NOT SO OPEN ANYMORE: America’s standing as a land of new opportunities and new vistas is being pummeled by data showing that mobility is declining. (courtesy photo/used under Creative Commons license)
*America, we hardly knew ye. Once we were considered a land of mobility – both by economic class and geography.
The facts have gotten in the way. Research shows that America isn’t really economically mobile. You tend to say in the economic slice you were born in.
And, in recent years, we have lost our wanderlust, too. Physical mobility is down and the debate goes on over why.
*A new study says that the jobless rate for African Americans is higher in Michigan than in any other state with a significant African-American population.
*In a democracy – or even a democratic republic such as ours – the true source of any problem always will be the voters.
*Slate’s Dave Weigel zeroes in on the primary problem with the critics of Michigan’s emergency manager regime: If not this, what, oh outraged voters?
“Detroit’s previous elected mayor, Kwame Kilpatrick, won two terms on low turnout, then went to jail on a total of 26 felony counts. The city council president elevated by his resignation, Monica Conyers, went to jail, too. And the problem runs deeper than that, with a total lack of faith in city services. (Watch some of Charlie LeDuff’s dispatches from the city about the length of time it takes to get cops to show up after a 911 call.)”
*Another one of these philosophical conundrums: A river project in Grand Rapids is gaining a federal designation that will lead to federal help and probably federal money.
Reason for celebration or chagrin? Should the federal government be worried about the appearance of the Grand River in Grand Rapids? Why should it not be?
*A map! At a high point of the Cold War, this document showed where citizens of the Soviet Union were not allowed to travel in the United States. A good part of my home state – Oklahoma – was a no-go zone. I’m not sure why, though. The shaded area doesn’t appear to cover Vance or Tinker Air Force Bases. Most of the covered area would have been small towns and farmland, then.
Soviet citizens weren’t going to enjoy Michigan’s sunrise coast, either, but a journey along the Lake Michigan shore was just fine. (Presumably because of shipping lanes.)
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