With the defection of Arlen Specter the media pundits, particularly on the right, have been bemoaning the decline of democracy supposedly brought about by having the Democratic Party in control of both the Congress and the White House at the same time.  They urge the expansion of the Republican Party in order to head off what they call a one party state. 

Those of us who have worked in Green Party politics can tell you from experience that the USA has been a one party state for decades and perhaps more...

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It is fashionable in these trying times to worry a lot about protectionism.  Economists issue dire warnings that hard times must not lead us to clamp down on “free trade”, because inhibiting the free flow of goods will lead to local scarcity and higher prices for everyone, thus exacerbating the current economic malaise.  But I wonder if these ideas have been thoroughly thought through in the light of the new economic order that we are trying to build.

To my mind, well managed protectionism is starting...

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When I was a young man, life was a bit simpler.  There was a thing called Common Sense.  People thought that things either made sense or they didn’t make sense, and easily described them in that way.  Nowadays it’s a bit more complicated, and one of the most interesting additions to that vocabulary is “economic sense”.  Recent events have caused me to reflect a lot on the notion of economic sense, and I’ve come to the conclusion that it is essentially an oxymoron. 

People usually say that something makes...

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