Motley Moose – Archive

This is the second part of two posts examining how North Korea fell behind South Korea.

As the previous post found, for several decades North Korea kept up with South Korea. Then, during the mid-1970s, the country started falling behind. Ever since then the gap between the two countries has widened.

This post will explore several factors behind what caused North Korea to fall behind. There seem to be three main causes: the failed ideology of juche (self-reliance), the end of Soviet aid, and Kim Jong-Il’s incompetent rule.

More below.

This is the first part of two posts examining how North Korea fell behind South Korea. The second part can be found here.

The story of the two Koreas is a common American tale amongst the educated classes. As the fairy tale goes, once upon a time there was one Korea. By chance, one day this Korea was divided amongst the communists and the capitalists. The communist Korea fell into chaos and poverty. The capitalist Korea became rich and a democracy. Beware communism!

The general thrust of this tale is true. But there are some interesting complexities behind how North Korea and South Korea became the way that they are. After the Korean War, it wasn’t as if South Korea immediately began pulling ahead. For a long time it wasn’t obvious which Korea was doing better.

This is what happened:

The 1940s

More below.

By: inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/

There is one thing that I’m very proud that the Obama campaign did – or rather, that it didn’t do. Obama’s campaign never attacked Mitt Romney’s faith.

More below.

This is part of a two-part series evaluating absentee ballots, which are being used more and more often. The first part focused on their advantages. This second part will focus on their disadvantages.

The previous part discussed the two main advantages of absentee ballots: absentee ballots make it easier to vote and enable voters to have more information about obscure ballot measures and races.

Let’s look at the disadvantages. Actually, there’s only one big disadvantage of absentee ballots: the potential for fraud or voter intimidation.

More below.

This is part of a two-part series evaluating absentee ballots, which are being used more and more often. The first part will focus on their advantages. The second part will focus on their disadvantages.

Absentee ballots are increasingly being used throughout the United States. They are especially popular in the West Coast; elections are entirely absentee-ballot in Oregon and Washington, for instance.

More below.

By: inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/

Today is Labor Day. When I was younger,  I didn’t understand what that meant. A day to celebrate labor? It was a strange concept. It didn’t mean much to me.

That was because to most Americans Labor Day means nothing. They take a day off work. They go shopping. They mark the end of summer.

The rest of the world doesn’t celebrate Labor Day, either. Instead, they celebrate something called May Day, or the International Workers’ Day.

May Day in China

More below.

By: inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/

While scouring the news around the world, I recently came across a fascinating article. Written by Laura Seay of Foreign Affairs, it criticizes the West’s media coverage of Africa.

More below.

By: inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/

Fox News is the most popular cable news channel in America, and it’s quite unique. Most obviously, there’s Fox’s conservatism. Other differences are more stylistic. A lot of Fox News programs are fairly similar to talk radio, for instance. Indeed, shows such as Hannity actually star on conservative talk radio stations.

Then there are the women on Fox News:

More below.

By: inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/

One of the great themes in American politics involves national security. Right-wing hawks argue that America must increase military spending to protect itself from its enemies. This is a very common theme, and it works. America spends five dollars on military spending for every dollar that China (ranked #2 in military spending) does. It spends ten dollars for every dollar on the military that Russia (ranked #3) spends.

But this doesn’t mean that America will win the next big war.

More below.

This post will look at the demographics of America’s governors by age, as of August 2012. All in all, this series on the demographics of America’s governors examines: