It is obvious to me that the Irish-British model is the way of the future, and the only question is when Germany and France will face reality: either they become Ireland or they become museums:

-Thomas Friedman, in 2005

Here is a staggering fact: right now, as I write this, every single citizen of the Republic of Ireland owes foreign creditors over $535,000.00.

How did this happen in a nation that free marketers from the CATO instutute to Thomas Friedman were just recently holding up as a model of 21st century economic development, and whose laissez faire policies were held in stark and favorable contrast with the Social Democratic welfare states of Germany and France?

Hery Farrell at Crookerd Timber thinks he knows: the genesis of the Irish economic catastrophe lies in the country’s corporate tax rate. More speficially, Farrell finds fault in Ireland’s low corporate tax rates: Read more »

“Sarah Palin lost almost half of her premiere audience in the second airing of her TLC reality series Sarah Palin’s Alaska. On Sunday, the series executive produced by Mark Burnett, drew 3 million viewers. That is down 40% from the 5 million who tuned in for the debut last Sunday… Meanwhile, AMC’s zombie drama The Walking Dead (4.8 million), continued to hold steady, down 5% from the previous week in total viewers.” [Deadline.com]

“The South Korean military went to ‘crisis status’ on Tuesday and threatened military strikes after the North fired dozens of shells at a South Korean island, killing two of the South’s soldiers and setting off an exchange of fire in one of the most serious clashes between the two sides in decades.” [NYT]

Larry King gets to the bottom of The Great Fetus Jar Mystery:

KING: You also disclose, Barbara — George discloses something very personal about you, which he says you gave him special permission to write about. He wrote that when you once had a miscarriage, you showed him the fetus in the jar.

BARBARA BUSH: No, really, the truth is…

KING: We touched on it before. But we didn’t elaborate.

BARBARA BUSH: I didn’t put it in the jar.

KING: What?

Read more »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPw0UGZwTvk

We spent Monday evening dwelling on what to do about the new Senator from Utah — besides six years of unsatisfying oblique references — but we’re not quite sure yet about our Course of Devious Action. Instead, to buy some time, we bring you The Most Awesome Mike Lee in the World.

A Hard Line on Debt: Tea Party Sen Says “No Way” [ABC]

Everybody’s getting a chuckle today out of this frame from a cartoon sitcom that peaked about fifteen years ago. But honestly, you can’t top the original.

This would be a lot more amusing to civilians if The Management didn’t insist on maintaining Plausible Deniability.

[Weigel]