Citizen Cartwright

Fiscal cliff talks: Just stalled on the surface?

While major media are reporting on Republicans' rejection of the latest White House offer as a step backward, Politico says the outlines of a deal are starting to take shape behind the scenes.

"There is no chance taxes are not going up for people making north of $250,000 — and virtually no chance that doesn’t include their tax rates, too," Politico says.

Expect a cut in entitlements at or above $400 billion, most or all of it from Medicare, says Politico. The savings will come through means testing, raising the retirement age and "efficiencies" to be named later.

"Democrats want most Medicare and other entitlement savings to kick in between 10 and 20 years from now, which will make some Republicans choke," says Politico.

Perspective on the taxes we pay

Most Americans paid much less in total federal, state and local taxes in 2010 than they would have paid in 1980, when adjusting for inflation, according to an analysis by The New York Times.

High-income households saved the most, lower-income households the least, the Times says.

What the drop in the birthrate means

The U.S. birthrate fell last year to the lowest level since 1920, and the drop was biggest among immigrant women hit hard by the recession, according to a Pew Research Center study released Thursday.

It had been assumed that births to immigrants would help maintain the U.S. population and create the taxpaying workforce needed to support the aging baby-boom generation, says The Washington Post.

Should we colonize Mercury?

It can be 800 degrees Fahrenheit at noon on the equator of the planet closest to the Sun, so scientists are surprised that NASA's Messenger spacecraft has found as much as a trillion tons of ice at the planet's poles.

But in The New York Times article on the findings, I most enjoyed the "what can Mercury do for us" sentiment.

It turns out that between the roasting equator and frozen poles, there's a temperate area, especially a few feet below the surface where the soil insulates against temperature swings.

That's an "ideal location to build a colony," says the Times.

Also in the news

U.N. General Assembly, in blow to U.S., elevates status of Palestine

Islamist-led Egyptian assembly adopts controversial draft constitution

Al Qaeda battle in Afghanistan to last for years, Panetta says

Clinton lays out plan for achieving worldwide AIDS-free generation

Accelerating melt of polar ice sheets contributes to nearly half-inch sea level rise

Qatar poet gets life in prison for 'insulting' emir

Revolving door seen spinning as usual as departing lawmakers head for lobbying firms

Drug, alcohol abuse linked to strokes in younger adults

CEOs meeting with Obama agree on tax hike

The more than a dozen business chiefs from companies such as Yahoo, Comcast, Marriott, Goldman-Sachs and Deloitte met Wednesday at the White House with President Obama to discuss solutions to avoid the "fiscal cliff."

"There needs to be some revenue element to this, and (Obama) started with rates. And he started with rates on what we would define (as) the upper two percent. ... That we have to pay our fair share. And I think everybody was in agreement with that notion," said Deloitte CEO Joe Echevarria.

House speaker on Cole's tax idea: Nope

John Boehner, R-Ohio, has shot down the proposal from senior Republican Rep. Tom Cole of Oklahoma that Congress should vote to extend middle class tax cuts and fight later about tax rates on the wealthy, media are reporting.

Simpson and Bowles: Only one-third chance of avoiding fiscal cliff

And plunging over the cliff would be "devastating to the economy," says Erskine Bowles, who co-chaired the bipartisan Simpson-Bowles debt commission.

There's another one-third chance that "we'll go over the cliff and people will come to their senses in the first week or so," Bowles says. A third possibility, that a deal takes even longer, "will lead to chaos" he says.

The stock market hasn't factored in the possibility that the country will go over the fiscal cliff, says Bowles. "They don't think we're stupid enough to do that."

Bowles says that if it happens, the stock market will crash.

To contemplate going over the cliff is "like betting the country," says Alan Simpson. "Anyone with that attitude — party above America — is missing the boat."

In New York City, a day without violent crime

Nobody was reported shot or stabbed in the city on Monday, the New York Daily News reported.

The story was was picked up by media worldwide; I first saw it on the BBC News website.

New York is on pace to finish the year with just over 400 murders, down from a record 2,245 in 1990.

Back then, "There were shootings galore,'' says Tom Reppetto, a New York Police Department historian. "We lived in a town where people were afraid to come out of their houses, where babies slept in bathtubs to avoid getting shot, where nursery schools ran drills — 'When you hear the shots, drop down.'"

Typical mother's note to my college-student daughter who lives in Manhattan: Crime IS up three percent overall this year, mainly because of a 9 percent surge in grand larcenies that police attribute to thefts of smart phones and tablets.

Also in the news

U.S. considers bolder intervention in Syrian conflict

U.S., Israel seek to limit impact of U.N. vote on Palestinian Authority

Argentina wins debt reprieve, averts default for now

Lots of talk about Hurricane Sandy at U.N. climate conference

EPA bans BP from new government contracts in wake of Gulf spill

In the Senate, resistance to method for curbing the filibuster

Arizona says it won't set up state-based health insurance exchange

Simple measures cutting infections caught in hospitals

Online calculator can predict child obesity risk at birth

Climbers' litter from Mt. Everest being turned into art