Cavalcade of Mammals

GDP: the US is doing better than Europe or Japan:
http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2012/11/long-slump

Unemployment: the US doing much better than Europe:
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/17/transatlantic-divergence/

Different economic policies, different outcomes. Europe and Britain have run austerity programs, cutting spending while the US increased spending and cut taxes.

Not unexpected, given what happened during the Great Depression, with the US economy quickly improving as New Deal spending programs kicked in, then falling back into recession after federal spending was cut in 1937 when the economy was still weak:
http://www.ourfuture.org/blog-entry/2009020603/fdr-failed-myth

Obama has done better than any other world leader during the financial crisis and the recession it caused. Not that he’s done super–unemployment is still at 8%. An extra $500 billion of Fed spending until the unemployment rate drops below 6% would be a much better policy than the current US policy to cut spending.

Common passwords
Occupy is having a jubilee
Delta government spending by administration (Rick Ungar, 5/24/12 Forbes)

There’s Already a Center-Right Party
Roman geometric shapes in bronze
Glass frogs from the cloud forests of South America pdf1, pdf2

Fighting over Miss Piggy:

The forgotten recent history of religion and abortion
Fiscal Madness, a summary of the current US budget situation as it relates to the economy
When Congress Busted Milton Friedman (and Libertarianism Was Created By Big Business Lobbyists)
Walmart and the squeeze on the lower middle class
How Damon Runyon Would Have Explained Jon Corzine