Mixed bag on politics

In Denmark where I'm from, you earn less when you work in the public sector, but it's true that you have the best pension deals, typically around 8 weeks of vacation and good parental leave and sabbath deals. Nonetheless most Danes still aim for a job in the private sector because the salaries are much higher and there's the possibility to get stocks/bonuses/stock options while all still have minimum 6 weeks of vacation. Women more often than men choose to work in the public sector because of the parental leave deal, the possibility for flexible work hours and there's a smaller risk of over time work so it's easier to pick up the children after school or daycare.

I don't know if Americans in the public sector earns more than people in an equivalent job in the private sector, but I'd be surprised if it was so.

As I understood based on the FRONTLINE tv documentaries and articles on the housing implosion it was not laws or the government that forced banks to make bad loans and rub them off to others that thought they were buying secure loan packages. But the lack of laws to prevent the banks from doing it. As far as I remember these preventive laws were made in the aftermath of the 1929 depression and removed by President Clinton in the happy 1990s. Economists were repeatedly warning that it was a problem that the law that demanded banks to have a certain amount of money saved up as a buffer, was gone. But no one i power seemed to listen.

As for retirement age, I think it's the same problem all over the developed world: The elderly burden is rising because the young/elder balance is tipping = fewer people in the working age to generate money to take care of the retired => retirement age rise, private saving is encouraged/rewarded by the government if not outright enforced. I don't necessarily think Boehner's idea on this issue is a bad idea. But there has to be a possibility for early retirement for people of weak health that are unable to work until they're 70. I expect to work till I'm 70, and that's what I want - if I stay healthy. And I'm gonna do all I can to stay healthy. In Europe people are saying that the 30s are the new 20's and the 80s are the new 70s and so on. People in their 80s being so healthy that they lead quite active lives, traveling, doing sports, having an active sexual life etc. That's what I hope will be the case for the majority of people in the world in a few decades.

As for the oil spill, I, too, like JK, have seen other oil companies presenting themselves as "green" companies, especially Shell

See the full debate here