Experimental Blog # 162

Comments on "The Roberts Court" - The Struggle for the Constitution by Marcia Coyle

This book is so complicated and detailed that it is very difficult for someone who is not well acquainted with American law and the judicial system to understand rather large parts of it.

The Supreme Court and the American judicial system probably have more to do with American government and politics than many people realize. The White House and its current occupant, the houses of congress, and the public activity of both the Democratic and Republican parties can be so distracting that the real governing, that is control, of the American people through its many courts might sometimes hardly be noticed. People might think that since they never go into them, any of the courts that is; they then have nothing to do with them.

There are so many laws passed by so many governing bodies, and the acts of the federal government can be so long, even 2 or 3 thousand pages, that millions of American citizens and their lawyers can continuously find ways to question the "constitutionality" of laws and acts of all kinds that they don't like. Or, at least, so it seems.

It is tempting to say that the "brains", or intelligence, of the American government, that means control, are concentrated in its juducial system; with the Supreme Court at the top. The well thought out arguments carried out before the 9 Supreme Court justices, and involving them, too, must be among the best examples of America's strongest minds; or, at least, strongest in the use of carefully chosen words in carefully composed sentences.

Experimental Blog # 161

Quotations and comments from "Plutocrats - The Rise of the New Global Super-Rich and the Fall of Everyone Else by Chrystia Freeland

"The rise of the 1 percent is a global phenomenon .."
"The 1 percent is outpacing everyone else in the emerging economies as well."
"Today two terrifically powerful forces are driving economic change: the technology revolution and globalization."

"Globalization is working - the world overall is getting richer. But a lot of the costs of that transition are being borne by specific groups of workers in the developed West."
" ..Credit Suisse calculated that there were about 29.6 million millionaires < > in the world, about half a percent of the total global population. North Americans .. account for 37 percent .. 37.2 percent .. are European ..Asia-Pacific is home to ..19.2 percent .. there are just over 1 million in China{3.4 percent}."

"Forbes classifies 840 of the 1,226 people on its 2012 billionaire ranking as self-made."

"In 2011, after Viktor Yanukovych, whose candidacy was backed by several eastern Ukrainian oligarchs, was elected president, he imprisoned Ms. Tymoshenko, in a politically motivated case redolent of Mikhail Khodorkovsky."
"When it comes to the creation of twenty-first-century billionaires, the USSR's sale of the century is also the most powerful driver, more important than Silicon Valley's technological revolution or the flourishing of finance on Wall Street and in the city of London."
"The fire sale of the assets of the former Soviet Union stands out because it marked such a sharp shift from nearly total state ownership ..But it was also part of a wider global trend."

" .. the seventy richest members of the NPC{National People's Congress in China} made more money in 2011 than the total combined net worth of all the members of all three branches of U.S. government - the president and his cabinet, both houses of congress, and the justices of the supreme court{all 660 members of the three federal branches}."!!
" .. there were 271 billionaires in China in 2011 .."
"China's plutocrats don't fight the state because they are the state - and when any of them forget that, they are treated with summary brutality: between 2003 and 2011, at least fourteen Chinese billionaires were executed."!!{also quoted as a fact in blog # 154}.

Experimental Blog # 160

Quotations from "Secrets of Silicon Valley" - What Everyone Else Can Learn from the Innovation Capital of the World by Deborah Perry Piscione

"Silicon Valley is a meritocratic culture that rewards innovative ideas, independent thinking, and hubris. It .. also embraces youth, failure, and transparency."
" ..Silicon Valley technologies impact the world's most basic ideas about work, learning, and lifestyles."
"We're just beginning a global startup revolution in talent development and idea creation , a movement so widespread that it could redefine the foundational concept of business and work in the twenty-first century."
" ..Silicon Valley is responsible for creating almost every technological innovation that has and will continue to change the global world in the way we live, work, and socialize."

"No longer does China want to be known as the world's manufacturing plant, but rather seven strategic emerging industries have been targeted for growth: next-generation information technology, biotechnology, new enegry, energy conservation, clean energy vehicles, new materials, and high-end manufacturing equipment."

"Silicon Valley is essentially a one-industry town < > all of its energy and resources go toward creating the best possible high-tech economy."