online archive
9:00AM
MAR 26 2008
The latest diagnostic fad
From Prospect, a cover story on a liberal Israel lobby; it is conventional wisdom that there were no WMD in Iraq, and yet there remains a dissenting minority who don't accept this; the "state of the nation" novel is back in fashion, but many of these books focus too closely on "authentic" period detail at the expense of convincing characters and stories; memoirs by high-class hookers may be cartoonish, but no less so than accounts that cast prostitutes as victims of rapacious male sexuality; and is trading antidepressant drugs for mood stabilisers a sign of progress, or just the latest diagnostic fad? From The New York Times Magazine, a special issue on redrawing the art world. Sex, truth and Vidia: An excerpt from Patrick French's biography of VS Naipaul. Brother, can you spare me a planet? An article on mainstream economics and the environmental crisis. Where angels no longer fear to tread: Science and religion have often been at loggerheads; now the former has decided to resolve the problem by trying to explain the existence of the latter. From The Nation, a special issue on The New Deal at 75; and a review of The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression by Amity Shlaes. A review of Upstream: The Ascendance of American Conservatism by Alfred S. Regnery (and more). A review of Making Poor Nations Rich: Entrepreneurship and the Process of Economic Development.
