The great thing about partisanship is you don't have to spend time understanding the issues to know what side you're on. - Ian Bremmer

The great thing about the U.S. economy right now is that we are the smart kids in the stupid-kid class. America has fiscal problems and gridlock issues and polarity and partisanship in Congress -- and yet, compared to Japan and Europe, the U.S. looks great.

Money talks: financing the periphery buys Berlin a leading role recasting the eurozone governance framework. The recent ‘six pack’ of legislative reforms hints at what’s to come: institutionalized fiscal discipline and an excessive imbalances procedure that protects against future moral hazard. The whole eurozone will tilt toward the German surplus model as we get more fiscal integration and more German leverage.

Authoritarian governments are now trying to ensure that the increasingly free flow of ideas and information through cyberspace fuels their economies without threatening their political power.