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Great American Water Crisis

In the wake of the recent Camden Conference (this year’s topic: “The Global Politics of Food and Water”), Court Haight clipped the attached article from UTNE. I’ve never heard of this organization, but here’s what they say about themselves:

Utne Reader and Utne.com are digests of independent ideas and alternative culture. Not right, not left, but forward thinking. We’re most interested in creating a conversation about everything from the environment to the economy, politics to pop culture.

201402 Great American Water Crisis (UTNE)

As I read the article, it appears to decry the “privatization” of water and asserts that public control and, in addition, ownership is far preferable for this common resource. I’m not convinced (at least as far as ownership is concerned) that this is the case…many other “public goods” are privately owned but subject to a certain amount of regulation.

What do you think?

State of the Union 2014

The suggestion was made at last week’s meeting that we discuss the President’s State of the Union address next Monday (February 3). Hopefully many of you were able to see it live (or delayed).
If you want to study it more closely (and I encourage you to do so, for a better discussion on Monday), here’s a link to the transcript of the speech as drafted. (I noted a few very minor departures in the speech as given–mostly exclamations, repetitions and an extra word here or there—that don’t change the substance of what was (or wasn’t) said.)

State of the Union Address (whitehouse.gov)

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