online archive
5:00PM
MAR 10 2008
Words to be looked at
A new issue of Words Without Borders is out. The introduction to Code Red: An Economist Explains How to Revive the Healthcare System without Destroying It by David Dranove. A review of Liz Kotz’s Words to Be Looked At: Language in 1960s Art. The introduction to Success through Failure: The Paradox of Design by Henry Petroski. The introduction to The Spaces of the Modern City: Imaginaries, Politics, and Everyday Life. More on Physics of the Impossible by Michio Kaku. Form TAP, Ezra Klein on why health insurance doesn't work. A review of Bonnie Bremser’s Troia: Mexican Memoirs. A review of Defending the West: A Critique of Edward Said’s Orientalism by Ibn Warraq and Reading Orientalism: Said and the Unsaid by Daniel Martin Varisco. A review of Bananas: How the United Fruit Company Shaped the World by Peter Chapman (and more). A review of American-Made: The Enduring Legacy of the WPA: When FDR Put the Nation to Work by Nick Taylor. Here's something you probably didn't need confirmed by Paris Hilton: amateur porn is hot. Mack the Quack: Jonathan Cohn on the disaster that is McCain's health policy. From Utne, an article on the politics of poop. The Red and Blue Plate Special: For pols, Harper's finds good eatin' on donors' dimes. From The New Yorker, Janet Malcolm on the wicked joy of the “Gossip Girl” novels.
1:00PM
MAR 10 2008
We can now map everything
With his ballot in his hand: An interview with anthropologist Margaret Dorsey on music, marketing, and Texas politics. We can now map everything — from illness to endangered species. A new issue of Edge is out. Is the mainstream press unbiased? What it really thrives on is conflict. Wanted: Einstein Jr — Something seems wrong with the laws of physics; spacecraft are not behaving in the way that they should. A review of Julio Cortazar and Carol Dunlop’s Autonauts of the Cosmoroute: A Timeless Voyage from Paris to Marseille. A review of Originalism in American Law and Politics: A Constitutional History by Johnathan O'Neill. An excerpt from Inside the Presidential Debates: Their Improbable Past and Promising Future by Newton N. Minow and Craig L. LaMay (and a look at memorable moments from presidential debates). A review of Race, Equality, and the Burdens of History by John Arthur. It takes a long time and a lot of research, but now you know: "Original Sin" has nothing to do with sex. Nick Hornby began the trend of the nobody-turned-somebody autobiography; in a culture of blogs, sex diaries and childhood-abuse memoirs, can Jasper Rees hack it with his narrative about the french horn? The first chapter from Knocking on the Door: The Federal Government's Attempt to Desegregate the Suburbs by Christopher Bonastia.
9:00AM
MAR 10 2008
Coming to terms with the past
From Slate, here's the latest edition of The Fake Memoirist's Survival Guide; and William Saletan on coercion, money, and the rise of reproductive freedom. From The Nation, a cover story on Who Would Jesus Vote For? The new evangelicals are rejecting the religious right and embracing a broader social gospel. Hold the front page: How to replace the editor with a computer ("Uh-oh" —ed.). A review of Joseph Horowitz’s Artists in Exile: How Refugees from Twentieth-Century War and Revolution Transformed the American Performing Arts. Is there an ethics that justifies Blackwater? Michael Walzer investigates. Words Matter: Cliche, not plagiarism, is the problem with today's pallid political discourse. From Prospect, a second Gorbachev? Although he owes his advancement to Vladimir Putin, Dmitri Medvedev may prove a surprisingly liberal president of Russia; but what might Chekhov have made of modern Russia's slide into authoritarianism? When it comes to emotions, Eastern and Western cultures see things very differently. A look at why publishers don't fact-check memoirs. Eric Rauchway on why the Democrats should look to the 1912 Republican primary for a lesson in embracing the people's candidate. Albert Mobilio on the Great Bear pamphlet collection. What does coming to terms with the past mean in the "Berlin Republic" in 2007? Jeffrey Herf investigates.
