Geneva. Switzerland is not perfect, but as countries go, it is hard to find one that is much better.

The more people know about Switzerland, the higher regard they tend to have for it. By almost any measure of human accomplishment, and particularly in creating a most successful country governance model, the Swiss are clearly No. 1 in the world.

Switzerland is a small, landlocked nation without much in the way of natural resources. It has managed to stay out of wars for two centuries and developed a long-term multilingual and multireligious democracy without strife. There is a rule of law with competent and unbiased judges and strong protections for private property.

Switzerland also ranks higher than average among the OECD countries (the 35 most-developed economies in the world) in levels of education and student test scores, and has lower levels of air and water pollution.

Civil liberties are strongly protected, including freedom of speech, religion, press, assembly and even the right to own guns. It does not get much better than this.

White House spokesman Tony Snow and Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff both were at a meeting I attended this week, attempting to allay fear and anger over the immigration reform bill. 

I have to tell you they were very persuasive.  I am convinced they are both honest, that they are genuinely trying to solve a seemingly intractable problem with good patriotic intentions, that they believe this bill is an unprecedented ("Underline that word three times," said Tony) commitment to secure our southern border, to effect employer enforcement, and replace chain migration with a merit system.

Chertoff and Snow are two decent men arguing from principle and integrity.  Both are smart - Chertoff is very smart.  And both are, with innocent naiveté, being taken to the Destruction of America Cleaners by Teddy Kennedy.

You can't make a deal with the devil.  You'll always get screwed, no matter how many amendments and marvelous provisions you stick into the deal. 

If we could prevent or cure all cancer, what would we die of?

The new year has begun with a war of words over whether cancer is mostly bad luck, as suggested by a new study from Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, and over whether it's a good way to die, compared with the alternatives, as suggested by Dr Richard Smith, a former editor of the British Medical Journal (BMJ).

Cancer is now the leading cause of death in Britain even though it is ever more survivable, with roughly half of people who contract it living long enough to die of something else. But what else? Often another cancer.  Cancer's growing dominance of the mortality tables is not because it's getting worse but because we are avoiding other causes of death and living longer.

It is worth remembering that some scientists and anti-pesticide enviros in the 1960s were convinced that by now lifespans would be much shorter because of cancer caused by pesticides and other chemicals in the environment.

In the 1950s Wilhelm Hueper - a director of the US National Cancer Institute and mentor to Rachel Carson, the environmentalist author of Silent Spring - was so concerned that pesticides were causing cancer that he thought the theory that lung cancer was caused by smoking was a plot by the chemical industry to divert attention from its own culpability: "Cigarette smoking is not a major factor in the causation of lung cancer," he insisted.

In fact it turns out that pollution causes very little cancer and cigarettes cause a lot. But aside from smoking, most cancers are indeed bad luck.

Obviously, the HFR's glass is more than half-full this week with the announcement yesterday (9/25) that the racist scumbag running the Department of Injustice is quitting.

The disgusting tearful hypocrisy of his goodbye to Zero aside, this is an event to be savored.  Here's a sample of the Congressional goodbyes to the most corrupt, criminal, and law-destroying AG our country has ever had the misfortune to endure...

Yet there is more to celebrate than his resignation - it's the timing.  There's lots of speculation on why he chose this moment, but the bottom line is he announced it a scant 40 days before the election...

Let's squelch the latest nightmare rumor on Holder - that Zero plans to nominate him for the next Supreme Court vacancy.  There's as much chance of that as Hillary being able to fly to the moon on her broomstick...

We're taking a break here for an important public service announcement.  The headlines regarding the Ebola epidemic in West Africa are becoming ever more dire.  That of Forbes yesterday (9/25) was: "Ebola - It's Far, Far Worse Than You Thought."

TTPers asked our Forum's resident genius, Skye, what could be done.  Here is his response.  Our suggestion is that you copy and paste it into an email sent to your Congressman, Senator, and any friend who is a health professional.  Who knows how many lives you could save by doing so...

How many times have you been subjected to flashing website ads blaring about the "coming collapse of the dollar"?  Two of the best conservative economic minds put the kibosh on this blather Saturday...

On Wednesday (9/24), Zero gave a speech at the UN.  The link is to the full text.  It was roundly ridiculed and denounced by many conservative pundits.  But believe it or not, there was a lot in it that is praiseworthy...

We close with a tribute to one of the world's most admirable women...

Jersey, Channel Islands.  Americans know of the state of New Jersey, but few know that it was named after the island of Jersey, which is located in the English Channel about 14 miles off the coast of France.

This small island, about two-thirds the size of Washington, D.C. with only 100,000 people, is today home to one of the world's largest financial centers.

Jersey has a higher per-capita income than America, and roughly twice the per-capita income of Britain and France. The globe is dotted with relatively small, prosperous places that have become rich without the benefit of natural resources.

What have they -- Jersey and the island next door, Guernsey, along with Bermuda, Cayman, Singapore, Hong Kong, and even larger places like Switzerland --  done right, leaving many of their larger and more richly endowed neighbors plodding along in their economic dust?