Matt Taibbi. The World Economy. Politics. Deep Politics Forum. Society and Government. US Goverment. Investigative journalism links... Watching the Government. Bill Clinton and How to Use Convening Power - Rosabeth Moss Kanter. By Rosabeth Moss Kanter | 10:10 AM September 19, 2011 The best CEOs do it. Effective entrepreneurs do it.
Middle managers who become change agents do it. Individuals with passion do it. Weak leaders are too timid to do it. On September 20-22 former President Bill Clinton is doing it. Hold those scurrilous thoughts. The Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) models the use of a widely-accessible but still-underutilized power in any sector or company: convening power. CGI has a big goal — to get traction on significant global problems, including jobs and the economy, resource consumption and climate change, education and the empowerment of women and girls. When President Clinton’s foundation was formed, the first thought was to run its own projects.
On a small scale, that’s what meet-ups do. Nearly anyone can convene. Think big. In previous blogs, I’ve written about campaigns for change. The best leaders convene conversations. How Bad Economies Recover Fast When Governments Get Out Of The Way. How Media Frames Structure Our Political Perceptions | Age of Engagement.
--Guest post by Meng Shi, American University graduate student with contributions from Matthew Nisbet. Framing is a frequently used term that derives from several decades of research in the social sciences. As applied to politics, frames explain why an issue matters, who or what might be responsible for a problem, and what should be done. In this manner, frames offer both a diagnosis and a prescription to a complex problem or event (Nisbet, 2009; Scheufele 1999). A leading example of how framing applies to foreign policy events was identified by political communication scholar Robert Entman (1992).
According to Entman’s analysis, despite the similarity of the two events, the Korean airliner shoot down was portrayed as an intentional and deliberate attack by the Soviets. In contrast, even given similar circumstances and uncertainty, the U.S. shoot down of the Iranian airliner was framed by the U.S. media as an unfortunate mistake and tragedy and given far less news attention. References: Joseph Stiglitz: 'The American Dream Has Become A Myth' Rising from rags to riches isn't the American dream, it's an American fairytale, according to Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz. "The American dream has become a myth," Stiglitz, an economics professor at Columbia University, told the German news magazine Der Spiegel in an interview published Tuesday.
"The belief in the American dream is not supported by the data. " There's evidence to support such claims. The U.S. has less economic mobility than Canada and much of Western Europe, according to economic research cited by The New York Times. While the data may not be there to back the idea of the American dream, there are some that still consider it to be pretty important. Stiglitz told Der Spiegel that in spite of anecdotes about poor people becoming rich, overall "the life chances of a young U.S. citizen are more dependent on the income and education of his parents than in any other advanced industrial country for which there is data. " (Hat tip: Mark Thoma.)
Also on HuffPost: An open letter to the Presidential candidates. InShare3 Dear President Obama and Governor Romney, I’ve cut short my watching of your debate and I probably will not watch the remaining two. While our country is more polarized than perhaps it has been since the Civil War, I find that my disillusionment with both of you is equal. When you talk about classes in the United States, you talk about those poor people who make $250,000 or under and then people who have done “very well for themselves” like you both have. I do not see that you understand what happens at wage levels below $250,000. You both talk about the creation of jobs but you do not acknowledge that the times have changed. You both toss about the term “pre-existing condition” as if it was just words.
Gentlemen, I am not yet 35 years old. You equate Donald Trump to a small business. Your words may be pretty, your faces may be splattered with smug smiles, and you might enjoy, Mr. A leader must understand, in my opinion, the people he or she is leading. Presidential Debate Aftermath: Mitt Romney Wins All-Important BS Contest | Matt Taibbi.