[Feb 28] From Foreign Affairs, Keir A. Lieber (Notre Dame) and Daryl G. Press (Penn): The Rise of U.S. Nuclear Primacy; Stephen Biddle of the Council of Foreign Realtions on Seeing Baghdad, Thinking Saigon; Amartya Sen reviews William Easterly's The White Man's Burden: Why the West's Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good. A review of Saudi Arabia Exposed: Inside a Kingdom in Crisis and Thicker Than Oil: America's Uneasy Partnership With Saudi Arabia. Peter Bergen on a guide to the hunt for Osama bin Laden. Juan Cole reviews The Far Enemy: Why Jihad Went Global, Knowing the Enemy: Jihadist Ideology and the War on Terror and The Next Attack: The Failure of the War on Terror and a Strategy for Getting It Right. Does masturbation lead to suicide bombing? One would think not. Ian Buruma explains. An interview with Yenny Wahid, an eloquent (and elegant) foe of Muslim fundamentalists. Barry Posen on why we can live with a nuclear Iran. Niall Ferguson on how the civilisations of the modern world are more likely to collapse than collide. Francis Fukuyama on Europe vs. Radical Islam: Alarmist Americans have mostly bad advice for Europeans. From First Things, Benedict XVI on Europe and its discontents; an essay on Will Herberg's Protestant-Catholic-Jew, then and now; a review of The Ways of Judgment; a review of Garry Wills' What Jesus Meant; a review of Life After Death: A History of the Afterlife in the Religions of the West. Rev. Timothy J. Keller preaches the Word and quotes the Voice in the Upper West Side. Obituary: Henry Morris, founder of the Institute for Creation Research. From The New Yorker, who gay is your priest? A memo to help identify and root out truly committed homosexuals. And God is back in fashion among intellectuals. But even spiritual movements today are motivated by Western fundamentalism: the Enlightenment

[Feb 27] Is freedom just another word for many things to buy? That depends on your class status. A review of Better for All the World: The Secret History of Forced Sterilization and America's Quest for Racial Purity. A review of The Baby Business: How Money, Science, and Politics Drive the Commerce of Conception. A review of The Running of the Bulls: Inside the Cutthroat Race from Wharton to Wall Street. A review of Rolling Away the Stone: Mary Baker Eddy's Challenge to Materialism. Gertrude Himmelfarb on welfare and charity: Lessons from Victorian England. A review of Earthly Powers. An excerpt from Benedict XVI’s The Spiritual Roots of Europe: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow. A review of Jim Wallis’ God's Politics. A review of Michael Lerner’s The Left Hand of God. More on Bruce Bartlett’s Impostor. Some experts believe the age of oil is near its end. Others insist that there are trillions of untapped barrels left -- and that the future of oil depends more on what happens above ground than below. From The Toronto Star, black, a divisive unifier: How one word insults dozens of cultures yet still defines a single history. An essay on Betty Friedan’s enduring mystique. The animal rights group Peta was back in the news last week after flour-bombing Paris Hilton during London fashion week: An interview with Ingrid Newkirk. And a review of Something Happened: A Political and Cultural Overview of the Seventies

[Weekend 2e] From Global Agenda, the richest country in the world is living beyond its means, says Joseph Stiglitz. The question is not when, but how hard, the landing will be; In 2005 millions rallied to the war on poverty, but poor countries also have a responsibility to use aid effectively and transparently, says Paul Wolfowitz; we should appeal to altruism rather than self-interest to reach our aid targets, says Jagdish Bhagwati, and be much more imaginative about how we deliver; Noam Chomsky sets out his vision of fair globalization; democracy cannot take root in countries such as Iran unless individuals enjoy freedom of expression, says Shirin Ebadi; the solutions to  the global refugee crisis are simple, says Angelina Jolie, if only we had the will to address it; and there is, perhaps, a 50% chance that humankind will be annihilated this century, says Nick Bostrom

[Weekend] From NPQ, an interview with Francis Fukuyama. A look at how the neoconservative right adopted the worst errors of the left. George Will reviews The Making of The Conservative Mind, National Review and Its Times, and Impostor. For all you rational egoists out there: Introducing The Objective Standard. The practice of using political boundaries to define economic boundaries is troublesome. In fact, the term "American economy" is more misleading than useful. From Foreign Policy, what exactly is soft power and how useful is it in dealing with today’s challenges? Joseph Nye explains. The radical Islamists are on the offensive. Will we defeat them? William Kristol wants to know. An interview with Michael "Faster" Ledeen. Pejman Yousefzadeh is in defense of a powerful Vice Presidency. An article on why JFK and RFK were right to wiretap MLK. A new issue of Clamor is out, including an essay on Blackness and Political Freedom on Hispaniola. What are we to make of the "Parecon" phenomenon? A review of Michael Albert's work, and a response by Albert. A review of Crashing the Gate: Netroots, Grassroots, and the Rise of People-Powered Politics. A look at why left-activist work can be liberating. And the end of the world is coming, and some Orange County Christians can't wait

[Feb 24] Potpourri: From Asia Times, Spengler on the devil's sourdough and the decline of nations. Karl Marx himself saw capitalism in a positive light; in its very progress he saw its demise. A demise precipitated by the anarchistic heart of the network society. William Bennett and Alan Dershowitz on a failure of the press. Unconstitutional constitutionalism: Is the "rule of law" simply the promulgation and enforcement of legislation, regardless of their content and the methods of their enforcement? Catfight at LewRockwell: Paul Craig Roberts on conservatives and the Leader Principle, a response by Viet Dihn and a reply. From The New Yorker, a review of The Happiness Hypothesis and Happiness: A History. An article on the politics of the Weather Underground. From spiked, an article on why it is morally right to use animals to our ends; and conspiracy theories about everything from Iraq to Hurricane Katrina to spiked writers are polluting the mainstream media. From The Economist, a review of books on Wal-Mart. From Monthly Review, Oxford's Arshin Adib-Moghaddam on the Muslim in the Mirror. An interview with journalist Jeffrey Blankfort: "The anti-war movement has failed". George Will on why Liberalism is not conducive to happiness. How Teddy Roosevelt became a cowboy: An excerpt from Rough Rider in the White House: Theodore Roosevelt and the Politics of Desire. More on The Revenge of Gaia. A review of A Question of Torture: CIA Interrogation, From the Cold War to the War on Terror. Stanley Kurtz on Fanatical Swedish Feminists. And a review of Witnessing Their Faith: Religious Influence on Supreme Court Justices and Their Opinions

[Feb 23] From Prospect, Edward Skidelsky on why Leo Strauss, father of neoconservatism, is not the fascist thinker of left-wing caricature. But neither is he a figure with whom democrats can feel comfortable. He believed in virtue rather than liberalism; was the Iraq adventure doomed to fail or did the US administration mess it up? A review of books; a review of Oliver Kamm's Anti-totalitarianism; and an article on the myths of appeasement: Appeasement did not spring from military weakness. 1930s Britain was well armed. Pat Buchanan on Churchill, Hitler, and Newt. Cleveland’s Aryan Barbarian oversees the collapse of a neo-Nazi powerhouse. From Open Democracy, two new books cast light on the diplomatic pressures exerted by the United States and its British ally to win support for the military option in Iraq. An article on neoconservatives as the new hippies. What have airport queues got to do with democracy and citizenship? Everything. From National Review, an interview with Michael and Jana Novak, authors of Washington's God. From the archives of America magazine, an article on the secrets behind the Index of Forbidden Books; a review of Christian Community in History, Volume I: Historical Ecclesiology; a look at the life and work of John Courtney Murray; and was Jesus a techie? Who is St. Maroun, the founder of the Maronite Catholic Church? From Christianity Today, Mark Noll reviews America and the Challenges of Religious Diversity; and Rick Santorum's It Takes a Family is an example of how not to fight the culture wars. An investigation into the private and public finances of Rick Santorum might want to reconsider becoming the ethics czar (and more). An article on purpose-driven spirituality: How deep does Rick Warren go? Ken Ham, who says creationism is the cure for racism, brings his $15-million-a-year crusade to Rocky Mount. And Jesus loves strippers! Lori Albee of JC's Girls Girls Girls wants to help spread the message of God's love to those in the sex industry

[Feb 22] From The Village Voice, an article the birth and life of the '9-11 Truth movement', the basics of alternative 9/11 theories, and a look at what it takes to make a conspiracy theory. Joseph Nye on the right way to think about oil: The problem is not that there is too little oil, but that it is in the wrong place. From TomPaine.com, a reaction to Francis Fukuyama's essay on neoconservatism. Can democracy really be "exported"? What democratic path is possible in the Muslim world? Does U.S. foreign policy encourage democracy in the rest of the world? An interview with James Fallows on getting it right in Iraq. From Salon, "freedmen," blacks whose ancestors were enslaved by Cherokee and other tribes, are suing to become tribal citizens. But the tribes say they are ineligible because they don't have Indian blood. Acting white: One professor studies the fight between identity and achievement. One student copes with it. From Nerve, an article on why it's so hard to get birth control at Planned Parenthood. Tim Harford on the economic case for polygamy. To call sex trafficking "modern slavery" fails to see it as the consequence of the sexualization of culture. From Mother Jones, a series of articles on The Last Days of the Ocean. Greening the Left: Tycoons will pay to generate leftist ideas in voters' minds, but now they want to see results. We bemoan the rise of the McMansion, the slash-and-burn path of the strip mall—but the real problem may be lurking in the shrubbery. A look at where our yards are now. A review of ReadyMade: How to Make (Almost) Everything. And from Transhumanity, an article on the Ubermensch, the Superman and the Posthuman, a look at how Rael continues to hurt the transhumanist cause, and on why and how transhumanists must transcend their nerdy aura

[Feb 21] From TNR, Thomas Nagel reviews Kwame Anthony Appiah's The Ethics of Identity and Cosmopolitanism. From Dissent, Mark R. Beissinger on Promoting Democracy: Is Exporting Revolution a Constructive Strategy?; a symposium on assessing the state of the labor movement; an article on Reducing Inequality: Merit Goods vs. Income Grants; and an essay on Herbert Hoover and Hurricane Katrina. From In These Times, why the left should forget DC: The battle is in the states; and have the marketplace successes of Michael Moore and Robert Greenwald changed the chances for documentary films? An interview with George Soros on  the global movement for an ‘open society’. More on War of Nerves: Chemical Warfare From World War I to Al-Qaeda. More on The Bomb in the Basement. A review of Against Empire: Feminisms, Racism, and the West. A look at why the Romans are important in the debate about gay marriage. Is 'gay Muslim' simply an oxymoron? Forget the virgins: Is there sex in heaven? From B&W, Brian Leiter reviews Leon Wieseltier's review of Daniel Dennett's Breaking the Spell. Edward Rothstein on how Breaking the Spell and how history illuminates the rage of Muslims. A review of Sacred Cow, Mad Cow: A History of Food Fears. And more on Benjamin Friedman's The Moral Consequences of Economic Growth

[Feb 20] Chili and liberty: Amartya Sen on the uses and abuses of multiculturalism. Irving Louis Horowitz on Democracy's Visions and Divisions. An interview with Alfred McCoy, author of A Question of Torture: CIA Interrogation, From the Cold War to the War on Terror. Conventional wisdom says that none of us is safe from terrorism. The truth is that almost all of us are. A review of God's Terrorists: The Wahhabi Cult and the Hidden Roots of Modern Jihad. An article on the rational suicide bomber. A review of While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam Is Destroying the West From Within. A review of The Right to be Wrong: Ending the Culture War Over Religion in America. A review of Michael Lerner's The Left Hand of God: Taking Back Our Country From the Religious Right. A review of The Untied States of America: Polarization, Fracturing and Our Future. An interview with Michael Parenti about his new book, The Culture Struggle. A review of Three's a Crowd: The Dynamic of Third Parties, Ross Perot, and Republican Resurgence. A review of Solidarity for Sale: How Corruption Destroyed the Labor Movement and Undermined America's Promise. An interview with James Garbarino, author of See Jane Hit: Why Girls Are Growing More Violent and What We Can Do About It. A review of Choosing Children: The Ethical Dilemmas of Genetic Intervention. A review of books on satisfaction, sanity and all those feelings in between, and more on Happiness: A History. More on Breaking the Spell. On the Enlightenment's impact on the Mass: an interview with Jonathan Robinson, author of The Mass and Modernity: Walking to Heaven Backward.  James Wood reviews The Five Books of Moses: A Translation with Commentary. An interview with Eric Metaxas, author of Everything You Always Wanted to Know About God (but were afraid to ask). Despite the vast incompleteness of our knowledge, recent research suggests that most people think that they know far more than they actually do. Most of what "everyone knows" about what matrimony used to be and just how it has changed is wrong. How much do you really know about marriage? And the length of a single night's sleep has decreased over the years, but the quality of our sleep has improved significantly

[Weekend 2e] Can a movement turn away from militarism and toward a more durable use of power? Francis Fukuyama on After Neoconservatism. From Behavior and Social Issues, Robin Rumph, Chris Ninness, Glen McCuller, and Sharon K. Ninness (SASU): Twenty Years Later: Commentary on Skinner's "Why We Are Not Acting To Save the World"; and John Nevin (UNH): The Inertia of Affluence pdf. From Zenit, a review of The Battle for the Soul of Capitalism, Capitalism's Achilles Heel, and The Ethics of the Market. "My sin was ripping off people around the world": John M. Perkins, author of Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, taps the fears of Big Business. From 49th Parallel, a review of A Story of America First: The Men and Women Who Opposed US Intervention in World War II,  a review of Pursuing the National Interest: Moments of Transition in Twentieth Century American Foreign Policy, a review of Keeping Us Safe: Secret Intelligence and Homeland Security, and a review of America's Oil Wars. A review of Ecological Ethics, Half Gone, The Revenge of Gaia, and State of the World 2006. A review of books on faith and terror. A look at the work of McGill's Gregory Baum and the new Muslim intellectuals. More on George Packer's The Assassins' Gate and James Risen's State of War. From Radical Middle Newsletter, a review of Somebodies and Nobodies: Overcoming the Abuse of Rank, and an article on the politics of literature 101: Did father know best? Dickens, Joyce, Henry James... they’re enough to put kids off books for life. Why is Julia Kristeva, icon of postmodern theory, writing detective novels? Novelist and essayist William Gass talks about philosophy and fiction, Europe and America, and the value of words in a visual age. Why do English-speaking authors no longer look to continental Europe for inspiration? And the supreme irony of the publishing industry is that it is killing itself with words

[Weekend] From The New York Review of Books, David Cole reviews The Next Attack, a review of Messages to the World: The Statements of Osama bin Laden, and Peter Bergen's The Osama bin Laden I Know: An Oral History of al Qaeda's Leader; a review of L. Paul Bremer's My Year in Iraq: The Struggle to Build a Future of Hope and George Packer's The Assassins' Gate: America in Iraq; and an article on Hamas and the perils of power. A review of The American Era: Power and Strategy for the 21st Century. From Grist, here's the introduction to a seven-week series on the intersection of economic and ecological survival. A review of Capitalism at the Crossroads: The Unlimited Business Opportunities in Solving the World's Most Difficult Problems. All economics is local: A review of Tim Harford's The Undercover Economist. Economist Robert Shiller has a knack for translating economic theories into plain English. He also picked the stock market crash, so how far away is the property meltdown? How we spend our money is changing. In the new 'experience economy' we pay to do things, not have things. From FT, hope to die before you get old? Baby-boomers are taking their own unique approach to mortality. Narcissists are charming, exasperating, captivating and sometimes downright ludicrous. The weird world of the megalomaniac, explained; and you're more than the star and author of your own life story. You're also the spin master. From Alternet, an interview with Cristina Page, author of How the Pro-Choice Movement Saved America: Freedom, Politics, and the War on Sex (and an excerpt). Peter Singer on why there's something inconsistent about moralizing that blocks stem cell research while justifying and downplaying collateral damage. Robert Sirico writes on the passing of Edmund Opitz. From The Weekly Standard, an article on what today's leaders can learn from Andrew Jackson. A new issue of The Occidental Quarterly is out, including the introduction to Sam Francis' Race and the American Prospect, and an interview with Alain de Benoist pdf. And white supremacist gang leader and murder suspect says he was brutalized by jail deputies

[Feb 17] From The Economist, why governments, employers and workers all need to change to keep baby-boomers on the job; more than a notional improvement: State pension systems that mimic private accounts; older workers want to retire later; companies fear they will soon be short of skills. Why can't the two get together?; understanding how the brain ages could help to slow deterioration; and a review of The Baby Business. A review of Fightback! Labour's traditional right in the 1970s and 1980s. From Smithsonian, South Pacific villagers worship a mysterious American they call John Frum - believing he'll one day shower their remote island with riches; when an Amish couple were accused of killing their daughter through abuse, pediatrician D. Holmes Morton went to work; and does a young Egyptian's unhappy stay in a small Colorado town in the 1950s explain why many jihadists hate America today? A review of The Osama Bin Laden I Know: an oral history of al-Qaeda's leader, Messages to the World: the statements of Osama Bin Laden, and Knowing the Enemy: jihadist ideology and the war on terror. Statistically speaking, the terrorist threat to America has always been low. So why are we spending such vast amounts on ineffectual Homeland Security? A review of Peter Singer's The President of Good and Evil: The Ethics of George W. Bush. More on Bruce Bartlett's Impostor. A review of Crunchy Cons: How Birkenstocked Burkeans, gun-loving organic gardeners, evangelical free-range farmers, hip homeschooling mamas, right-wing nature lovers, and their diverse tribe of countercultural conservatives plan to save America (or at least the Republican Party). Let the nativist "vulgar jerk," as Christopher Hitchens rightly pegs Garrison Keillor, go on laughing. Elevated radio jocks are one thing, philosophers something else. From Revolution, Chairman Bob on the U.S. Constitution: An Exploiter's Vision of Freedom. And from Lyndon LaRouche's Executive Intelligence Review, Carl Schmitt set precedent: Leader can change law

[Feb 16] Ronald Dworkin on why even bigots and Holocaust deniers must have their say. Islamic culture has continually transgressed its own taboos. But sustained provocation will put off even the best of wills. From Chronicles, Thomas Fleming and Srdja Trifkovic on the cartoon jihad. Europe’s newspapers have the right to print offensive cartoons? Certainly. Was it a wise thing to do? Probably not. A review of The West Last Chance: Will We Win the Clash of Civilizations? Will we let Jill Carroll be killed? Peter Singer on the morality of dealing with kidnappers. The introduction to Amos Oz's How to Cure a Fanatic. A review of Dangerous Alliances: Proponents of Peace, Weapons of War. The first chapter from The Impact of Human Rights Law on Armed Forces. From AEI, a lecture on a religious idea called "America": How Puritanism created it, what it means, why it matters. An interview with Catholic University's Monsignor Robert Sokolowski on the philosophy behind Deus Caritas Est. From American Daily, think Father Coughlin was a conservative? Think again. Communism isn't an ideology but a religion; like Christianity it has its saints, its scriptures, and its iconography. And yes, Soviet Communism is just getting started. Will Wilkinson on solidarity: More than a feeling. Given the option of harmony without tyranny, why aren’t you an anarchist? From Alternet, an interview with Andrew Gumbel, author of Steal This Vote: Dirty Elections and the Rotten History of Democracy in America (and an excerpt). From PUP, the introduction to The Minds of Marginalized Black Men: Making Sense of Mobility, Opportunity, and Future Life Chances. An interview with Nick Adams, author of Making Friends with Black People. A look at the racial case against the Winter Olympics. Is it time we let athletes take what they like, provided it is safe - and might it even be fairer? Japanese and Americans don't see eye-to-eye on how athletes achieve gold. During the Olympics, the mirror neurons of whole nations will be electrically identical. Why America stopped caring about international sports competitions. An interview with Bernard-Henri Levy on the value of traveling par hasard. An interview with Lawrence Weschler, author of Everything That Rises: A Book of Convergences. And you have $1. How should you spend it to do the most good?