Matters Social and Political, as in the failure of the Swedish model. Thanks to Dennis Prager and Freedom and Prosperity blog for bringing to my attention this story in the Wall Street Journal on what has happened to Sweden as described by Member of Parliament, Mauricio Rojas:

...a new study ("Sweden after the Swedish Model") by Mauricio Rojas, an associate professor of economic history at Lund University, calls into doubt the continued vitality of this social concept. ...Mr. Rojas contends that Folkhemmet is a model for a bygone era, brought low by the Swedish economic crisis of the early '90s. Only the privatization of public services and a ceiling on public spending since those days has kept the Swedish economy afloat. That is, what success Sweden has enjoyed in the past decade has come from the progressive abandonment of the old model. Even now, over half of Sweden's GDP is soaked up by tax revenues. This is the highest tax burden in Europe. It is thus no surprise that robust economic growth is an objective Swedes consistently fail to achieve. Despite empirical evidence, the idea that the Swedish model is obsolete still runs counter to conventional thinking in much of Sweden today and, more broadly, many corners of Europe. But its declining validity in today's competitive world is something Europeans would be wise to heed. If Sweden can learn to see itself through a new lens, it can be competitive well into the future. There might be reason for optimism. Even in Stockholm, voices demanding less regulation and more free enterprise are making themselves heard. The heavy tax burden and the welfare measures it supports is now well-acknowledged as having sapped incentives to work.http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB112137695324786074,00.html?mod=opin ion&ojcontent=otep (subscription required)
- posted by gkissel @ 10:25 AM

 
Matters Terrible, but Monitorial as in tracking the jihadists. Here is a link to jihadwatch.org which has the latest on the London bombings and primarily monitors jihad activity that we should all be aware of.
- posted by gkissel @ 7:05 AM