It’s Black Monday in the NFL, as multiple teams have given the axe to their head coaches less than 24 hours after completing their final game of the regular season. Foremost among the men looking for new jobs? Andy Reid, the Eagles’ career leader in wins whose squad stumbled to a 4-12 record this year. “Andy Reid won the most games of any head coach in Eagles history and he is someone I respect greatly and will remain friends with for many years to come,” owner Jeffrey Lurie said in a statement. “But, it is time for the Eagles to move in a new direction. Coach Reid leaves us with a winning tradition that we can build upon. And we are very excited about the future.” Other coaches also fired this morning include Pat Shurmur of the Browns and, most likely, Romeo Crennel of the Chiefs and Norv Turner of the Chargers. Rex Ryan, conversely, is expected to keep his job in New York, although General Manager Mike Tannenbaum has been fired.
The fiscal cliff is overrated by some measures. It’s just the beginning, by others. The economy won’t cease to exist if the cliff is breached . However, prospects for a long-term recovery – and the political system’s ability to institute positive change – are in doubt. Regardless of whether a last-minute deal is reached to avoid the worst tax hikes and spending cuts, the impact of the fiscal cliff will be felt well into 2013. Most likely, a compromise will be reached soon, if only to put off the inevitable. But the tone has been set for the new year, and possibly for the next four. The plunge over the fiscal cliff may not result in drastic economic decline, especially if the situation is rectified quickly, yet it is a symptom of a bigger problem. Call if dysfunctional or call it just plain broken, Washington is apparently incapable of even the smallest legislative moves that involve compromise. Hopes of a grand bargain on long-term American fiscal policy, involving entitlement spending, tax rates, and the debt ceiling, totally disappeared weeks ago. All that’s left are fading possibilities involving the delaying portions of tax increases and restoring some planned cuts, with long-term problems lingering. Those are moves that actually make the deficit outlook worse. More saliently, they should be the politically easy things to get done, yet Congress is paralyzed and the president appears powerless to do anything meaningful to prod action. Other items on President Barack Obama’s second-term agenda – immigration reform, environmental policy, infrastructure investments, gun control – look like dreams now. Blame whomever you choose, but the simple fact is that Washington is now broken beyond the point where bold individual leadership can even fix it. The forces at play are bigger than the ability of the president, Harry Reid and John Boehner , or any other person or persons to turn them around. The “fiscal cliff” metaphor suggests a jump into a void, but at least one that has a bottom. Too bad the depth of where we are headed has yet to be determined.
The US has encircled the world with a web of military bases that today amount to more than 700, in 40 countries. It's one of the most powerful forces at play in the world, yet one of the less talked-about. Why do countries like Germany, Italy, Japan still host hundreds of US military bases and thousands US soldiers? What stance has president Obama taken on this subject? This documentary answers these and other questions both through the words of experts Noam Chomsky, Gore Vidal, Chalmers Johnson and through those directly affected by US bases in Italy, Japan and the Indian Ocean. EFFENDEM FILM, TAKAE FILMS presents: Standing Army http://www.standingarmy.it/ http://www.effendemfilm.com/ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5vxlFuTcUQc&playnext=1&videos=BsB7njPMnX4 added by: cool0ne
