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Women’s Equality Day

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The long list of calls settled itself into the monotone of routine.  “Hi, my name is Erik, and I’m calling for Jim Scheibel, your DFL candidate for Mayor of Saint Paul.”  The 1989 election was going to be close, so Get Out The Vote (GOTV) calling to loyal Democrats was important.  But just as I let the script propel my calls with their own momentum the soft gravely tone on the other end split the evening open.

“Oh, dear, you don’t have to remind me to vote.  I’ve been voting ever since they let us.”

We’ve been “letting” women vote for 93 years today, ever since Tennessee ratified the 19th Amendment on August 26th, 1920 by just one vote.  This anniversary, “Women’s Equality Day”, is a good time to reflect on how young and precarious this precious foundation of democracy is for half the population.

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Cabinet Government

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There are basically two types of Democratic-Republics in the world – Parliamentary, or a Prime Minister led government, and a strong President based system.  Hybrids of various kinds involving monarchs and other systems with varying degrees of power abound, but every democratically elected government in the world falls into one of these categories.  The person who shows up at the international conferences has one of these titles.

But is that the only way to go?  The situation in Egypt, among other places, has led me to wonder if there is some way a nation with a history and tradition of strong leadership might do better under a system of more than one nationally elected leader with defined roles and a real balance of power between them.  I call it an “Elected Cabinet”, and the inspiration comes from the laboratories of democracy, the US States.

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Chair(wo)man of the Fed

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Who will succeed Ben Bernanke as Chairman of the Federal Reserve?  It’s come down to two people as far as anyone can tell, Larry Summers and Janet Yellen.  Or, sometimes more accurately, Larry Summers and not Larry Summers.   This is a terrible shame because no person has done more to earn the post than Yellen.

Yet Summers seems to remain Obama’s choice for the job despite growing opposition.   On the other side, support is growing in the popular press for Yellen as an opportunity to break the glass ceiling for women.  It’s heating up as a battle that Obama may avoid by picking a third candidate that no one is concentrating on now, but the loss would be terrible if Yellen doesn’t get the nod.  Here’s why.

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What is Employment?

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There’s been a lot of good economic news lately, the second year in a row that July uncharacteristically surged ahead.   The “ISM Index” poll of manufacturers looked more positive than it has since 2008, even with a strong US Dollar.  Initial claims for unemployment fell to 326k last week, another low since 2008.  US GDP grew at 1.7% in 2Q13, not exactly great news but far better than expected (and accompanied upward revisions to previous quarters).  The ADP employment report showed a net gain of 200k jobs, the rosiest figure of them all.  Only 82k of those came from small businesses, with large companies gaining a new high of 60k jobs added – meaning that for the first time since 2008 big companies are in a hiring mood.

By the time you read this, the official Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) employment report for July should have come out, and it should be roughly in line with the more smooth ADP figure.  Now that we are really turning a corner, as Barataria expected in 2013, it’s time to take an in-depth look at what “employment” means and why there’s still so very far to go.

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Nate Silver

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Nate Silver has left the biz.  The most celebrated political reporter in a long time jumped from the New York Times to become a sports reporter at ESPN.  It’s not really a mystery, given Silver’s love for sports and outsider status at the fossilized Times.  As Public Editor Margaret Sullivan put it, “A number of traditional and well-respected Times journalists disliked his work. … They were also tough on me for seeming to endorse what he wrote, since I was suggesting that it get more visibility.”

Not long ago that political reporters were more or less the top of the journalistic heap and sports writers were at the bottom.  Silver’s new gig turns that upside down.  It’s not a mystery given how much political writing is horserace driven and sports reporters have become the true celebrities of the biz.  But there is much more to it than that.  I believe Silver’s popularity brilliantly displays what journalism must be for a new generation.

Here is my obituary praising Silver’s career as a political journalist, written not as the end of Silver but as the end of good political reporting – for now.

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