From Rolling Stone, Nir Rosen on the myth of the surge: Hoping to turn enemies into allies, U.S. forces are arming Iraqis who fought with the insurgents, but it's already starting to backfire. The Physics of the Familiar: How paint dries, the way flags flutter, how Nature discovered origami, and other marvels of the physical world. The real reason we are singing Barack's praises? He likes cool music. Only a revolution will do: Taki's Top Drawer hosts a symposium on the Ron Paul movement. From The Atlantic, when postwar modernism went west, it dropped the angst—and transformed a culture. Prices are going up for contemporary art, but will these works still be so fashionable—and saleable—in 25 years? From Wired, free! A look at why $0.00 is the future of business. Dani Rodrik and Arvind Subramanian on why we must curb international flows of capital. Taking beauty personally: A beauty salon for veiled women has provoked the wrath of secularist Egyptians. The Forensic Humanitarian: How a statistical sleight of hand can expose war crimes. A review of Global Pharmaceuticals: Ethics, Markets, Practices by Adriana Petryna, Andrew Lakoff and Arthur Kleinman. A review of Suckers: How Alternative Medicine Makes Fools of Us All by Rose Shapiro. Where Kant meets Kareem: A review of Basketball and Philosophy: Thinking Outside the Paint.

Moral thinking: Biology invades a field philosophers thought was safely theirs. Are liberals and conservatives different species? The answer is yes. From TNR, Michael Tomasky reviews Liberal Fascism by Jonah Goldberg; and more on They Knew They Were Right by Jacob Heilbrunn.  Anyone trying to impress, to sell or to obfuscate is likely to brutalise the language: Language should evolve, but its lazy use leads to meaninglessness. The introduction to Religion in American Politics: A Short History by Frank Lambert. The introduction to The Rise of the Conservative Legal Movement: The Battle for Control of the Law by Steven M. Teles. The Virginia School: Move over Austria and Chicago — George Mason University makes economics interesting. There are magazines that mirror the cultural environment and those that open up new channels of expression – "canonizing" and "talking" magazines respectively. A look at the world’s biggest construction projects. From Foreign Policy, an article on how to start your own country in four easy steps. Seyla Benhabib on Turkey’s headscarf legislation: One step backwards or two steps forward? An article on celebrating Alex Steinweiss, the father of the album cover. SMU will be site not only of a Bush Presidential Library, but of institute that will not be governed by standard academic rules and that many fear will put a partisan taint on scholarship. Obituary: William F. Buckley (and go over to National Review's "The Corner" for more).

From Dissent, a review of A Guest in My Own Country: A Hungarian Life and The City Builder by George Konrad; and on the Turin Book Fair controversy: An interview with Mitchell Cohen. From First Things, Robert George on law and moral purpose; an article on Justice Kennedy; and a review of Law as a Means to an End: Threat to the Rule of Law by Brian Z. Tamanaha. From CT, a review of Reasons to Believe: One Man's Journey Among the Evangelicals and the Faith He Left Behind by John Mark (and more on Frank Schaeffer). A review of Levelling the Playing Field: The Idea of Equal Opportunity and Its Place in Egalitarian Thought by Andrew Mason. What are the great scientific challenges of the century? Scientists are writing the Book of All Species on the Web, in the hopes it will be useful to scientists and nonscientists alike. From Edge, Nicholas A. Christakis on why social networks are like the eye. The Flip Side of Internet Fame: In the age of Google and YouTube, public shaming can turn anybody into a celebrity—or a fool. How dissent is sustained in the face of consumerism and co-optation in Bloomington, Indiana, a quintessential midwestern college town. Here's an analysis of Obama's stump speech — even white supremacists don't hate Obama. Why are people having fewer kids? Perhaps it's because they don't like them very much.