Word: meanings
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 2000-2009
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...present chastening can't mean turning into a nation of overcautious, unambitious scaredy-cats. This is the moment for business to think different and think big. The great dying off of quintessentially 20th century businesses presents vast opportunity for entrepreneurs. People will still need (greener) cars, still want to read quality journalism, still listen to recorded music and all the rest. And so as some of the huge, dominant, old-growth trees of our economic forest fall, the seedlings and saplings - that is, the people burning to produce and sell new kinds of transportation and media in new, economic ways...
Whether or not Congress passes some kind of carbon-taxing scheme that ushers in a true alternative-energy era, "sustainability" is going to be shaping individual and public-policy decisions. And I don't just mean eating locally grown foods, driving more fuel-efficient cars and using weird lightbulbs. Annual increases of 10% and 15% in real estate prices were not sustainable; endlessly lowering taxes and expanding government isn't sustainable; Medicare and the war on drugs as currently constituted are not sustainable. Sustainability in this sense is as much old-fashioned green-eyeshade Republicanism as it is newfangled kumbaya...
...They're not gagging and being prevented from breathing. In fact, they store fat in their liver, which is unlike us. But it sounds awful and because most people don't have a stake in it, it's easier to have an opinion - like this is just decadent and mean and the ultimate example of our inhumanity. It's a safe way to say you're sticking up for animals without putting much on the line...
Even as Baucus works to bring Republicans on board, he will also have to deal with some of his fellow Democrats who are pushing to include health-care legislation in budget "reconciliation" - an aggressive maneuver that would mean it requires only 51 votes to pass the Senate, rather than the 60 it takes to overcome a filibuster under the normal rules. "If it's partisan, the minority party can find all kinds of ways to throw sand in the gears, and outside groups will start to mobilize," he warns. "My view is, we can get more than 60 votes...
When he sings, "Why aren't you in the administration?/ Is there some kind of politicking that I don't understand?/I mean, Timothy Geithner is like some little weasel," his voice practically drips with despair - not unlike the despair Krugman recently felt about Tim Geithner's financial plan, come to think...