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Robert de Neufville
Contributor, Big Think
I lecture and write about politics and philosophy. I hold degrees in politics from Harvard and Berkeley, and have studied complex systems at the Santa Fe Institute. Other interests include theoretical physics, cognitive science, evolutionary biology, and the game of Go. You can find me on Twitter at @rdeneufville.
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In December, The New Republic put together an amusing collection of quotations from conservatives predicting that different social programs would mean the end of the American way of life. There’s […]
On Thursday, Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) placed a “blanket hold” on all of President Obama’s nominees, effectively preventing the Senate from voting on any of them. In a statement, Shelby’s […]
President Obama’s poll numbers slipped dramatically over his first year in office. Since last February, the percent of Americans who say they approve of his performance has fallen twenty points. […]
President Obama won office in part on the strength of his promise to be a “post-partisan” president. But Obama’s attempts to reach out to the other party—as admirable as they […]
The conventional wisdom is that Republican Scott Brown’s upset victory in the special election to fill Ted Kennedy’s vacant Senate seat was a referendum on health care reform. In a […]
Over the course of 2009, the Dow Jones industrial index grew a healthy 17%. The Nasdaq grew a remarkable 41%. Over the same period the average compensation—the total cost of […]
In politics, people usually see what they want to see. The truth is, President Obama would probably be attacked by the Right for reading a list of Republican talking points. […]
Ben Bernanke will probably be confirmed to a second term as Chairman of the Federal Reserve in the next few days. But opposition to his nomination has emerged on both […]
Last weekend, a group calling itself the All-American Basketball Alliance announced plans to form a professional whites-only basketball league. According to a statement—released for some reason just before Martin Luther […]
With his election to the Senate in a staunchly Democratic state, Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) has quickly become the Republican Party’s presumptive new savior. Even though he is just assuming […]
After Martha Coakley called Scott Brown to concede the special election to fill Ted Kennedy’s old seat in the Senate, a friend of mine confidently predicted that not only would […]
“The worst debacle in American political history.” That’s what a senior Democratic Party official called the Democrat Martha Coakley’s performance in the Massachusetts special election to fill deceased Sen. Ted […]
“Being first sucks.” That’s what Amanda Simpson, one of the country’s first two openly transgender presidential appointees, told ABC News. “I’d rather not be the first, but someone has to […]
Let’s get this straight up front: President Obama has had a remarkable first year in office. He came into office with two wars and a serious financial crisis to deal […]
You have probably been annoyed by how expensive and frustrating it can be to get health care. But you may also, like many people, assume that’s the way health care […]
During the presidential campaign in 2008, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) reportedly said in private that he believed that the country was ready to elect a black man who, […]
As I wrote yesterday, with the unemployment rate at 10% and the economy still hemorrhaging jobs, the Democrats are in trouble. Now more than ever they need to field their […]
Unemployment is a peculiar feature of the division of labor. In a society where people are able to completely provide for themselves by hunting or growing their own food, barring […]
Yesterday I wrote that Sen. Chris Dodd’s (D-CT) retirement may actually improve the Democrats’ chance of retaining his seat in the fall. Indeed, as Greg Sargent reports, an early poll […]
With unemployment hovering around 10%, it looks likely the Democrats could lose a substantial number of seats in the 2010 midterms. In fact, the economic climate already seems to have […]