Katie FINALLY realized that her husband should be kept far, far away from her sister. Donna and Taylor's talk with Katie opened her eyes to the inappropriate relationship forming between Katie and Bill, and set her on a course to put them in check.
Heather Tom was at her best as she conveyed Katie's disgust, anger and frustration when she walked in on Bill and a scantily clad Brooke at Forrester. "Get your hands off him, Brooke. Get the hell away from my husband!" she commanded angrily. Brooke feigned innocence, trying to convince her sister that nothing inappropriate was going on with her and Bill, but Katie rightfully saw past Brooke's nonsense. "We were just celebrating. Bill helped me pull off a major coup. Eric agreed to re-launch Brooke's bedroom — my line. It's really very exciting. We were just having a toast to our success," said Brooke of her bed celebration with Bill.
"And you didn't have time to put some clothes on or maybe move the celebration off the bed, or maybe you just didn't want to," retorted Katie. Ha!
The highlight of the episode came as Katie effectively eviscerated Brooke and her track record when it comes to her "innocent" relationships with men. "Wow. Listen to you — so full of admiration and praise for my husband. I would think it was great if I didn't know better, but this is how it starts, isn't it?" asked Katie, slightly amused and highly irritated. "Listen, I get that you want to save the company and that Bill's trying to help you, but you're anything but naive. He's a man, and here you are, dressed like this, alone with him. Bill and I are a family, and I will not be one of your victims. We both know your history. I know exactly what happens when you get caught up in something and you follow your heart. You end up in bed with the wrong man. And it sure as hell is not going to be mine."
The set-up is Katie's overreacting; of course nothing would happen between Brooke and Bill. Katie's seen Brooke's pattern one too many times. Let's not forget Hope was conceived because Brooke had an affair with Deacon while he was married to Bridget! Then there was the "accidental" sex with Hope's boyfriend Oliver. Katie has every right to be weary of Brooke and Bill's friendship…it's only a matter of time before Bill ends up in Brooke's bed.
DAYS: Sonny Punches Hate in the Face
It was the punch heard 'round the world! Sonny Kiriakis decked that homophobic douchebag Nick right in his hateful mouth. This is why people should think before they speak. I bet Nick will think twice before calling Sonny a "f*ggot" the next time they interact. Normally, I wouldn't condone violence, but Nick had this one coming. Sonny doesn't appreciate being intimidated or bullied, maybe he can teach Will how to stand up for himself. More on that in the miss section…
GH: Carly and Sam Say Goodbye to Todd and John
Tuesday's episode of GH saw Todd and John's relationships with Carly and Sam come to an end. Though we know Todd will be back at some point, John's exit seems to be a little more permanent, at least for the time being.
Carly's admission that she would Todd would inevitably destroy each other showed glimpses that she's actually learning from her past mistakes. She warned Todd that their downfall wouldn't come from the secrets and lies, but because of something very different. "We're afraid to love. We're afraid to be vulnerable. So, we drive the people who love us away, and we test, and we test until they break."
When Todd disagrees with her assessment, Carly tearfully reminds him that it's already happened. "You already have. And you'd do it again or it would be my turn. I've sabotaged every man who's ever loved me. I push and I push until I push them too far, and I don't want to do that to you. I don't want to get to the point where we're screaming and yelling at each other and where all we feel is disappointment and hate. I don't want that." She's had that before and doesn't want to repeat the same mistakes again. It's clear Carly has feelings for Todd, but she's making the smart decision to walk away. It might be the smartest thing she's ever done.
Meanwhile, the end of something that never was finally came when Sam realized she wasn't quite ready to move on. Whether it was guilt over how their "relationship" began or fear of moving on, something in Sam told her that she wasn't ready for sex, and wasn't ready for whatever it was that was between them. Their relationship, based on an unidentifiable connection that bonded them, amounted to a few fleeting kisses and supporting one another.
Sam acknowledged that the beginnings of relationship probably wasn't the most appropriate given both of their circumstances. "I could have been at home with Jason. I could have been at my mother's. But for some reason, I chose to be close to you, and I told anyone and everyone that would listen to me that we were just friends, but it was more than that. I was married, and you had a family to go home to," Sam said to John, voicing some of the very points fans opposed to "McBam" have stated.
Looking back, I think of their "relationship" as a deep rooted friendship that saw some lines get crossed. Sometimes when one becomes too emotionally dependent on a friend for support and happiness, the lines between friendship and love tends to blur. Speaking from personal experience, I know what it's like to confuse friendship with something more. I don't think Sam is in love with John, nor is he with her. How? Why? Those are the questions GH hasn't answered. Why would Sam be in love with John? How did he fall in love with her? Until those get answered, I won't see their relationship as anything other than two friends who had an emotional affair.
GH needs to find a way to re-invest in Sam outside of her pairings. With Jason missing/dead and John removed as a distraction, Sam can get back to living her own life. I'd rather see Sam searching for answers about her father, reestablishing her friendships with Maxie and Spinelli, focusing on her career, being a mother to Danny and being a single woman. The same goes for Carly. Why can't Port Charles have strong, independent single women?
GH: Returns and a Connection Revealed
Lulu's disappearance set up the long-awaited returns of Bobbie Spencer and Nikolas Cassadine. Bobbie seamlessly fit it with Luke, Laura and Scotty, and it was as if she never left. At the end of Friday's episode, Nikolas returned as well, sharing a hug with Laura. Their appearances are a hit simply because it's good to see them. I'm hoping there's some substance to their resurfacing in Port Charles, so further judgment will be withheld.
Revealing Britt was the daughter of Dr. Obrecht was a welcome surprise! Some may have seen it coming, but it was nice to see that GH didn't telegraph this months ahead of time. Does Britt know what her mother's been up to? Has she been working with her mother all along? Could Faison be her father? So many questions, so much potential. Don't drop the ball here.
Y&R: Victor and Nikki Exchange Vows (Again)
It's difficult to put into words just how I felt about Victor and Nikki's wedding. Not because I didn't enjoy it, but because I don't feel like my words would do it justice.
I haven't been a fan of Victor and Nikki's relationship in recent years, mainly because of the way he's treated her. Underneath the toxicity of their tumultuous relationship is a love that's very pure and endearing. No matter what they've done to each other over the years, there's always been an underlying love between them. Victor looks at Nikki as if she's the only woman in the world. As they declared their love (again) in front of their children, loved ones and friends, I was reminded of all of the things that I once loved about them.
[textblock style="3″]Nikki: The yogi's words described something that I have always believed – that Victor and I were meant to be together – in mind, body, and spirit. We've chosen to walk this path we call life hand in hand for all eternity. And so, I dedicate this poem to you, to us, and our shared joy.
"I have been here before, how long ago I may not know. But just when at that swallow's soar, your neck turned so, some veil did fall. I knew it all of yore. Has this been thus before? And shall not thus time's eddying the flight. Still with our lives our love restore in deaths despite and day and night yield on delight once more?" We will always be together. No matter what life gives us, no matter where it takes us. I will love you forever.
Victor: We have enjoyed the best that life can offer and some very difficult times. But we have overcome them. We've overcome all challenges. There's nothing we can't endure. You're my past, my future. But you know the only thing we really have is this moment. And we shall enjoy it to the fullest. I'll be damned if we don't. Sorry, reverend.
Reverend: I couldn't have said it better myself.
Victor: I shall cherish every day we have together. I shall try to surprise you every day and express my commitment to you over and over. I shall love you with body, mind, and soul; yesterday, today, for all times. I love you.
Nikki: I love you.[/textblock]
GH: The Llanview 3 Depart Port Charles
John McBain, Starr and Todd Manning have departed Port Charles. Though I enjoyed most of the Llanview 3's time on GH, their additions to the cast polarized the audience. There were those who welcomed who welcomed it with open arms, while others felt like their presence was tantamount to nothing more than a distraction, While I'm looking forward to seeing Todd again in a few months, the status of Starr and John remain in question. Here's some advice, don't try to force something that isn't meant to be. If GH is unable to reach a deal to bring back Starr and John, the show should move on. There's no need to bring on new characters (or recasts) to try and force pairings simply because the actors may have had chemistry in prior roles.
If they form organically, great. If not, no thanks. I doubt their exits will assuage the naysayers, but at least it's one less thing they have to complain about.
[label style="2″]The Misses[/label]
DAYS: 5 Days of Jennifer/Daniel
It's bad enough when a storyline you hate monopolizes the majority of an episode, it's even worse when said storyline is on every single day. Daniel and Jennifer is the weakest part of Days of our Lives and unfortunately it doesn't seem to be an end in sight. "Dannifer" hasn't been the same since their winter 2012 breakup, and any attempt to recapture what was special between them has failed. Maybe it's that Jack wasn't cold in the ground before Jennifer started setting her sights on Daniel. Maybe it's that there's always the possibility of Jennifer leaving Daniel again when/if Jack is resurrected. Maybe it's because their relationship is nauseating. Maybe it's because the show seems to be trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. It's just not working and it's because of a combination of everything.
Then there's the Abby issue. For as much as Abby loved her father, there is no way in hell that she would support Jennifer moving on with Daniel so soon after his death. For Abby to be Dannifer's cheerleader in all of this also confuses me.
It's sad to see Chloe's return wasted for this foolishness. Was her return conceptualized as her being the force that unites the audience into supporting Dannifer? If so, someone seriously underestimated the fans hatred for these characters. When fans are cheering Chloe and Anne to destroy Jennifer, you know something went wrong. After Chloe leaves what happens? Daniel and Jennifer get to have a happily ever after until Daniel inevitably cheats on Jennifer, thus proving Lucas right all along? We'll see.
DAYS: Will's Lack of a Spine
Will briefly showed some fire a few weeks ago when he finally confronted Nick about his real reasons for keeping him away from his unborn child. Unfortunately that was the last time it would be seen. Yes, Nick has Will between a rock and a hard place, but why not call his bluff? Will's family essentially runs Salem. EJ definitely wouldn't press charges and has more than enough clout to ensure whatever the DA planned would be stopped. Nick runs over Will because he lets him. If he stood up for himself or knocked Nick on his ass once or twice maybe he'd back off.
Tagged: Opinion Soap Opinions Soaps	Share
Silo says:
Oooops, I totally forgot to add that the Dannifer/Chloe SL is a disaster. Cringe-worthy. And I don't think viewers need to worry about Jack & Jen reuniting. By now everybody watching knows that Daniel is the love of Jen's life (insert sarcasm)!
The writing for Will is just as bad, I have had enough of him complaining 24/7 and blame his mother for everything bad happening to him. He needs to take responsibility for his own actions! I wish Sami would stop bothering with him. He is just not worth it anymore.
Bill is NOT going to end up in Brooke's bed. The Brooke who slept with Deacon is long gone! This SL is solely about giving Taylor a purpose on the show again. All she does is rant about Brooke or the Logans. Since when does she care about Katie?! The idiot is obsessed with Brooke! I am SO over B&B sacrificing Brooke for Taylor time and time again.
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We had friends aboard for dinner the other night and I did a two course Asian meal. We had a nice prawn and fish curry for mains but the dish of the night was the Thai Lemongrass Fish soup that I made for a starter. I have a bit of an addiction to lemongrass lately can't get enough. To the point I am now growing my own on the boat, along with three types of chilli. I made a stock by roasting the prawn shells to make a base for the soup. Lots of lemongrass some ginger and garlic, chilli, fish sauce, soy, limejuice and zest, water and S&P. Then I steamed some beautiful Red Throat Emperor and ladled over the mildly spicy lemongrass soup. Top with some freshly fried shallots and a few chilli rings and you are done.
This entry was posted in asian, fish, Thai and tagged fish soup, food ninja, soup, thai. Bookmark the permalink.


Nay-sayers of new ETFs often say that investors should wait a little while before getting involved with these funds. New ETFs need to time to mature and become seasoned, the critics assert. Those words of caution are not entirely without, but there are at least two major flaws in that line of thinking.
First, those that tell investors to steer clear of new ETFs rarely, if ever, offer up a uniform set of standards that investors should look for before getting involved with new ETFs. Second, sitting on the sidelines for too long can keep investors from enjoying solid returns.
With those concepts in mind, investors do not need to blindly throw their hard-earned money at every new ETF that comes to market. However, the following funds have not even been around for three months and already have the look of winners.
WisdomTree China Dividend Ex-Financials Fund (NASDAQ:CHXF) The WisdomTree China Dividend Ex-Financials Fund paints the picture of why not all ETFs need to be treated like the town leper. In fact, waiting for CHXF to gather the appropriate amount of seasoning has proven foolhardy. CHXF, which debuted on September 19, already has $29.3 million in assets under management.
Assuming a price of $53.50 (slightly rounded lower) and average daily volume of 25,500 shares (slightly rounded up), CHXF's average daily dollar volume is strong at $1.36 million. Beyond those superficial statistics, CHXF has returned almost six percent since its debut. In terms of annual fees, CHXF is 11 basis points cheaper than the iShares FTSE China 25 Index Fund (NYSE:FXI), the largest China ETF by assets.
PowerShares S&P 500 High Dividend Portfolio (NYSE:SPHD) The PowerShares S&P 500 High Dividend Portfolio is not even two months old, but at this point, the fund already looks like a survivor. Raking in nearly $32 million in AUM since an October debut, proves as much.
Noteworthy is SPHD's AUM growth. Just two weeks ago, the fund had $23 million in AUM. Adding more than a third of that total in such a small time frame is impressive.
SPHD has a 30-day SEC yield of almost 4.7 percent, according to PowerShares data. That certainly helps the cause of any new ETF. The knock on SPHD to this point has been performance. The new ETF has lost about 4.3 percent since its debut, though is likely attributable to the fund's 21.4 percent allocation to utilities stocks, a group that has been punished on fiscal cliff fears.
iShares Core MSCI EAFE ETF (NYSE:IEFA) Some might say it is not fair to put an iShares fund on this list give the marketing prowess of the world's largest ETF sponsor. Fair enough, but there is only so much ETF sponsors can do to cajole money out of investors for new products. At some point, the new fund has to stand on its merits. It is safe to say IEFA is doing that or is at least close to.
As its name indicates, IEFA is a member of the iShares core suite, aimed at bringing more options to conservative, cost-conscious investors. IEFA is also the core equivalent of the popular iShares MSCI EAFE Index Fund (NYSE:EFA), but the two are by no means identical twins.
For starters, long-term investors should prefer IEFA because its expense ratio is 20 basis points lower. Also noteworthy is the fact that IEFA includes small-caps, something that EFA does not do. In part, that contributes to a large lineup for the new ETF. IEFA is home to over 2,500 stocks, while its older counterpart is home to 914.
For those obsessed with the superficial metrics, IEFA has jumped over four percent since its debut and has $68.3 million in AUM.


Can I have a chemical peel cold sore?
Can I have a chemical peel with a cold sore?
Blog / Can I have a chemical peel with a cold sore?
Question: If I am prone to cold sores, would it be safe for me to have a chemical peel on my whole face, or should I just have spot treatment?
Answer: Patients who are prone to cold sores may get them while healing from chemical peels and this can cause scars. The theory behind it is that chemical peel or laser treatment can reactivate dormant virus in your nerve ganglions. One way to prevent this from happening is to have your provider prescribe Valtrex few days prior to your treatment.


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United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland | English
Liebherr Group: Products & Services for United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
Other websites for United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
Philipp Liebherr (M.A./B.Sc.)
Member of the administrative board of Liebherr-International AG, the holding company of the Liebherr Group in Bulle (Switzerland)
Joint direction and management of the Aerospace and Transportation, and Concrete Technology Divisions, together with his father, Dr. h.c. Willi Liebherr (President of the administrative board of Liebherr-International AG)
Studied Business Administration and Engineering at Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts (Switzerland)
Degree: Bachelor of Science in Business Engineering with Specialisation in Mechanical Engineering
Studied Business Management at the University of Zurich (Switzerland)
Degree: Master of Arts in Business Administration
Studied Bachelor of Arts in Management at the University of Fribourg (Switzerland)
Degree: Bachelor of Arts in Management
Products and Services of the Liebherr Group
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The Liebherr Group is synonymous worldwide with sophisticated technical products and services. Our corporate culture is characterized by the self-conception of a family-run business.

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Etgar Keret: 'I feel more Jewish than Israeli'
by warnewsradioPosted on March 3, 2012
The acclaimed Israeli writer explains why his latest collection of short stories took him 10 years to write
You wouldn't mistake an Etgar Keret short story for the work of anyone else. A typical piece will run to just a few pages, will be colloquial in style, and will juxtapose everyday life with some bizarre turn of events. In "Unzipping", from his new collection Suddenly, a Knock on the Door (his first for 10 years), a woman discovers, while her boyfriend is sleeping, a "teensy zip" under his tongue: "When she pulled at it, her whole Tsiki opened up like an oyster and inside was Jurgen." In "Pudding", a man is dragged from his home by thugs, stripped, dressed in school uniform and then deposited at his parents' house, whereupon he finds he has regressed to his childhood.
Keret's stories often read like bar-room anecdotes or surreal jokes that break off before their punchlines. They are at once sophisticated and anti-literary, extremely funny and slyly serious. While invariably set in contemporary Israel, and full of sex and violence, they also hark back to older storytelling traditions, such as the parable, the folk tale and the absurdist fictions of Gogol and Kafka.
Keret, who was born in 1967 and grew up in Tel Aviv, is sometimes described as being at the forefront of a "new" kind of Israeli writing, one that eschews head-on engagement with politics. While the region's turmoil saturates his work, his stories convey no clear message or ideological position. Keret explains this by telling me that, as a writer, he feels more Jewish than Israeli. "Most of the Jewish writer friends I have are American and I feel closer to them because they're always obsessed with one issue – identity: what does it mean to be an American Jew?" Israelis, he says, rarely deal with the question of what it means to be Israeli. "Maybe it's too difficult, but they tend to suppress it. There is something about Jewish writing that's very reflective, while Israeli writing is more active and epic in nature."
Keret attributes his adherence to a Jewish outlook to the fact that he grew up with a "dual identity": a sense of being European as well as Israeli. "I'm the son of Holocaust survivors. It was important for my parents to pass as Israeli-born Jews. But when I would go to sleep, my mum would recite Polish poems and they would listen to Wagner."
In person, Keret is relaxed, charming and very funny. Spending time with him is like entering the world of his stories: suddenly, everything seems slightly off-kilter, full of comic potential. We meet at a private members' club, and before we sit down there's some kerfuffle over tables. "People are so territorial here," he says. "It's worse than the Middle East." Keret says that stories often begin for him with an observation: a scene on a street, a snatch of conversation. "I don't think in terms of ideas. I have some sort of starting point. And I never know where the story is heading." He likens the process to driving: "The first thing I have to do is press the gas pedal and take my hands off the wheel. If I crash, maybe I'll get to somewhere interesting. It can't be premeditated."
One of the funniest stories in Keret's new collection is "Actually, I've Had Some Phenomenal Hard-Ons Lately", about a businessman who's having an affair with a colleague. The thing that satisfies the man most about this arrangement is that, when he takes his mistress for a "candlelit dinner", the cost is tax-deductible. Keret says the story was triggered by overhearing someone use the title phrase in a cafe.
"It struck me as such an amazing sentence. What's interesting is the word 'actually' and the word 'hard-on' used together. Because there's something about 'hard-on' that's so primal, so instinctive, while 'actually' is such a meta, linguistic kind of word." The resulting story was a kind of imaginative working out of this clash. "The cheating is the 'hard-on' bit, while the tax is the 'actually'," he explains.
Suddenly, a Knock on the Door took a decade to write, partly because of Keret's increasing involvement with the world of film and partly due to writer's block. "What happened was that my life changed a lot: I got married, I had a kid, a mortgage. I kept having ideas for stories, but they were about bachelors living in a dirty apartments, trying to get laid." It took time, he says, to find a way to write that was relevant to his new circumstances. Although Keret now makes light of this period of non-productivity ("The funny thing was that no one gave a fuck"), the title story of his new collection is eloquent testament to how difficult it must have been. It describes a writer being held hostage in his living room by a gunman, a pollster and a pizza delivery man, all clamouring for him to tell them a story. The writer can't think of any opening, other than: "It began with a knock on the door."
The story is vintage Keret, a parable about creativity that blends his travails with larger questions about the status of writers in Israel. Happily, it ends well: the writer finds a new way to begin.
William Skidelsky
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from William Skidelsky
via http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/mar/04/etgar-keret-interview-short-stories
Posted in War News Radio Online
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Team RivaL is a United States based esports organization. They first entered PC SMITE when when they acquired Yomi on July 27, 2015. They returned when they acquired the previous roster of Cyclone on March 23, 2017.
Outside of SMITE PC, the organization has teams in SMITE XBOX, World of Tanks, Super Smash Bros, and Counter Strike; Global Offensive.
For information about their SMITE XBOX team, see here.
On July 27, 2015, Team RivaL acquired the Yomi Challenger team. At the Fall Relegations, RivaL, with the help of substitute TheBest, would beat out former SPL team Enemy in a 3-1 series, earning a spot to compete in the Fall Split. Two days after qualifying for the SPL, RivaL would be acquired by Team eLevate.
January 2,Team RivaL announces they will return to the SPL for season 6.
January 10, PolarBearMike, Arkkyl, PandaCat, CaptainTwig, and fineokay join. sLainy joins as coach.
January 12, Team Rival acquires a spot in 2018 EU SPL.
December 14, Roster disbands. Deathwalker, Wlfy, Vote, KaLaS, and AlphaJackal leave.
March 22, Former Cyclone roster aqcuried. Deathwalker, iceicebabyy, Wlfy, Vote, and KaLaS join. AlphaJackal joins as coach.
July 27, Yomi roster acquired. Gili, Mytherea, Unrelinquished, Vessalius, and Metyankey join.
August 3, Roster and staff acquired by Team eLevate.
This page was last edited on 6 April 2019, at 03:02.


It is no secret that I have a passion for Node, it's the language that got me into development, and the one I most enjoy.
As a Software Developer it's always important to expand your horizons; whether that be learning new skills or languages.
I've been meaning to embark on the journey of learning Go, A programming language created at Google in 2009, for a while. This articles intention is to document my learning curve.
Make a simple CRUD API, in Node, to manage a list of To-Do's.
Make the same API, in Go.
Before we start writing code it's always important to plan.
The first step is to create a new project folder(mkdir expressApplication), initialise it (npm init -y) and then install our required packages (npm i express body-parser mongoose morgan).
Then we make the Node app. Seeing as this is not a tutorial on how to write an API using node, I am just going to provide the code below.
Note: It is not good practice to have everything in one file, but it's good enough for this article. You'll also have to input your Mongo connection string (.connect(mlabUri)) if you plan on running this code.
This is the part of the article where I will go into a lot more detail.
At the time of writing this paragraph I have never written a Go app, have no idea about best practices or how the language works properly.
The aim, at the end of this section, is to have a good understanding of the basics, document my learning curve and hopefully help others doing the same.
If you haven't already, head on over to the Go Downloads page and download/install it.
One thing the installer won't make clear is workspaces. In fact it won't even ask you what you think about them.
"What the hell is a Go Workspace?" I hear you ask. The short and simple answer is it's where all of your Go development happens.
We're not going to change where our Workspace is (if you want to you can) so it defaults to $HOME/go. Any new projects we now start will be done inside $HOME/go/src.
If you have decided to specify a different location for your Go Workspace, you'll need to make a src directory.
Now we have our workspace setup, we can create our first project. Each of our subdirectories inside the src directory will represent a separate package or command, and each will contain at least one .go file.
Nothing fancy. We're naming our package (main), importing a package (fmt) and then using it to print "Hello World" to the console.
For this to work your PATH must include your workspaces /bin directory.
After making the "Hello World" app, I decided to take 10 minutes to have a play around with the language to see what I could learn.
The main.go file will have access to the privateHelperFunc function as they act as though they are part of the same package.
Functions that start with a lowercase letter (e.g. privateHelperFunc) are private and cannot be used outside the package.
Functions that start with a uppercase letter (e.g. PublicHelperFunc) are public and are exported for use.
Now it's time to finally get cracking on making our application!
goApi will be our package where we aim to replicate our Node/Express API.
We will be building our Go API using iris (which is the Go equivalent of Express). Note: In the middle of writing this article, I became aware of a lot of controversy around Iris. If you are planning on using this package in a live environment I implore you to do some research first.
Iris is a fast, simple yet fully featured and very efficient web framework for Go.
Before we do anything we need to install the iris package. Providing you have installed Go, you can do this using the command go get -u github.com/kataras/iris. Once you have done this it will appear under your pkg directory.
Before we get into the integration with MongoDB or creating all of our CRUD operations, it's important we have a look at how a basic Iris server looks.
A panic typically means something went unexpectedly wrong. This is basically the equivalent of throw new Error() in Node. We use app.Use(recover.New()) so our sever can handle any panics thrown by the endpoints, stopping our application from going down in flames.
We can use Regex expressions in route definitions. In the GET request example above we have specified that an id has to be a string that contains 10 or more numbers.
Ignore server closed errors. We use iris.WithoutServerError(iris.ErrServerClosed) to prevent errors showing on the console when we close (CTRL + C) our server. If we don't include this we'll see [ERRO] 2018/04/09 12:25 http: Server closed every time we close it.
Now let's make our main package file (touch src/goApi/main.go).
Here we've made seven endpoints and we've connected our application to MongoDB using mgo. As mentioned at the top of this section in the middle of writing this article, I became aware of a lot of controversy around Iris. If you are planning on using this package in a live environment I implore you to do some research first.
One of the most important concepts I learnt while making this API was Pointers.
Pointers allow you to pass a reference to the memory location of a variable, rather than the value itself. This would be, in a Node.js example, like amending a primitive value to a reference value.
This Pointer article has a good explanation and examples.
This exercise taught me a few basics about the Go language, but there is still plenty to learn.
I've commented most of my Golang code, rather than write explanations for each line in this article. If you have any questions/comments feel free to ask!


text:
Phone text crash man's amazing recovery
As Norfolk police carry out a high profile crackdown on drivers who use their mobiles while behind the wheel, Arron Randall told how his life was almost destroyed by a driver who flouted the law.
A young man who almost lost his leg after a horror crash caused by a driver using their mobile phone today spoke of his remarkable battle to defy doctors and walk again.
Mr Randall, 32, was on a motorcycle when a driver texting on her mobile phone went over a red light in Mousehold Lane and crashed into him, throwing him into the air and snapping all the ligaments in his leg.
Doctors told the former Taverham High School pupil that he would need to have his leg amputated, which would have been a crushing blow for Mr Randall, team captain of the Norwich Union staff rugby team and a keen Thai boxer.
But he was determined to fight and underwent three operations over the next six months to rebuild the joint.
"I saw three doctors and two of them wanted to amputate," he said. "Then I saw the consultant Neil Walton, and he saw how determined I was and my fighting spirit.
"He said it was the biggest knee reconstruction he'd ever done. The longest operation was seven hours working to reconstruct all the ligaments."
He was unable to put weight on the leg for weeks, and at first his partner Suzi, 25, had to care for him constantly, even helping him to roll over in bed as he could not move unaided.
"It was terrible," he said. "I was a young man of 25, I was heavily into sports, and I couldn't believe they wanted to take my leg.
"But I knew right from the start that I was going to walk again. My doctor is still surprised every time he sees me - he told me I would have a severe limp for the rest of my life. But I walk normally now."
Mr Randall, who lives in Sandy Lane, Taverham, told the Evening News his story because he wanted to explain how reckless drivers could ruin lives just for the sake of answering a mobile phone call or checking a text.
He said: "It destroys lives. I would ask anyone who thinks about using their phone while driving: please, please don't.
"It might only be a few seconds but that can have a massive impact on someone's life."
Mr Randall believes an easier reporting system could help cut the number of drivers who use mobile phones and help prevent similar accidents happening again - and that mobile phones themselves could be the answer if pictures of offenders could be used as evidence.
Mr Randall worked as a sales advisor for Moneyfacts.com, but since leaving the job in 2008 he and his wife have both become part-time scuba diving instructors - an interest that began as a way for Mr Randall to get exercise without putting weight on his leg.
"It's been a really positive experience for me," he said. "Even though I can't run or sprint on land, in the water I'm as fit as the next man.
"A year ago I thought I was fully recovered, but I just keep getting stronger - I have just started cardio training for the first time since the accident. I keep improving."
When the accident happened Mr Randall was saving for an engagement ring, but it was not until after he was recovered that he proposed to Suzi.
"I walked into the wedding ceremony last year and it was the best day of my life," he said. I felt like I had made it. To be able to do that and then to go on the travels we have been on together is wonderful.
"There were times people said I would never be able to do it but on that day everything I worked for, everything I put myself and my family and friends through, it was all worth it."
Have you had a life-changing experience? Call reporter Mary Hamilton on 01603 772418 or email mary.hamilton@archant.co.uk
This month Norfolk police are cracking down on phoning while driving with a new enforcement campaign.
A radio and poster advertising campaign has been telling drivers to "zip it behind the wheel" and that "distracted drivers cause destruction".
This week alone 93 drivers have been pulled over for using their mobiles while on the move, and last week the Evening News reported that 139 motorists had been spotted in the first two weeks of the police campaign - 232 people in just three weeks.
Each offender was given a £60 fixed penalty notice and had their licence endorsed with three penalty points.
In total 2,537 drivers were prosecuted in Norfolk for using their mobile phone whilst driving in 2009 - an increase of nearly 500 drivers from the 2,042 prosecuted during 2008.
Research by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA) shows drivers are four times more likely to crash if they are using a mobile phone.
Legislation prohibiting the use of hand held mobiles while behind the wheel has been in force since December 1, 2003.
Title talk is in the past. City chief urges squad to focus on the big time


The campaign to end the War on Drugs has gained momentum in recent years with state ballot initiatives legalizing recreational marijuana use in Colorado and Washington, and a similar referendum coming to Washington, DC on this year's general election ballot. Along with the push to reform sentencing laws, even retroactively, for nonviolent drug offenses, it appears that huge strides are being made in allowing free citizens the right to enjoy relatively harmless substances as they choose. But as with any government effort, the reality is far from the idealized campaign promise.
In Washington state, which decriminalized small amounts of marijuana possession and consumption on the 2012 ballot, state-sanctioned retail sales just began in July. However, as this is still deep blue Washington we're talking about, there is far from a free market for the stuff. The state has a strict licensing program that only allows certain retailers to sell marijuana legally, from only certain licensed producers, resulting in only one place to buy in all of Seattle on opening day. This isn't exactly Starbucks for weed.
Uber under attack from bureaucrats… and anarchists?
Popular ride-sharing services Uber and Lyft have been under assault from local and state-level bureaucrats since their inception. In city after city, the status quo (generally, taxicab commissions) collude with government officials to set outrageous barriers to entry that keep competitors from entering the market.
These barriers range from coveted million-dollar medallions that limit the number of cars on the road to complex regulations crafted by taxicab special interests and enacted by their friends in government. In some cities, bureaucrats are even using these services, then fining the driver and impounding the vehicle.
There are even websites like "Who's Driving You?" that seek to cast a shadow over these innovative services.
ReasonTV produced a short documentary late last year titled "Uber Wars" about Uber's face-off against the Washington, D.C. Council and the DC Taxicab Commission. While the battle over livery services in the nation's capital seems to have quieted for now, it hasn't stopped bureaucrats, police officers, and even anarchists from attacking the service in other cities.
Will the FCC Force Television Online Even If Aereo Loses in Court?
The Supreme Court hears oral arguments yesterday in a case that will decide whether Aereo, an over-the-top video distributor, can retransmit broadcast television signals online without obtaining a copyright license.
If the court rules in Aereo's favor, national programming networks might stop distributing their programming for free over the air, and without prime time programming, local TV stations might go out of business across the country. It's a make or break case for Aereo, but for broadcasters, it represents only one piece of a broader regulatory puzzle regarding the future of over-the-air television.
According to Chairman Wheeler, TV stations shouldn't limit themselves to being in the "television" business, because their "business horizons are greater than [their] current product." Wheeler wants TV stations to become over-the-top "information providers", and he sees the FCC's role as helping them redefine themselves as a "growing source of competition" in that market segment.
Crony capitalism is America's disease and the real problem with the modern perception of capitalism that most of the left likes to use against capitalism itself, without discerning between what voluntary trade and free markets can accomplish and what crony capitalism actually is all about.
It's very easy to find perfect examples of crony capitalism in the age of President Barack Obama.
One of these perfect examples has been relying on taxpayer money to subsidize financial incentives destined to foreign companies that purchase U.S. exports: the Export-Import Bank.
The agency's charter expires in 2014, making now the perfect time for opponents of crony capitalism to raise their objections to the agency's upcoming congressional renewal. Heritage's The Foundry talked to Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-TX) about the Export-Import Bank and why he thinks that the federal export-subsidy agency should not be allowed to stay in business.
Ms. Crawford is wrong on the facts and the philosophy.
The author of The Wealth of Nations would have been 290 years old today, had we discovered warp capability in the 18th century.
It was in this work and in this passage that Smith first began to describe the "invisible hand" of the market — the way that the rational self-interests of individual actors in a market, acting in concert with each other, yield efficient allocations of resources.
By the design of some grand cosmic joke, noted George Mason University economist Don Boudreaux in 2011, today is also John Maynard Keynes's birthday.
I was one of the millions of people who had seen the footage of the "flaming water" supposedly caused by fracking in Pennsylvania, but had never seen Gasland or really studied the issue in depth. When the opportunity to attend the Los Angeles premiere of Frack Nation arose, I decided to see what the fuss was about. Cinematically and content-wise, Frack Nation did not disappoint.
Frack Nation starts with the same flaming water shot from Gasland that has alarmed environmentalists and the masses and describes the anti-fracking movement's complaints. What was helpful for a newbie like me was to have the fracking process described in detail.
McAleer interviewed many of the farmers of Dimock, Pennsylvania, the "ground zero" of this issue. The farmers almost unanimously want the ability to lease their mineral rights to the gas companies for fracking. Many of them are dairy farmers whose land has been in the family for generations. They passionately tell McAleer that they need this money to be able to survive, as farming is a money-losing proposition these days. It is what they love to do, and leasing mineral rights will allow them to do that instead of joining the ranks of the unemployed.
Just as passionately, they state they would never allow anything on their land that harms the environment. Their homes are on this land. Their dairy cows graze on this land. They've tilled this land for a lifetime. They are believable – they would not allow any process that harms their asset, the land, just for money.


text:
package com.wsn.chapter18javaio;

import java.io.BufferedReader;
import java.io.FileReader;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.util.LinkedList;

/**
 * Created by power on 2017/8/11,011.
 */

public class Pracise8 {

    LinkedList<String> list = new LinkedList<>();

    // Throw exceptions to console:
    public void read(String filename) throws IOException {
        // Reading input by lines:
        BufferedReader in = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(filename));
        String s;
        while ((s = in.readLine()) != null)
            list.add(s);
        in.close();
    }
    public void show() {
        while (list.size()>0){
            System.out.print(list.getLast() + "\n");
            list.removeLast();
        }
    }

    public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
        Pracise8 p = new Pracise8();
        if (args.length>0){
            p.read(args[0]);
            p.show();
        }
    }
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
Q: add_rewrite_rule issues i usually add rewrite rules for custom pages like this:
add_rewrite_rule('^deal-purchase?','index.php?is_purchase_page=1&post_type=page','top');

However on a site im working on now, the above just redirects to the home page whereas if i create a custom post type and reference that:
add_rewrite_rule('^deal-purchase?','index.php?is_purchase_page=1&post_type=market','top');

it works. Anyone any ideas what might be causing the 1st code to fail?

A: The second one works because post_type=market triggers the market post type archive.
Pages have no archive, so post_type=page in the first example doesn't point to a valid destination.
Rewrite rules have to ultimately result in a successful main query.
For a specific page, you could use page_id or pagename.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


* The new Nano Scenes are quite a bit smaller than the scenes from last year, but they're less expensive, too. This one combines together Jack Skellington's house and the iconic graveyard hilltop to create one scene. The space for figures to actually stand isn't huge (you can probably only stand three figures on the set itself) but it'll look impressive in the midst of your collection. Still, I kind of wish Jada Toys had either released two sets or just focused on the hilltop.
*There have been many more expensive renditions of Jack Skellington's house released over the years but this one isn't bad for being around 10 bucks. I like the black and orange color scheme. While it isn't a perfect match for the film's colors, it definitely feels evocative of the film's style. There is enough space in front of the house for one minifigure to stand.
* My favorite part of the set is the hilltop. Unfortunately it is two small to hold more than one figure but Jack by himself looks great up there. The way the moon is placed "behind" the hill looks great and really makes for a fun display.
* The front gate of Jack's house actually opens (the doors are on little hinges) and it features a pumpkin design as well as two black cats on the top of the posts. The wall also has a nice paint effect to give it a bit of an aged look.
* The pumpkin patch at the base of the hill gives space for another figure to stand (perhaps Sally, spying on Jack?), features some cool little pumpkins, and has a bit of fence around it.
* Here is a shot of the figures all hanging around. As you can see, the set itself can only hold three figures. Other figures look good around it, but it is pretty small in and of itself.
* This set includes the Jack Skellington DS87 minfigure. This same figure comes with the 20-pack and the 5-pack so it would have been nice if Jada Toys had offered something new. Perhaps Jack with an arm extended?
This is a cool little set but I definitely think it could have been so much more. Everything feels kind of crammed together whereas just focusing on the hilltop or Jack's house alone would have probably been better. Also, a unique figure would have been welcome treat. Still, it is a fun set and makes for a nice companion to the 20-pack of Nightmare Before Christmas metalfigs. If you can get it for around $10 it is a Good and a 1/2 display piece and is well worth adding to your collection.
If you love Jack Skellington, I've also reviewed Diamond Select's Pumpkin King, the Funko Dorbz Pumpkin King #233, the ReAction Jack Skellington (Evil Smile), Pumpkin King Jack, and Santa Jack, and the POP! Disney Pumpkin King #153 from The Nightmare Before Christmas.
wow that is a very cool piece.
I thought so, too. It's a pretty interesting concept for sure.
I wish this stuff was showing up in stores as much as I see the other licenses they do. Looks like I'm going to be wasting some time (and probably money) at Ferrara Market.
I like Ferrara Market although I have been seeing these at Target more and more frequently.


Nintendo's Profits are on the up. The Switch has done well above expectations and the 3DS is still going strong. The Mobile market however is doing well but Nintendo's President desires to out more work into their mobile apps to raise their profits further.
This information comes from a translated excerpt from Nikkei courtesy of Japanese Nintendo.
Nikkei: How are you looking at the profitability in the business for smartphones?
Kimishima: We've published Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp and more, but we still haven't raised them profit-wise. From here on we want to work on various things like upgrading the insides of them.


The Australian Passport Workplace and its agents are committed to delivering a safe, effective and responsive passport service for Australia. A registered Migration Agent will be in a position to supply tips on which visa is most acceptable, help with lodging a well-ready application, and will know about immigration laws and procedures.Mind the information. Some embassies would not require an interview since they will merely rely on the documents you submit given this process, they usually put really specific instructions and it really is important that you take note of those. (Examples: they would want you to use only a certain type of envelope, or that you have to staple your photo to the application type and NOT paste it, or they want you to write in blue ink). These actions may well appear ridiculous or tedious but you should do it nevertheless do not slack off and don't rebel. Make it a point to read the suggestions extremely effectively which need to normally be on the embassy's website.The business visa application should be supported by an INVITATION from The Ministry of Interior. A 2016 Home Office review stated fewer folks must be detained in immigration centres, even though pointing out that every location cost £34,000 a year. He stated: My organization was undertaking nicely so I decided to go travelling and focus on my individual life. I went to 59 nations in total and during my travels, I realised that the most beautiful girls were in Eastern Europe.Soon after recently meeting with customers we once again heard of the issues that some potential migrants face when deciding on a migration agent, and it pains us to say that we believe there are misleading agents out there. 1. Each country's visa requirements vary and depend on your citizenship, explanation for travel, length of remain, and whether several entries are needed. You can investigation your specifications and apply on your own by means of your location country's embassy or consulate in the U.S.British nationals want a visa to enter mainland China, but not Hong Kong or Macao. For mainland China, you must get a visa prior to arrival, like for Hainan Island, even though some exemptions may possibly be offered for tour groups travelling to specific parts of the country. For particulars of entry needs to China contact the Chinese Embassy or the China Visa Application Service Centre nicely prior to your proposed trip. You might be asked to provide your prior passport in help of your visa application.Becoming a lawful permanent resident and getting a green card is the objective of many foreign-born scientists who come to the United States to study and conduct analysis. Unfortunately for would-be immigrants, U.S. immigration law is confusing, and much of it is based on the premise that U.S. workers need to be protected from the competition of would-be immigrants.You may be eligible to apply for permanent settlement in the UK if you have claimed asylum as a refugee, beneath humanitarian protection, are stateless, or would like to reunite with your family. Consulting the UK's section on settlement will support provide you with the essential information to see if you can apply.b. Following enrolment, the University will be required to take a copy of your passport, visa and biometric identity card (if you have 1). This details will be stored securely in accordance with the information protection act, and will be retained by the University for 2 years soon after you have graduated. Cardiff Metropolitan University will require to make this information to the UK Immigration Authorities if requested.Admittedly, the authorities are attempting to stem the tide. Yesterday, police and immigration officials raided addresses all through the nation as element of a co-ordinated operation against traffickers. An Australian man has been stabbed to death in central Gothenburg, on the west coast of Sweden, about four.30am Wednesday regional time.Sadly, I never have the background (our circumstances are various) or the time to do the investigation to answer your query. I advocate asking it in a forum. From what I've heard, the procedure is the identical (and possibly even the visa is the identical?) regardless of whether you are married or not.Whenever possible, attempt to apply for your business visa eight weeks or much more prior to a massive trip. The much more time you give your self to get your visa in hand, the less you are going to have to worry as your trip approaches. Some visas can take anyplace from 4 to six weeks to acquire, and unexpected delays can crop up at any time. So if at all possible, get your ducks in a row and apply for your visas as soon as you can.You can make contact with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children at 1-800-843-5678 and the information will be forwarded to the suitable agency for investigative action. You could also wish to visit the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Net site for more data.


text:
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Two-Step Plan to End 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell'
By Kenneth Jost
The White House and congressional leaders have reached an accord for a two-step repeal of the military's 'don't ask, don't tell" policy. But the plan, accepted by gay rights groups, still faces uncertain prospects in pivotal votes later this week.
Under the compromise reached in a White House meeting on May 24, Congress would vote to repeal the 1993 law that bars open gays and lesbians from serving in the military. The change in policy would be delayed, however, until after the Pentagon completes a study, due to be finished by Dec. 1, on how to implement the change.
In addition, the proposed legislation would condition the end of the policy on a certification from President Obama and Pentagon leaders that the change would not harm military readiness or unit cohesion.
The White House formally endorsed the plan in a letter from budget director Peter Orszag to Rep. Patrick Murphy, D-Pa., who has been the chief House sponsor of repeal legislation. In the letter blessing the accord, Orszag said the delay would "guarantee that the Defense Department has prepared the necessary policies and regulations needed to successfully implement the repeal."
Murphy plans to introduce the plan as an amendment to a defense spending bill due to be considered on the House floor on Thursday, just before Congress leaves for its Memorial Day recess. Sen. Joseph Lieberman, I-Conn., would similarly offer the plan on Thursday when the Senate Armed Services Committee takes up its version of the defense spending bill.
A leading House Republican said GOP members will oppose the plan. "The American people don't want the American military to be used to advance a liberal political agenda," said Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana, chairman of the House Republican Conference.
Gay rights groups that have been critical of the White House's failure to press more forcefully to end the policy applauded the new plan with modest reservations. In a statement, Aubrey Sarvis, executive director of the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, called the White House agreement "a dramatic breakthrough in dismantling 'don't ask, don't tell.'" But Sarvis voiced some ambivalence in a comment to the Washington Post. "We can live with it," Sarvis told the newspaper.
From the opposite side, Elaine Donnelly, president of the Center for Military Readiness, which backs the current policy, is attacking the proposed two-step repeal. "Any vote for a 'repeal deal' with 'delayed implementation' would be an irresponsible abnegation of Congress' authority, surrendering the military to the control of political appointees doing the president's bidding," Donnelly said.
More than 13,500 service members have been discharged under the policy since Congress passed the law in 1993. Congress adopted the policy as a compromise after President Bill Clinton's plan to lift all restrictions on service by gay men and lesbians touched off a political firestorm in his early days in the White House.
Obama promised during his 2008 campaign to push to repeal the policy, but did little more than reiterate his stand in a speech to the Human Rights Campaign's annual dinner in October and in his State of the Union address in January. In February, however, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, both endorsed ending the policy in testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee.
In his testimony, Gates said he was immediately easing enforcement of the policy and also creating a task force to study the practical steps needed to implement repeal. The White House had been urging lawmakers to wait until completion of the study to take up the issue. The congressional supporters of repeal were impatient with the delay, however.
For their part, gay rights leaders were openly worried that the possible loss of Democratic seats in the November elections would imperil repeal in the next Congress. Sarvis is stressing now that the outcome of this week's votes is not assured. "The votes still need to be worked and counted," he says.
For background, see Peter Katel, "Gays in the Military," CQ Researcher, Sept. 18, 2009.
Posted by Kenneth Jost on 5/25/2010 11:39:00 AM 0 comments
Prominent Conservative Quits Congress After Admitting Affair With Staffer
by Marcia Clemmitt
Rep. Mark Souder, R-Ind., announced today that he is resigning from Congress after acknowledging to colleagues that he had an affair with a female staff member. Both Souder and the staff member are married.
"In the poisonous environment of Washington, D.C., any personal failing is seized upon, often twisted, for political gain," said Souder, who only two weeks ago survived a tough primary election challenge. "I am resigning rather than put my family through that painful, drawn-out process."
During his 16 years in Congress, Souder has been a strong conservative voice on Capitol Hill, whom the CQ Researcher has cited and quoted in numerous reports, most recently in my March 26, 2010, report on "Teen Pregnancy, where I quoted his remarks from a 2008 hearing on abstinence education.
"Extreme interest groups believing in sexual freedom and sexual justice have denigrated the debate over abstinence education by turning it into a vehicle to promote their own ideological agenda of radical sexual autonomy," Souder said. "We ought not to be persuaded by these groups who, although adopting the language of science and reason" to promote contraceptive education, "are really just evangelists of a … tragically incorrect moral vision. We must … realize that this debate involves deep disagreements between competing values" about morality.
In March 2004, as chairman of the House Government Reform Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy and Human Resources, Souder confronted the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration over what he called their continued failure to inform the public about "the lack of effectiveness of condoms in preventing infection." Souder based his complaint on the fact that condoms are only very minimally effective against HPV – human papillomavirus – according to Sarah Glazer's Dec. 3, 2004, report on "Sexually Transmitted Diseases," in which his remarks were quoted. (Condoms are effective against many other sexually transmitted infections, including HIV, however.)
Souder has also been a proponent of strong curbs on illegal drugs, including medical use of marijuana. "I am exasperated at the FDA's failure to act against fraudulent claims about 'medical' marijuana," he wrote in a 2006 letter to the FDA, quoted in our June 2, 2006, report on the "War on Drugs" by Peter Katel. Souder had begun pressing the FDA to take a strong stance against the medical use of marijuana in 2003.
An ardent spokesman for right-to-life views, Souder has called for a "federal presumption in favor of life" for the Medicare and Medicaid programs, to ensure that federally insured patients are "not denied ordinary care such as hydration or nutrition without due process and full exercise of their rights of human beings," said our May 13, 2005, report on the "Right to Die" by Kenneth Jost.
In Congress, Souder has also taken strong stands against gun control and for strict punishment of drug crimes and crimes of violence, including among young people.
Our 1998 report on school violence quoted him urging the House to pass a bill to allow juveniles age 14 and up to be tried as adults for violent or drug crimes.
"There should be a price to pay if someone shoots somebody, if they rape somebody or if they use a gun in an armed robbery," Souder said. "We have spent too much time worrying about these juveniles without thinking about the people who are terrorized by these young people."
In 2004, Souder announced he had 228 cosponsors on a bill that would abolish gun-control laws in Washington, D.C., and make it illegal for the city's mayor or council to enact any such laws in the future, our 2004 "Gun Control Debate" report noted.
"The folly of gun control is shown time and again in cities that have strict gun control laws," Souder said. "Washington, D.C., has the most restrictive gun control laws in the country, yet it is known foremost for its violent criminal activity." His bill, he said, "would allow law-abiding people to use guns to protect their homes and families."
The legislation was passed by the House of Representatives, but the Senate never acted on it.
In 2005, Rep. Souder contributed the "pro" At Issue essay for the Researcher's report on "Intelligent Design," addressing the question, "Should public schools teach the controversy surrounding evolution and intelligent design?"
In his "yes" response to that question, Souder wrote:
"The question of biological origins continues to plague discussions about public school science-education policy. But why can't high school students just learn the standard scientific view and be done with it? Science is science, and that should end the debate.
"Normally it would. But evolution is different.
"Charles Darwin's theory — and its modern variants — assert that everything we see in the living world is the result of an unplanned, unguided process of random variation and natural selection. It has, from the very beginning, been something more than just a scientific theory. Darwinism quickly became a near-religious conviction for modern agnostics, and since its early days it has been used against people of faith. That history, of course, does not disqualify it as science, but it does help explain why many well-educated Americans have not made, and perhaps never will make, their peace with Darwinian theory.
"…The Darwinian mechanism as an explanation for macroevolution has long been the subject of cogent and powerful scientific criticisms. And those criticisms have become more compelling in recent years as new evidence piles up: Recently uncovered fossil beds deepen the mystery of the Cambrian explosion, and molecular biology reveals the nanotechnology and digital information inside each lowly cell.
"…The theory should not be taught as an absolute."
Posted by CQ Press on 5/19/2010 01:56:00 PM 0 comments
Young Offenders 'Less Culpable': Court
Juveniles who commit crimes are less culpable than adult offenders, according to the Supreme Court, and for that reason cannot be imprisoned for life without possibility of parole for a nonhomicide offense.
The court's closely divided ruling strikes down sentencing provisions on the books in 37 states and the District of Columbia as well as federal law that permits life-without-parole for juvenile offenders. The decision, based on the Eighth Amendment's Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause, will apparently require resentencing for 129 inmates currently serving without life-without-parole.
The decision in Graham v. Florida relied on and extended the court's 2005 ruling to bar the death penalty for juvenile offenders under the Eighth Amendment. Writing for a five-justice majority in the new case, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy quoted extensively from his own opinion in the earlier ruling, Roper v. Simmons.
"Roper established that because juveniles have lessened culpability, they are less deserving of the most severe punishments," Kennedy wrote. Compared to adults, he wrote, juveniles have "a lack of maturity and an underdeveloped sense of responsibility," "are more vulnerable or susceptible to negative influences and outside pressures, including peer pressures," and have characters that are "less well formed."
"No recent data provide reason to reconsider" those observations, Kennedy continued. In fact, "developments in psychology and brain science continue to show fundamental differences between juvenile and adult minds."
The ruling came in the case of a Florida man, Terrance Jamar Graham, sentenced to life without parole in 2006 after a second home burglary conviction. Graham, who was 16 at the time of the second offense in late 2003, received a severe tongue-lashing from the judge at sentencing.
The judge said that because of Graham's "escalating pattern of criminal conduct," it was "apparent" that Graham had "decided that this is the way you are going to live your life." "The only thing I can do now," the judge concluded, "is to try and protect the community from your actions."
The justices divided for the most part along traditional ideological lines in the ruling. The court's four liberal justices joined Kennedy's ruling, while three conservatives —led by Justice Clarence Thomas — dissented. He argued that the court was wrong to override legislative judgments about sentencing.
The ruling, Thomas wrote, "raises the question whether any democratic choice regarding appropriate punishment is safe from the Court's ever-expanding constitutional veto." Justices Antonin Scalia and Samuel A. Alito Jr. joined his opinion.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. disagreed with his conservative colleagues on upholding Graham's sentence, but also disagreed with the new constitutional rule that the Kennedy-led majority established. Roberts said Graham's sentence should have been set aside under the court's precedents prohibiting "disproportionate" penalties. He cited Graham's age, the nature of his two offenses and the "unusual severity" of the sentence as reasons for finding an Eighth Amendment violation.
But Roberts said he would not bar life-without-parole sentences for all juveniles. "Some crimes are so heinous, and some juvenile offenders so highly culpable, that a sentence of life without parole may be entirely justified under the Constitution," Roberts wrote.
In his opinion, Kennedy said that despite laws on the books permitting life-without-parole for juveniles, the relative rarity of such sentences indicated "a national consensus" against the practice. Juvenile offenders have been sentenced to life without parole in only a dozen states plus one in federal court, Kennedy said. The vast majority of the cases — 77 out of 129 — are in Florida.
Kennedy said that a life-without-parole sentence is especially severe for a juvenile because it "improperly denies the juvenile offender a chance to demonstrate growth and maturity." He specified, however, that a state is not required to guarantee a juvenile offender eventual release. Instead, the state must provide "some meaningful opportunity to obtain release based on demonstrated maturity and rehabilitation."
In his dissenting opinions, Thomas emphasized that the ruling did not bar life-without-parole for a homicide offense. And in a brief additional dissent Alito noted that the ruling also would allow states to continue to sentence juvenile offenders to lengthy prison terms; he cited a 40-year term as one example.
For background, see Thomas J. Billitteri, "Youth Violence," CQ Researcher, March 5, 2010.
CQ Press Award for Teaching Innovation
Announcing the 2010 CQ Press Award for Teaching Innovation
NOMINATION DEADLINE: June 15, 2010
CQ Press proudly announces the 2010 CQ Press Award for Teaching Innovation. The award, which carries a $500 cash stipend, will be presented at the 2010 Reception Honoring Teaching at the American Political Science Association Annual Meeting in Washington, DC.
The CQ Press Award for Teaching Innovation recognizes a political scientist who has developed an effective new approach to teaching in the discipline. The award seeks to honor a wide range of new directions in teaching. For example, one year, a professor might be chosen because of an innovative course syllabus, and in another year, a professor may be honored for using a new multimedia approach to reaching students. The only limits on what will be recognized are the imagination and creativity of those teaching political science.
More information on the award including submission guidelines can be found on the American Political Science Association (APSA) website.
Kagan: Few Clues on Future Views
Supreme Court Editor, CQ Press
Elena Kagan appears on a path toward Senate confirmation as the next Supreme Court justice, but her ability to move the court in the direction that President Obama hopes for remains to be seen. Indeed, her first effort in that regard failed.
In announcing his selection today (May 10), Obama stressed along with Kagan's academic credentials (Princeton, Oxford, Harvard) her reputation as a consensus-builder in six years as dean of Harvard Law School. Obama specifically pointed to Kagan's role in hiring conservative scholars for the school's ideologically fractious faculty as evidence of a judicial temperament open to diverse points of view.
Liberal advocacy groups have been pinning their hopes on Kagan as the silver bullet for pulling Justice Anthony M. Kennedy more often toward the four-justice liberal bloc and away from the bloc of four conservatives headed by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. But as U.S. solicitor general, she ended on the losing side of the Court's 5-4 decision in January striking down a major provision of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law and freeing corporations and unions to spend unlimited sums on congressional or presidential elections.
Obama referred to the case, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, in his remarks, noting that Kagan took on the case as her debut before the Court last September despite the odds against the conservative majority's upholding the law. But, echoing his earlier comments on the retirement of Justice John Paul Stevens, Obama said that Kagan understood that "in a democracy, powerful interests must not be allowed to drown out the voices of ordinary citizens."
Kagan had been regarded as the presumptive front-runner for the vacancy ever since last fall, when Stevens signaled his likely retirement by hiring only one law clerk for the coming term instead of the normal complement of four for a sitting justice. In his remarks, Obama indicated he was drawn to Kagan's life story: immigrant grandparents; her father a housing lawyer, her mother a public school teacher. He noted as well her firsts as a "trailblazing leader" — first female dean at Harvard Law School and now the first woman to serve as solicitor general.
In her academic career, Kagan produced only a limited paper trail: several law review articles on First Amendment issues, a pair on presidential power, and a few book reviews and speeches. They give conservative critics little ammunition for opposing her, but likewise leave liberal advocacy groups with only limited clues about Kagan's stands on specific legal issues. In her longest academic writing, she dissected the Court's free speech cases at length but offered no overarching theory of her own.
If confirmed, Kagan will come to the Court after service in all three branches of the federal government. She was law clerk to federal appeals court judge Abner Mikva and later to Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, both liberal icons. She served as special counsel to the Senate Judiciary Committee during the 1993 confirmation hearings for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg — and later wrote critically about Ginsburg's evasion of senators' questions. She then went on to serve under Mikva as associate White House counsel during the Clinton administration.
Kagan will lack, however, the experience that the other eight justices have: prior service on a federal appeals court. Some conservatives are pointing to the lack of experience as a detriment. On the other hand, some Court watchers have been yearning for a justice to be selected from outside the judicial monastery. William H. Rehnquist — who served for 19 years as chief justice — and Lewis F. Powell Jr. in 1971 were the last justices to be nominated without prior judicial experience.
If she joins justices Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor as the third woman, Kagan would add to gender diversity, but otherwise she will make the Court less representative of the country as a whole. If she is confirmed, all nine justices will have attended either Harvard or Yale law school. (Stevens graduated from Northwestern.) She will be the seventh justice who counts the Boston-Washington corridor as home (all but Kennedy and Clarence Thomas). And Kagan would be the third Jewish justice — and, with six Catholics, leave the Court for the first time ever with no Protestant member.
Kagan's background marks her as a liberal from her childhood on Manhattan's Upper West Side through a college thesis on socialism and her campaign work for such Democrats as Rep. Theodore Weiss and 1988 presidential nominee Michael Dukakis. Republican senators looking for vulnerabilities will undoubtedly criticize her decision as Harvard dean to enforce the law school's policy barring military recruiters on campus to protest the "don't ask, don't tell" policy on gays in the military. (She changed the policy after the Supreme Court ruled against law schools on the issue by an 8-0 vote.) With that exception, however, Kagan gives potential opponents few easy targets for attack.
Among the four front-runners for the nomination, Kagan was the youngest; she turned 50 last month. She would be the youngest justice to take the bench since Clarence Thomas was appointed at the age of 43 in 1991. (Justice Antonin Scalia took office in 1986, six months past his 50th birthday.) Her relative youth — and the prospect of a 20- to 30-year tenure — was undoubtedly a factor in Obama's selection. Stevens retires after a 35-year evolution from moderate conservative to liberal leader. With limited evidence, predictions about Kagan's role should be made and considered with utmost tentativeness.
Posted by Kenneth Jost on 5/10/2010 01:11:00 PM 0 comments
Polarized Party Base Ousts Incumbent Utah Sen. Bob Bennett
The polarization of political parties I heard about when I spoke with experts for our "Gridlock in Washington" report last month continues apace.
This past weekend, a Republican Party convention in Utah rejected three-term Sen. Bob Bennett as the GOP nominee for the November election, on the grounds that Bennett isn't conservative enough.
That event comes as no surprise to political scientists. One big strike against Bennett, in the eyes of party faithful: He's worked with moderate Democrats on bipartisan initiatives. Even though most political analysts say the majority of American voters prefer middle-of-the-road proposals that contain both Democratic and Republican ideas, increasingly, the most politically active among us reject bipartisan projects out of hand.
"A major reason that Bennett is being challenged in his primary is because he collaborated with Ron Wyden [D-Ore.]" on a bipartisan health-care reform bill, said Sean F. Evans, an associate professor of political science at Union University in Jackson, Tenn. Conservatives had blasted Bennett for pushing the proposal, saying that its "goal of universal coverage was the wrong goal for Republicans on political and substantive grounds," wrote columnist Reihan Salam in the conservative magazine National Review.
Bennett's not the only senator in trouble with the party apparatus of his home state for pursuing bipartisan proposals, according to Sean Theriault, an associate professor of government at the University of Texas, Austin.
For example, of South Carolina's two senators, both Republicans, Jim DeMint staunchly opposes proposals that would mean working in a bipartisan way with Democrats, while Lindsey Graham has frequently reached out to Democrats seeking compromises on issues like climate change, says Theriault. For this reason, while the two men's actual voting records are quite similar, a local Republican organization in the state "passed a censure resolution against Graham for working with Democrats."
No Democrats so far appear to have been directly censured by the party apparatus for working on a bipartisan basis. Nevertheless, in recent years Democratic congressional leaders have become more likely than in the past to award leadership positions on public policy to members who fight for more consistently liberal causes, analysts say.
For example, in late 2008, Democratic leaders in Congress stripped Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., of his long-time post as chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee in favor of Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., Evans points out. A fervent champion of the automobile industry so crucial to his home state, Dingell – unlike Waxman – would probably have dragged his feet on or even opposed climate-change and alternative-energy legislation.
Analysts expect more incumbents, on both sides of the aisle, to face strong challenges this year, as local party activists seek out more ideologically pure candidates. If that happens – and most political scientists seem pretty certain that it will – look for Washington to be even more polarized in 2011.
Posted by CQ Press on 5/10/2010 10:42:00 AM 0 comments
Is a confrontation with China inevitable?
To follow is an excerpt from the CQ Researcher report on "U.S.-China Relations" by Roland Flamini, May 7, 2010
The Chinese leadership is "gunning for a paradigm shift in geopolitics. In particular, Beijing has served notice that it won't be shy about playing hardball to safeguard what it claims to be 'core national interests,'" writes Willy Lam, a China specialist at the Washington-based Jamestown Foundation think tank. [Footnote 22] At the top of those national interests is Taiwan which, The Economist magazine said recently, "has been where the simmering distrust between China and America most risks boiling over." [Footnote 23]
The chance of a war between China and the United States is generally regarded as remote. The Chinese threat to the United States is indirect — for example, if China should decide to use force to annex Taiwan, and America intercedes — as it is committed to do even though the United States does not recognize the island as an independent state.
China hands like Elizabeth Economy, director of Asia Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations think tank in Washington, downplay the new "Red Scare." Economy argues that the West — particularly the United States — has "completely lost perspective on what constitutes reality in China today." Economy concedes that "there is a lot that is incredible about China's economic story, but there is a lot that is not working well on both the political and economic fronts," distorting the real picture.
In other words, China has enough problems without provoking the challenge of an international nemesis. The Chinese leadership appears to worry about a fragile society: A persistent nightmare is that a sudden significant spike in unemployment, officially kept at 4 percent (but possibly higher because of the huge, hard-to-track migrant-worker population) could lead to widespread unrest. [Footnote 24]
Still, looking at the Chinese as the potential aggressors, does China have the capacity for a military confrontation with the United States?
In the past five years China has spent hundreds of billions of dollars modernizing its armed forces, with special emphasis on the navy. China's 1.7 million Chinese under arms is considerably more than the 1.4 million in the U.S. armed forces, but in 2009 the U.S. defense budget was $738 billion and China's estimated at between $69.5 billion and $150 billion. [Footnote 25]
The government insists it seeks a peaceful solution to the issue of uniting Taiwan to the mainland, but the Chinese have built up a formidable fleet of submarines and developed anti-ship missiles to counter a possible U.S. defense of the Taiwan Strait. The Americans will be ready for them. In its annual report to Congress on China's military power, the Pentagon said it was "maintaining the capacity to defend against Beijing's use of force or coercion against Taiwan."
Beyond the strait, the Pentagon reported, "China's ability to sustain military power … remains limited." [Footnote 26] The Pentagon's annual report is a source of irritation to the Chinese, who routinely denounce it. This year, the Xinhua news agency dismissed the assessment as "a largely subjective report with distorted facts and groundless speculation." [Footnote 27]
Less hypothetical is the threat to the U.S. government's computer system. The Pentagon's 2009 report said U.S. government computers had been the target of "intrusions that appear to have originated" in China, although not necessarily from the military. [Footnote 28] And in his annual "Threat Assessment" to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair warned in February that "malicious cyber activity is occurring on an unprecedented scale with extraordinary sophistication."
As a result, Blair added, the United States "cannot be certain that our cyberspace infrastructure will remain available and reliable during a time of crisis." Blair did not refer to China directly at that point. However, later in his assessment he called "China's aggressive cyber activities" a major concern. [Footnote 29]
In January, after Google reported that hackers in China had targeted the computers of more than 30 U.S. corporations, including its own, and that the e-mail accounts of human rights activists had also been hacked, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton called on the Chinese government to investigate and to make its findings public. [Footnote 30]
U.S. officials and business executives warn that a trade war could also erupt if the Chinese don't yield to international pressure and raise the aggressive undervaluation of the renminbi, kept artificially low to favor Chinese exports. China's cheap currency is a serious problem for the global economy by undercutting exports throughout the industrial world, including the United States, and contributing to the trade imbalance. (President Obama has contended that if China lets the renminbi appreciate, U.S. exports would increase.)
The Obama administration has so far avoided picking a public fight with China over its currency — even to the extent of postponing indefinitely a Treasury Department report on worldwide currencies originally due out on April 15. Without any movement by Beijing on the currency front, the report could well label China a "currency manipulator." If that happens, Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., is ready with draft legislation that would place more tariffs on Chinese goods.
Chinese Commerce Minister Chen Deming recently told The Washington Post that the United States would lose a trade war with China. "If the United States uses the exchange rate to start a new trade war," he said, "China will be hurt. But the American people and U.S. companies will be hurt even more." [Footnote 31]
One way for America to increase its exports, said Chen, would be to remove the restrictions on high-tech goods with possible military applications, which the United States imposed following Beijing's repressive crackdown on student demonstrations in 1989 in Tiananmen Square — something the Obama administration shows no signs of doing.
* Is a U.S.-China partnership actually possible?
* Is a confrontation with China inevitable, as some predict?
* Has China's "market authoritarian" model of government emerged as an alternative to Western democracy?
For more information see the CQ Researcher report "U.S.-China Relations" [subscription required] or purchase the CQ Researcher PDF.
Roland Flamini is a Washington-based correspondent who writes on foreign-affairs for CQ Weekly, The New Republic and other publications. Fluent in six languages, he served as Time bureau chief in Rome, Bonn, Beirut, Jerusalem and the European Common Market and later served as international editor at United Press International. His previous reports for CQ Researcher were on Afghanistan, NATO, Latin America, Nuclear Proliferation and U.S.-Russia Relations.
[23] "Facing up to China," The Economist, Feb. 4, 2010.
[24] Nicholas D. Kristof, "China, Concubines, and Google," The New York Times, March 31, 2010.
[25] Drew Thompson, "Think Again: China's Military," Foreign Policy, March/April 2010 .
[26] "Annual Report to Congress: Military Power of the People's Republic of China, 2009," Department of Defense.
[27] "Pentagon issues annual report on China's military power," Xinhuanet, March 26, 2009.
[28] Pentagon report to Congress, op. cit.
[29] Dennis Blair, "Annual Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community for the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence," February 2010.
[30] Cecilia Kang, "Hillary Clinton calls for Web freedom, demands China investigate Google attack," The Washington Post, Jan. 22, 2010.
[31] John Pomfret, "China's Commerce Minister: U.S. has most to lose in a trade war," The Washington Post, March 22, 2010. Department of Defense.
Is Washington paralyzed?
To follow is an excerpt from the CQ Researcher report called "Gridlock in Washington" by Marcia Clemmitt, April 30, 2010
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The word "gridlock" to describe a paralyzed government — one that moves legislation slower than some would like, or not at all — became common usage around 1980, according to Sarah A. Binder, a senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution, a centrist think tank. The concept is far older, however. "Alexander Hamilton was complaining more than two centuries ago about the deadlock rooted in the design of the Continental Congress," the body of delegates who governed the colonies during the American Revolution, Binder said. [Footnote 9]
More recently, political scientists have defined gridlock as "the propensity of existing policies to be impervious to change in spite of preferences of a popularly elected majority to enact new policies," explained Stanford University political science professor Keith Krehbiel. [Footnote 10] And, in many ways, such "gridlock is endemic to our national politics, the natural consequence" of a Constitution that set up two separate legislative bodies, the House and Senate, plus a separately elected presidency, with each entity having the power to stop the other two from enacting new policies, Binder said. [Footnote 11]
In some time periods, accusations of gridlock fly thick and fast, and the past few years has been one of those. However, analysts strongly disagree about whether we are experiencing gridlock and, if we are, whether it is a bad thing.
"The Senate is almost dysfunctional now," said Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa. [Footnote 12]
"Congress just got a lot more done in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s than in the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s," wrote political analyst and former President George W. Bush speechwriter David Frum. [Footnote 13]
"Bitter partisanship and ideological extremism rule the day," says Stanford's Fiorina. "A president many voters thought to be a pragmatic centrist chose to defer to the liberal agenda" of some congressional Democratic leaders "while the [Republican] 'party of no' digs in its heels and opposes them at every step. Politics increasingly looks like a collective 'celebrity death match.' Washington is gridlocked, paralyzed, stalemated. And one could write much the same story about California and some other state capitals."
As of mid-March, the Senate "was backed up with 88 unconfirmed nominees" whose names President Obama has forwarded for approval to executive branch positions, wrote Ryan Grim, senior congressional correspondent for the Huffington Post blog. Demonstrating the increase in congressional foot-dragging just over the past decade, that total is "83 more than the Bush administration faced at this point in its tenure," Grim said. [Footnote 14]
"I think you get the picture that" the held-up nominations constitute a "systematic" effort "to undermine the ability of the executive branch to do its job," said Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore. [Footnote 15]
Further evidence of the roadblocks to changing national policy is the fact that, while a major health-care reform bill has been enacted, it "was done by the narrowest of margins" even though one party holds the White House and both houses of Congress, including one of the largest Senate majorities in decades, says Jeremy Mayer, an associate professor of public policy at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va.
"It's hard to gauge gridlock because Congress doesn't always have to do much" in a given year except pass some spending and budget bills and move other routine legislation, says Frances E. Lee, an associate professor of political science at the University of Maryland in College Park. Nevertheless, Lee and others say that this Congress has changed more policies than many predecessor congresses.
"It's tough to make a case for being in gridlock when Congress has passed the largest social reform in decades" in the form of the new health-care reform law, says Mayer.
In fact, a good case can be made for saying that "this is a truly historical Congress," based on that accomplishment alone, says C. Lawrence Evans, a professor of government at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Va.
"Since Obama's been president, there's been a major stimulus bill, major higher-education provisions," and more, besides the health-care reform legislation, says Jones at the University of Texas. "I get so frustrated with people who talk about gridlock."
Many political scientists point out that Congress' slow march to most legislation is the result not of dysfunction but of institutional procedures put in place by the Constitution mainly to ensure that federal laws reflect the long-term will of the people and are enacted only after significant deliberation.
"Congress does the will of the people at a given time," but not the will of each fleeting "50-plus-one-percent majority," says Jones at the City University of New York. If Congress were constructed to immediately change laws "to flip to what the will of the one deciding voter wanted, the result would be constant change" and instability, since the preferences of a bare majority "flip all the time," Jones says. Instead, Congress acts only in response "to views that a sizable chunk of the public has held for a length of time."
"It takes a lot of time to build a consensus" on how to solve major problems, says Donald Wolfensberger, director of the Congress Project, a nonpartisan study project at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. "Without there being a solid national consensus on solutions" to a given problem, it's right that Congress not rush to legislate, he says.
The public often "has too high expectations for government" to create instant solutions, Wolfensberger says. For example, "the government has been proceeding with work on the economy, but given the fact that about three-quarters of the people" in one recent poll said they believe that "Washington is broken, I don't think people see how much is actually being done," he says. "The government doesn't specifically replace jobs. It's not like there's some button you can push."
"Many people don't see that, by Congress talking, they're doing exactly what we want them to do" — which is deliberate over important issues, says Sean F. Evans, an associate professor of political science at Union University in Jackson, Tenn.
Speed in legislating is overrated, says Lara Brown, an assistant professor of political science at Villanova University in Villanova, Pa., who served as a Department of Education official during the Clinton administration. "If we were passing laws as quickly as we were changing parties, we would have an incredibly unstable system," says Brown.
Our stable system of laws "has created prosperity," in part because "high predictability allows business to flourish," says Brown.
The Issues:
* Is Washington paralyzed?
* Is party polarization threatening our democracy?
* Should Senate filibuster rules be reformed?
For more information see the CQ Researcher report "Gridlock in Washington" [subscription required] or purchase the CQ Researcher PDF.
[9] Sarah A. Binder, "Going Nowhere: A Gridlocked Congress," Brookings Institution website, March 18, 2010, www.brookings.edu.
[10] Keith Krehbiel, "Institutional and Partisan Sources of Gridlock: A Theory of Divided and Unified Government," Journal of Theoretical Politics, January 1996, pp. 7–40.
[11] Binder, op. cit.
[12] Quoted in Peter Crabb, "How Political Gridlock Delays the Economy's Recovery," Idaho Statesman online, Feb. 11, 2010, www.idahostateman.com.
[13] "Trading Smoke Filled Rooms for Gridlock," Frum Forum blog, March 1, 2010, www.frumforum.com.
[14] Ryan Grim, "Jim Bunning's Back: Blocking Nominees Over Canadian Smoking Law," Huffington Post blog, March 16, 2010, www.huffingtonpost.com.
[15] Quoted in ibid.
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