Ezra Klein

Scott Lemieux asked a very good question in the comments a couple of posts ago: “Roughly what percentage of energy consumption is taken up by the internal combustion engine, and what by energy production? The higher the latter, the more difficult the long-term problems (of peak oil) would seem to me, although perhaps it doesn’t […]

Ezra here. This post of Brad Plumer’s on different explanations for America’s strangely absent universal health system is fantastic, you should all read it. Moreover, I’d love to see [guest blogger] Matt Holt’s response. Alrighty-then. Back to vacation.

Shakes here… As an appropriate follow-up to Durbin’s apology for calling out the heinous nature of abuses going on at Gitmo, the White House has rejected the proposed creation of an independent commission to investigate abuses of detainees held at Gitmo and elsewhere. White House spokesman Scott McClellan said the Pentagon has launched 10 major […]

This is Matthew Holt, back with more on why health care costs so dang much. Health Affairs (the essential peer reviewed health policy journal) has an article from the very well respected Center for Studying Health System Change (HSC) which announces that the decrease in the increase of health spending has stalled (here’s the slightly […]

What is the evolutionary purpose for myopia? I forget where I heard the question raised recently, but it may well have been on the Al Franken show during a discussion of intelligent design. Economics is my day job, and I think that it offers insight into this biological riddle. So please indulge me while I […]

If you didn’t catch it, read my intro post below. There’s also some links in there to primers, etc. This post, however, will be an attempt to sum up a pretty complex topic. Hubbert’s Peak is reached when demand for oil exceeds production and supply. Let’s be clear, peak oil is not about running out […]

I’m The Jew. Thanks Ezra. Yada yada yada. Neil is absolutely correct when he says Remember that when Republicans try to define the Democrats, they won’t ever bring up the centrist’s moderate, conciliatory remark distancing himself from the radical. They’ll bring up the radical’s remark that fearful centrists pushed beyond the pale and didn’t bother […]

Hi, this is Matthew Holt from The Health Care Blog, and I’ll be writing a few articles about health care, (which may be somewhat crossposted from my blog) and taking the odd rare opportunity to rant about other subjects of my choosing here too. I will (as instructed by Ezra) be writing later in the […]

(So, I’ve been requested to being everyone up to speed on the Downing Street Memos. Well, here goes…) Since 9/11, President Bush has positioned himself as the best, if not only person, with the wherewithal to protect America from terrorists. He has used the nebulous “War on Terror” to justify everything from the encroachment on […]