Rose Cantine

The Nigerian man, Abdul Farouk Umar Abdulmutallab, who was arrested in Detroit after setting off an incendiary on a Northwest Airlines flight from Amsterdam, is the son of Alhaji Umaru Mutallab, a former Nigerian minister who,  until recently, was a director of Nigeria’s oldest bank. Mutallab belongs to a very prominent and wealthy Nigerian family. What is [...]

From Salon: This news comes by way of Politico’s Meredith Shiner and Jonathan Allen, who appropriately point out the obvious conflict here: “The party’s own platform calls [abortion] ‘a fundamental assault on innocent human life.’” The RNC didn’t opt out of abortion coverage, though, even though that is allowed by Cigna, its insurer. Worse yet, though, [...]

“American companies are not seeing much lasting benefit from their country’s investment in Iraq. Some American businesses have calculated that the high security costs and fear of violence make Iraq a business no-go area. Even those who are interested and want to come are hampered by American companies’ reputation here for overcharging and shoddy workmanship, [...]

Are you surprised? The Financial Times reports that senior officials from the Bush administration are now leading reconstruction projects in Iraq.
Senior Bush administration figures including Zalmay Khalilzad, former US ambassador to Baghdad, and Jay Garner, the retired general who led reconstruction efforts immediately after the war, are leading a new business push into Iraq. The [...]

Reverse brain drain: “More skilled immigrants are giving up their American dreams to pursue careers back home, raising concerns that the U.S. may lose its competitive edge in science, technology and other fields. ”What was a trickle has become a flood,” says Duke University’s Vivek Wadhwa, who studies reverse immigration. Wadhwa projects that in the next five [...]

It’s funny how American conservatives get all it all wrong about the British NHS or any other country’s “socialized” medicine. They’ve been calling it a disaster but it works quite well, as Stephen Amidon, an American writer living in Britain, recently wrote in Salon:
“This, I learned, is what the NHS is about — common decency. It [...]

It’s funny how things work in the US. They don’t want to spend public funds for health care, fiber-based high-speed broadband networks, repairing crumbling bridges, parks, schools and other important matters that serve the general public. But, when it comes to helping wealthy corporate sponsors and their investors suck money from the public, US politicians [...]