Facts & Arts

Articles

Greece Must Exit

by Nouriel Roubini Added 17.05.2012

The Greek euro tragedy is reaching its final act: it is clear that either this year or next, Greece is highly likely to default on its debt and exit the eurozone. Postponing the exit after the June election with a new government committed to a...

Netanyahu Creates a Big New Government to Do Nothing but Survive

by James J. Zogby Added 15.05.2012

Benjamin Netanyahu, ever the master maneuverer, has done it again. Just moments before the Israeli Parliament was to ratify the call for new elections, the Kadima Party announced that it had completed negotiations with the Prime Minister and...

Is Europe on a Cross of Gold?

by Barry Eichengreen Added 13.05.2012

ROME – Increasingly, one hears predictions that the euro will go the way of the gold standard in the 1930’s. And, increasingly, the reasoning behind such forecasts seems persuasive. But does that mean that the euro doomsayers are right?...

NYPD Surveillance Revisited

by James J. Zogby Added 08.05.2012

When a senior White House national security official traveled to New York City recently to praise that city's police department, he stoked the embers of a controversy between the Administration and the Arab American and American Muslim...

Romneynomics

by Mike Lux Added 08.05.2012

It's great news for us Democrats that former Romney partner in Bain Capital -- Edward Conard -- is out with a new book on economics, Unintended Consequences: Why Everything You've Been Told About the Economy is Wrong. My first guess when hearing...

If He Were President, the Far Right Would Lead Romney Around by a Ring in His Nose

by Robert Creamer Added 07.05.2012

Believe that, as President, Mitt Romney would revert to his days as a “Massachusetts Moderate?” Think again. Every bit of evidence indicates that if he were President, the Far Right would lead Romney around by a ring in his nose. Just...

After Austerity

by Joseph E. Stiglitz Added 07.05.2012

"....there is no example of a large economy recovering as a result of austerity....But that is what Europe is doing. Indeed, its leaders’ willful ignorance of the lessons of the past is criminal."

Chinese Shadows

by Ian Buruma Added 07.05.2012

"These are interesting times in China. A senior Communist Party official, Bo Xilai, is brought down – accused of offenses that include wire-tapping other party bosses, including President Hu Jintao – while his wife is investigated for her...

What We Owe Egypt

by Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson Added 03.05.2012

"The protesters in Tahrir Square perceived the cause of Egypt’s poverty in its non-responsive, repressive political system, its corrupt government, and the general lack of equality of opportunity in every sphere of their lives. They saw their...

Israel’s Continued Independence Rests On Palestinian Independence

by Alon Ben-Meir Added 02.05.2012

As Israel recently observed sixty-four years of independence, it is critical that Israelis reflect on the path they have taken and ask if the current one is sustainable in the long-term. Much has been achieved since the nation’s founding and the...

Ideas over Interests

by Dani Rodrik Added 27.04.2012

John Maynard Keynes once famously said that “even the most practical man of affairs is usually in the thrall of the ideas of some long-dead economist.” He probably didn’t put it nearly strongly enough. The ideas that have produced, for example,...

A Crisis in Full Flight

by Hans-Werner Sinn Added 26.04.2012

"For a while, it looked as if the European Central Bank’s €1 trillion credit program to pump liquidity into Europe’s banking system had calmed global financial markets"..........."Already German, Dutch, and Finnish savings amounting to €15,000,...

Cancer by the Numbers

by John Allen Paulos Added 25.04.2012

"The Dartmouth researchers found that, of the estimated 138,000 breast cancers detected annually in the US, the [cancer screening] test did not help 120,000-134,000 of the afflicted women. The cancers either were growing so slowly that they did...

Welcome to Israel seasonal political charade

by Alon Ben-Meir Added 20.04.2012

With the victory of Shaul Mofaz in the leadership contest of the Kadima party, the fractious nature of Israeli politics once again haunts what remains of Israel’s peace camp. Mofaz is by no means a perfect candidate but he at least came up with...

Should America Be Involved in Democracy Promotion in the Arab World?

by James J. Zogby Added 20.04.2012

For the past three decades, democracy promotion has been a staple, though oftentimes understated arm, of overall US foreign policy. President Jimmy Carter advocated this agenda. Ronald Reagan advanced it as a weapon in the Cold War. And...

The Paranoid Style in Chinese Politics

by Minxin Pei Added 18.04.2012

While in power, Bo was lauded for crushing organized crime and restoring law and order in Chongqing. Now it has come to light that he and his henchmen illegally detained, tortured, and imprisoned many innocent businessmen during this campaign,...

The Politics of Palestine

by James J. Zogby Added 13.04.2012

It may still be possible to imagine a just political resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But, in the real world, politics is not the work of our imagination. Rather it is about power, those who have it and how they use it. Politics,...

Christianity’s Via Dolorosa

by Fiorello Provera Added 07.04.2012

In almost every part of the world, reports emerge on a daily basis of Christian communities falling victim to harassment and persecution....the Middle East remains the most dangerous place for Christians to live....But the world’s top offender...

Golden Rules for the Eurozone

by Harold James Added 04.04.2012

"The new collateral requirements, together with tentative talk of autonomous interest rates, represents a remarkable incipient innovation. In the aftermath of the crisis, some policymakers are beginning to see that a monetary union is not...

Don’t Follow America on Health Care

by Prabhat Jha Added 30.03.2012

"The US is one of the few high-income countries that does not finance health care through a publicly funded prepaid system. On average, wealthier countries spend roughly 11% of their GDP on health.......The US spends 1% of its GDP annually...

Overturning ObamaCare Would Make Roberts Court Most Activist, Partisan in Modern History

by Robert Creamer Added 28.03.2012

Time was, not long ago, when the right wing railed against the overreach of unelected judges with lifetime appointments who tried to usurp the power of Congress and impose their own vision of society. That was before the Roberts Court. In...

Syrian Kurds: Time to Assert their Rights

by Alon Ben-Meir Added 27.03.2012

Regardless of what may come out of Kofi Annan’s peace plan to end the internal conflict in Syria, and whatever may emerge from the Arab League meeting this week in Baghdad, the prospect of Assad’s fall offers the Kurdish minority in Syria a...

Arab Peace Initiative: 10 Years Later

by James J. Zogby Added 27.03.2012

It has been 10 years since the Arab League endorsed the Arab Peace Initiative (API), in which the leaders of the Arab World asserted that they would recognize and normalize relations with Israel if Israel were to withdraw from the territories...

The Problem With U.S. Inequality

by Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson Added 23.03.2012

Occupy Wall Street (OWS) brought the increased inequality in the U.S. to the headlines, where it deserves to be. Almost a quarter of total U.S. national income now accrues to the richest 1 percent of the population, a figure that was barely...

Ineptitude Coupled with Moral Bankruptcy

by Alon Ben-Meir Added 23.03.2012

A little more than a week ago, a heart-wrenching photo by Rodrigo Abd appeared in the front pages of the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. The horror on the face of this young Syrian boy named Ahmed encapsulates...

Will China Rule the World?

by Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson Added 23.03.2012

This fall China will have a new leader, widely expected to be Xi Jinping, the country's vice president, who recently met President Obama in Washington. Doubtless every move of a Xi regime would be closely watched: Will China carry on buying the...

Scary Oil

by Nouriel Roubini Added 22.03.2012

"Today’s fragile global economy faces many risks: the risk of another flare-up of the eurozone crisis; the risk of a worse-than-expected slowdown in China; and the risk that economic recovery in the United States will fizzle (yet again). But no...

The Euro’s Imagined Community

by Robert J. Shiller Added 21.03.2012

"[A] currency works as a constant, if latent, reminder of identity. In using it, one has the psychological experience of participating with others in a common venture, and thus developing a sense of trust in both the endeavor and one’s...

Jesus vs. the Christians

by Michael Lux Added 14.03.2012

A lot of people have asked me how it is that so many Republicans claim to follow Jesus in spite of apparently not following his actual teachings at all. How is it that they say they are Christians yet seem to believe the exact opposite of what...

Why the Long Primary Slog is so much Worse for GOP in 2012 than for Democrats in 2008

by Robert Creamer Added 13.03.2012

As the Republican primary season soldiers on, you periodically hear pundits argue that in the end it will “strengthen” Mitt Romney – or whomever the ultimate winner turns out to be. That, they say, was what happened in 2008 and that is what...

Stopping Syria’s Descent into Hell

by James J. Zogby Added 13.03.2012

Syria continues its long, slow descent into hell, with violence and tragedy showing no let up. By now, one year into this horror, it has become clear that neither side can win an easy victory, reaffirming the adage that there can be "no victor...

Egypt Can Rise to the Historical Occasion but It Must Choose Wisely

by Alon Ben-Meir Added 13.03.2012

A few days after the Egyptian uprising, I argued that the Arab Spring could well turn into a long and cruel winter due to a host of prominent factors including: the lack of traditional liberalism, the elites’ control of business, a military that...

JFK and the So-Called Religious Issue

by Steve Shaw Added 07.03.2012

John F. Kennedy is and remains our only Chief Executive who was Roman Catholic. And it still seems no small wonder that he got elected at all. As his speechwriter and close aide, the late Ted Sorensen once said, "The single biggest obstacle to...

Our Kind of Truth

by Ian Buruma Added 07.03.2012

"The point is not whether Santorum is right or wrong factually. What he says 'feels' right to his followers, because it conforms to their prejudices. And the Internet, having swamped the quality press, feeds and reinforces those prejudices,...

Why Rising Gas Prices Could Backfire on the GOP in November

by Robert Creamer Added 06.03.2012

Eight months before the fall elections, Republican strategists are in a dour mood. · The economy has begun to gain traction. · Their leading candidate for President, Mitt Romney, is universally viewed as an uninspiring poster child...

When Technophobia Becomes Toxic

by Henry I. Miller Added 01.03.2012

Given the health benefits – to say nothing of the often higher and more reliable yields – governments should introduce incentives aimed at increasing use of such genetically engineered grains and other crops. In addition, one would expect...

A Euro Sabbatical

by Hans-Werner Sinn Added 29.02.2012

Many people regard debt relief and socialization of debts as the only way out. This help has been given. The recent agreement gave Greece relief of €237 billion ($316 billion), about 30% more than Greece’s net national income of roughly €180...

Iran: Obama’s Indecisiveness Makes Israeli Strike Likely

by Alon Ben-Meir Added 29.02.2012

The failure of President Obama to impose crippling sanctions a few months after assuming office in 2009 makes the prospect of an Israeli strike on Iran nuclear facilities in the coming few months increasingly more likely. To prevent Israel from...

Romney and GOP in Trouble

by James J. Zogby Added 28.02.2012

Whether or not former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney wins Tuesday's primary contests in Michigan and Arizona, he is in trouble, and both he and the Republican Party leadership know it. During the past month, the topsy-turvy Republican...

Weimar Europe?

by Harold James Added 25.02.2012

The second criticism, repeatedly voiced by the Nobel laureate economist Paul Krugman, is that the supposed German history lesson is chronologically false. It was not the famous hyperinflation of the early 1920’s that destroyed Germany’s fragile...

End the Slaughter in Syria while Isolating Iran

by Alon Ben-Meir Added 24.02.2012

Last Monday I distributed my weekly article which dealt with Syria entitled “SYRIA: THE LYNCHPIN TO BREAKING THE SHIITE CRESCENT". Because of the relevance to and the urgency of the dire situation in Syria, I ask that you please revisit that...

What Bible Is Santorum Reading?

by Mike Lux Added 23.02.2012

When conservative Congressman Todd Akin a few months back suggested that liberalism was a "hatred of God," I postulated that given the overwhelming support for liberal and progressive values in the Judeo-Christian Bible, perhaps he had never...

Final Four: The GOP Arizona Debate

by Alan Schroeder Added 23.02.2012

Scorpions in a bottle, or comrades in arms? The GOP presidential debate in Mesa, Arizona, was really two separate events: a first half in which the candidates spat venom at each other, and a second half in which they agreed on most everything --...

Watching the Republicans: The Arizona Primary Debate

by Binoy Kampmark Added 23.02.2012

It’s painful. It’s horrendous. It’s grotesque. It’s another Republican presidential debate. Gazing at the behaviour of the candidates at the last Republican primary debate in Arizona, and the shop of horrors is bursting. Newt Gingrich tried...

Syria: The Lynchpin to Breaking the Shiite Crescent

by Alon Ben-Meir Added 22.02.2012

Seldom has the dividing line between the forces of moderation and the forces of extremism been so clear in the Middle East. The extremist anti-West, Iran-led Shiite Crescent, consisting of Iraq (largely operating at Iran’s behest), Syria, and...

Anthony Shadid: A Man for Others

by James J. Zogby Added 21.02.2012

New York Times' reporter, Anthony Shadid died unexpectedly this week. With his passing we lose America's finest reporter on Arab World issues—at the time when Americans need his work more than ever. The importance of Shadid’s writings to...

Good and Bad Deficits

by Robert Skidelsky Added 20.02.2012

Europe has its own Tea Party crackpots who loathe the welfare state and want it abolished or radically pared, and who are convinced that all state-sponsored capital spending is a “boondoggle”........And they prefer the total waste of letting...

Is the Web Closing?

by Esther Dyson Added 20.02.2012

Within the tech community, there is much angst about whether the Web is about to be “closed.” Will it be controlled by companies like Apple, Facebook, and Google, or will it remain “open” to all? Will individuals be able to reach any content...

Why the War on Birth Control is a Political Disaster for the GOP

by Robert Creamer Added 20.02.2012

From the point of view of a partisan Democrat, I can only think of one thing to say about the Republican Party’s escalating opposition to birth control: go ahead, make our day. You have to wonder if the political consultants advising the...

Israel's Borders and National Security

by Alon Ben-Meir Added 18.02.2012

No one should fault the Israelis for their preoccupation with national security. Indeed, the Jewish historical experience speaks for itself: centuries of persecution, expulsion, anti-Semitism and segregation culminating with the Holocaust and...

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No significant global warming since 1995

by Jarl R. Ahlbeck 51197 downloads

The recovery of the earth's climate from the little ice age started about 200 years ago, but the concentration of the atmospheric carbon dioxide started to increase significantly as late as in the 1950s, probably due to rapidly increased burning...

Wilson Is the Poster "Child" for the New Republican Party

by Robert Creamer 24250 downloads

When Representative Joe Wilson (R-SC) yelled out that President Obama was a "liar" in the middle of Obama's nationally televised address to a joint session of Congress, he became the poster child for the new Republican Party. I definitely mean...

Fareed Zakaria: The Post-American World – A Book Review

by Olli Raade 15163 downloads

Above there is an interview with Fareed Zakaria by the New Perspectives Quarterly about his book "The Post-American World". Below there is a summary of the book as for a background for the interview. Zakaria argues that America's relative weight...

Genetically modified plants benefit everybody

by Petter Portin 14071 downloads

We consume approximately one gram's worth of genes in every meal. This may not seem like very much, but each of our meals contains trillions of individual genes. The transfer-genes contained in genetically modified food-stuffs are identical to...

Effects of banning smoking in restaurants

by Pentti Huovinen 12350 downloads

Latest research shows that the banning of smoking in restaurants has reduced heart attacks by as much as a fifth. Researchers in the University of California have analysed relevant studies undertaken after 2004. In all the studies it was...

Behind the scenes at piano competitions

by Michael Johnson 11122 downloads

Has the time come to rethink the concept of piano competitions? Many participants and leading musicians believe so. The proliferation of international competitions - now numbering more than 750 - is producing hundreds of annual laureates who...

Finland show the way to coffee binge-drinking

by Michael Johnson 10399 downloads

I was between jobs a few years ago when I stumbled into a bit of public relations work for the coffee industry. The coffee marketers seemed a decent lot, just men and women trying to make a living. They had only one characteristic that bothered...

Brzezinski: Russia's Invasion of Georgia Is Reminiscent of Stalin's Attack on Finland

by Nathan Gardels 9914 downloads

On Sunday (Editor's note: August 10, 2008) I talked with Zbigniew Brzezinski, the elder statesman who was national security advisor to President Jimmy Carter, about the Russian invasion of Georgia. He long tangled with Soviet power. Now he takes...

What does Ms. Palin’s tattoo tell us?

by Michael Johnson 9905 downloads

BORDEAUX - I have witnessed the gradual penetration of tattoo culture into the middle classes in Europe and the United States over the past two or three years but I always thought it would go away. So I was stunned to see that now we have...

Firewalls to Freedom

by Rebecca MacKinnon and Evgeny Morozov 9477 downloads

NEW YORK - Even the most cold-hearted realists would agree that the failure of Communist censorship played a role in the collapse of the Iron Curtain: Voice of America, the fax machine, rock 'n' roll, and the lure of Western capitalism helped to...

Future low solar activity periods may cause extremely cold winters in North America, Europe and Russia

by Jarl R. Ahlbeck 9472 downloads

Summary. The observed winter temperatures for Turku, Finland (and also generally for North America, Europe and Russia) for the past 60 winters have been strongly dependent on the Arctic Oscillation index (AO). When the Arctic Oscillation index...

How the French take their sex in stride

by Michael Johnson 8791 downloads

BORDEAUX -- Our glamorous, doe-eyed Minister of Justice, Rachida Dati, is the talk of France again - this time over her surprise pregnancy. Always controversial, she has now added spice to the gossip by politely declining to reveal who the...

The Real Che Guevara

by Guy Sorman 8503 downloads

PARIS - Hollywood history is often nonsensical, but filmmakers usually have the good sense not to whitewash killers and sadists. Steven Soderbergh's new film about Che Guevara, however, does that, and more. Che the revolutionary romantic, as...

Why Growing Income Inequality is Bad For America

by Robert Creamer 8499 downloads

The recent controversy over the huge bonuses at financial firms like AIG and J.P. Morgan Chase have served to highlight both the disproportionate growth of the financial sector, and the perverse incentives that led traders and executives to take...

Putin's doctrine surfaces

by Stefan Forss 8454 downloads

A few Georgian battalions - trained to fight terrorists, not to manoeuvre against a powerful Russian army! - undertook a militarily deficient offensive against Tskhinvali in South Ossetia on August 8. The Russians replied promptly and...

New cheap power source heading for independent tests

by Michael Johnson 8156 downloads

As Middle East oil climbs to record highs, research into alternative energy sources is attracting a wave of new science, much of it still experimental and untested. One of the most advanced concepts, scheduled to go live about a year from now,...

Republicans Take Huge Political Risk Opposing Obama Jobs Bill

by Robert Creamer 7993 downloads

You'd think that the results of November's election -- coupled with the collapse of the economy -- would begin to make Republican lawmakers question the consequences of their blind commitment to right wing economic orthodoxy. Apparently most...

A Tribunal for Kenya: the Waki Commission Report

by Binoy Kampmark 7984 downloads

The Waki commission, charged with the task of investigating post-election violence in the aftermath of the Kenyan elections last December, has called for a special tribunal to try various perpetrators. The Commission of Inquiry into...

Odd couple share Cliburn gold

by Michael Johnson 7777 downloads

The Van Cliburn International Piano Competition in Fort Worth, Texas, ended Sunday on a somewhat sour note, with some critics and former winners wondering how the jury could award the top prize jointly to the two young winners - one a Chinese...

Fareed Zakaria: Facing a Post-American World - An Interview

by Nathan Gardels 6994 downloads

Fareed Zakaria is author of The Post-American World and editor-in-chief of Newsweek International. He spoke with NPQ editor Nathan Gardels in June. NPQ | Barack Obama has been reading your book The Post-American World. If he becomes president,...

Global Warming – Man-made or Natural?

by Kenneth Rundt 6392 downloads

One of the most interesting global questions today is whether the climate is changing and, if it really is, whether the reasons are man-made (anthropogenic) or natural - or maybe even both. The United Nations appointed Intergovernmental Panel on...

France banking on laser research

by Michael Johnson 6330 downloads

At the heart of the French advanced research program is a little-known project for a giant laser cannon -- not for shooting down satellites but for something potentially much more powerful. It will test theories for the next generation of...

The curious story of Sarah Bernhardt’s leg

by Michael Johnson 6208 downloads

It has been 94 years since the right leg of the great actress Sarah Bernhardt was sawed off by a Bordeaux surgeon. Still preserved in formaldehyde, it remains an object of great - if somewhat morbid - curiosity despite the passage of time. The...

Nathan Gardels interviews Joseph Stiglitz about Wall Street meltdown

by Nathan Gardels 5976 downloads

Joseph Stiglitz was awarded the Nobel Prize for Economics in 2001. I spoke with him on Tuesday (Editor's note September 16, 2008) about the Wall Street meltdown. Nathan Gardels: Barack Obama has said the Wall Street meltdown is the greatest...

Renewable Energy: The Cold Facts

by David Eichler 5920 downloads

Renewable energy sources, such as wind, direct solar power, hydroelectric power, and biomass and the biofuels derived from it may be the basis for future civilization. The primary source of energy that generates each of these forms, however, is...

The Coming Battle of the Atlantic: Euro vs. the Dollar

by Kenichi Ohmae 5707 downloads

Tokyo - Because Americans are more proactive than the Japanese, they are likely to avoid the same kind of deep slump as we had for almost a decade. Nonetheless, with the value of their key assets-their homes-diminished, they will become a land...

Time to Nationalize Insolvent Banks

by Nouriel Roubini 5550 downloads

NEW YORK - A year ago, I predicted that the losses of US financial institutions would reach at least $1 trillion and possibly go as high as $2 trillion. At that time, the consensus among economists and policymakers was that these estimates were...

Is There Moral Progress?

by Peter Singer 5485 downloads

After a century that saw two world wars, the Nazi Holocaust, Stalin's Gulag, the killing fields of Cambodia, and more recent atrocities in Rwanda and now Darfur, the belief that we are progressing morally has become difficult to defend. Yet...

French aren’t saying neigh to horsemeat

by Michael Johnson 5456 downloads

As Europe feels the effects of rising prices - mainly tied to energy costs - at least one sector is benefiting. The new big thing appears to be horsemeat, increasingly a viable alternative to expensive beef as desperate housewives look for...

The Secret World of Female Circumcision

by Juliet Torome 5280 downloads

NAIROBI - As a child in rural Kenya, I was a secret admirer of female genital mutilation. I was swayed by talk of friends and elders about how once a girl undergoes "the cut," she gains respect and grown men consider her suitable for marriage....

The last financial crisis?

by Tom Berglund 5199 downloads

" The more actors there are who can read the signs of an approaching crisis, the less serious will be the consequences when the crisis breaks out." The world's financial markets are going through a crisis that is rapidly developing into what...

Does Legalizing Prostitution Work?

by Heleen Mees 5124 downloads

AMSTERDAM - Prostitution is virtually the only part of the personal services industry in the Netherlands that works. One can't get a manicure in Amsterdam without booking an appointment two weeks in advance, but men can buy sex anytime - and at...

Take Action against the non-democratic developments in Russia

by Björn von Sydow. The article was translated into English from Swedish by Jeffrey Ganellan. 5022 downloads

Russia's government - with considerable support from domestic opinion - has recently taken a turn towards a new, authoritarian system of governance, with control over the establishment of political parties and the nomination of candidates, the...

"God's Continent" by Philip Jenkins - A Book Review

by Olli Raade 5000 downloads

Jenkins writes about Islam in Europe and Islam's impact on Europe, Christianity, and about Islam itself. He examines a number of undesirable trends generally attributed to Islam. Jenkins, however, argues that phenomena such as high criminality...

The crash course that educated Mrs. Palin

by Michael Johnson 4787 downloads

Sarah Palin, the Republican candidate for vice president of the United States, finally submitted to a television interview after intense coaching from top-level White House advisers. Never in U.S. history has a candidate for high office had to...

Séraphine’ film wins 7 French Césars

by Michael Johnson 4786 downloads

Presenting a new and earthy face of French cinema, the outsider candidate "Séraphine" won seven awards at the Césars, the annual French film competition, including best film and best actress of 2008. The near-clean-sweep on Friday night...

Starving the Archive: Dick Cheney and his Records

by Binoy Kampmark 4631 downloads

What are we going to do about old Dick's subterfuge and an office he did much to undermine during his time in power? All sorts of conjecturing has been taking place about how best to deprive the archival records of the US Vice President's papers...

When a frog Is not a frog

by Michael Johnson 4592 downloads

The main French defense manufacturer called a group of experts and some economic journalists together a few years ago to unveil a new military helicopter. They wanted us to choose a name for it and I thought I had the perfect one: "The Frog". I...

How to kill a river: the Murray-Darling System

by Binoy Kampmark 4583 downloads

It's looking more than just grim. A vast river system in Australia, the Murray-Darling Basin, seems terminally affected by drought and decades of environmental abuse. Cosmetic measures have been suggested by the Australian authorities dealing...

Bush's legacy will be NGOs with a truly global vision

by Jean-Paul Marthoz 4516 downloads

A year from now, the Bush administration will be history. Opinion polls around the world assessing the unpopularity of the current US president suggest that the departure of one of the most controversial administrations in American history will...

The triumph of Game Theory in various sciences

by Vesa Kanniainen 4439 downloads

A book review: A Beautiful Math: John Nash, Game Theory, and the Modern Quest for a Code of Nature Author: Tom Siegfried, Science editor of Dallas Morning News Publisher: The Joseph Henry Press of the National Academy of Sciences Many of us saw...

The best medicine yet – a good laugh

by Michael Johnson 4301 downloads

My sister died a year ago after a 13-year bout with various cancers. She had been cut to pieces by surgeons - mastectomy, hysterectomy, the lot -- but somehow she always managed to return to her productive normal role as wife and mother. She...

After the war in Georgia…

by Göran Lindblad and Björn von Sydow 4268 downloads

Two European countries have waged war against each other - Georgia and Russia. Numerous civilians have been displaced and no one really knows how many have been killed or wounded. The current ceasefire agreement is fragile and the crisis has...

Britain trades free speech for security

by Michael Johnson 4231 downloads

Britain's decision to ban outspoken Dutch Parliamentarian Geert Wilders from entering the United Kingdom last week dramatizes the religious tensions that once again loom over humankind. Specifically, it is a sign that intolerant Muslim faithful...

Stendhal at his best : a “worthless” historian

by Micael Johnson 4115 downloads

When I was young and the world was different, I used to hide Stendhal's classic novel "The Red and the Black" in the dust jacket of a Bible and read it on Sunday mornings in church. Parishioners peered over my shoulder to try to see what was so...

Danger: piano can take over your life

by Michael Johnson 4113 downloads

The late Glenn Gould made some powerful enemies in the music world when he decided to record Bach's Goldberg Variations at a slow tempo. He also made music history. The Canadian virtuoso pianist was tired of hearing the same old Goldberg played...

Republicans Claim That We Must Destroy Medicare to Save It

by Robert Creame 4087 downloads

People like me who came of political age in the 1960's will never forget the absurd statement from an American General, that we had to destroy a Vietnamese village in order to save it. That Orwellian proposition came to symbolize the essence of...

Beijing’s Olympic Challenge

by Linda Jakobson 3880 downloads

BEIJING - The Beijing government appears to be facing a daunting Olympic challenge. On the one hand, China's leaders must ensure the safety of 80 visiting heads of states, some 16,000 athletes and hundreds of thousands of Olympic spectators. On...

George Orwell is Reborn as Mitch McConnell

by Robert Creamer 3877 downloads

Sixty-one years ago, the novelist George Orwell published the novel "1984" - a social science fiction classic about a future totalitarian regime that had perfected the art of propaganda and mind control. The book contributed several iconic terms...

Bob Woodward: The reason for the decrease in violence in Iraq is not the surge, but "highly classified techniques"

by Olli Raade 3735 downloads

The surge in Iraq is not the reason for the decrease in violence. Instead the reason is "highly classified techniques". This is what Bob Woodward claimed in an interview with Bill Maher. Woodward refused to specify what he meant with the term...

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What will life be in 2020: Leading Thinkers answer - Video

by Ericsson Multimedia Channel

682 reviews

What will life be like in 2020? The telephone equipment company, Ericsson asked 20 thinkers--including professors, inventors, 'futurists,' and digital experts "What will life be like in 2020? Ericsson explains the project: In 2020 - Shaping...

Republicans Begin to Question the Competence of their Leadership

by Robert Creamer

772 reviews

If there is anything that the Republicans hate, it's losing. And when it came to the health care bill Republicans lost big. They had bet all the marbles on stopping health care reform cold and then convincing voters next fall that Obama's...

Britain trades free speech for security

by Michael Johnson

1270 reviews

Muddled over Banksy: Street Art in Melbourne

by Binoy Kampmark

306 reviews

The occasion is an opening reception at the upmarket Melbourne art gallery, The Metro. The location is affluent Armadale. The show is titled 'On the Wall - International Street Art Group Show', where cliques of constipated art viewers and...

Future low solar activity periods may cause extremely cold winters in North America, Europe and Russia

by Jarl R. Ahlbeck

682 reviews

8 Ways to Unplug and Recharge Your Brain

by Matthew Edlund, M.D.

299 reviews

Do you feel stressed, tired, fatigued, rushed, drained, zapped? Join the club. Add an economic crisis to multiple jobs, kids, elderly parents and a body-crushing lifestyle, and lots of Americans feel whacked-over-the-head overloaded. What's the...

An Intercourse with the Natives

by Dhiraj Singh

296 reviews

WE STAND IN THE middle of New South Wales' Royal National Park holding hands and looking heavenwards to invoke Yullangur-'the dreaming' of the creation serpent-as our guide Les Bursill starts us on a tour of Australia's sacred sites. 'The...

Venezuela’s Republic of Crime

by Kevin Casas-Zamora

3 reviews

The recent kidnapping of Mexico’s ambassador to Venezuela, has cast an unflattering light on the latter country’s declining public safety.....several diplomats have suffered a similar fate in Venezuela’s capital.

Will the Republicans Be Stupid Enough to Filibuster Bill to Hold Wall Street Banks Accountable?

by Robert Creamer

178 reviews

The big question in Washington this week is whether the Republican leadership will be stupid enough to filibuster the Senate bill to hold big Wall Street banks accountable. There are very few things the Republicans could do that would help the...

The Week that Was, and the Week Yet to Come: Testing Obama's Mettle

by James J. Zogby

246 reviews

This coming week will tell us a great deal about the ability of President Obama to be a strong leader and an honest broker in Middle East peacemaking. With the President having postponed his Asia visit in order to be on hand for conclusion of...

Republicans Claim That We Must Destroy Medicare to Save It

by Robert Creame

89 reviews

Turkey's Changing Regional Role

by James J. Zogby

48 reviews

In just one year, relations between the United States and Turkey have moved from tension to cooperation. This was the focus of remarks by a Turkish journalist speaking at the opening session at the second convention of the Turkic American...

Palestinian Incitement against Israel

by Alon Ben-Meir

118 reviews

The adoption of nonviolent methods by the Palestinian Authority to advance the Palestinian cause is admirable and represents the most promising strategy to affect change. But for a nonviolent movement to serve the intended purpose of advancing...

The Triumph of Irrelevance: The Kagan Appointment

by Binoy Kampmark

233 reviews

The Obama administration is making every concerted effort to keep its domestic agenda interesting and perplexing. The decision to make Elena Kagan a Supreme Court appointee has been baffling. Lacking judicial experience, and a legal record...

Kill the "Peace Game"

by Sharmine Narwani

127 reviews

The Palestine-Israel conflict is no pesky regional skirmish. This century-long battle over territory threatens to draw the entire global community into its bowels if it is not dealt with soon, and the only way out of the current paralysis is to...

Telecom reforms drive French workers to suicide

by Michael Johnson

370 reviews

French workers have never been known for their flexibility. But the impact of globalization has meant a gradual erosion of the cocoon inside which they have traditionally found comfort. The backlash against more rigorous management standards has...

The Politics of Palestine

by James J. Zogby

5 reviews

Netanyahu: Then and Now

by James Zogby

474 reviews

When Benjamin Netanyahu became Prime Minister in 1996, he ran on a platform dedicated to ending the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. That is what he said in Israel. For U.S. consumption, Netanyahu took a different approach, seeking instead to...

Republicans Are So Drunk on Wall Street Money That They’re Driving Off a Political Cliff

by Robert Creamer

167 reviews

You see it all too often - a grisly news story about a kid who runs his car off a cliff. We ask, "how could he have done it, how could he have been so reckless?" The answer invariably comes back: because he was drunk. The same thing just...

Real Factor in Midterms: Too Few Jobs, Not Too Much Spending

by Robert Creamer

215 reviews

"I know we should provide more money for state government to prevent hundreds of thousands of teachers, police, and public workers from being laid off, but I just can't vote for one more bill that increases the deficit." If I had a dollar for...

Dirty Little Secrets the Republicans Don't Want You to Know

by Robert Creamer

189 reviews

The Republicans have a set of dirty little (actually not so little) secrets they don't what you to know - and certainly don't want you to think about when you go to the polls in November. And the fact is that some of those secrets could provide...

An Opportunity for a Syrian-Israeli Peace

by Alon Ben-Meir

210 reviews

While the world reacts to the recent flair-up of violence along the Lebanon-Israel border, other developments in the area could present an opportunity to advance regional peace if pursued. The recent visit by King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and...

Welcome to Israel seasonal political charade

by Alon Ben-Meir

6 reviews

The Spy Who Bored Me

by Michael Brenner

261 reviews

The "Comatose Sleeper Cell" mystery shows us that the ability of the country's security services to waste resources is matched only by the media's ability to dramatize trivial material. The only surprise is that the exchange did not take place...

Khaled Meshaal Interview: A Hamas Take on Mideast Geopolitics (Part 2)

by Sharmine Narwani

171 reviews

Palestinian resistance group Hamas has beaten some unusual odds to survive today: Israel's unlawful siege of Gaza has crippled the coastal strip's economy and left Hamas scrambling to govern a restless population living under increasingly...

New Rules for Hot Money

by Nouriel Roubini

172 reviews

NEW YORK - Capital flows to emerging-market economies have been on a boom-bust merry-go-round for decades. In the past year, the world has seen another boom, with a tsunami of capital, portfolio equity, and fixed-income investments surging into...

Republican Spending Cap Would Have Caused Depression if It Were Law in 2009

by Robert Creamer

116 reviews

Republicans have proposed legislation that would cap federal spending at 20.6% of the country's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) - just below the average of the last forty years. Sounds reasonable, right? Only if you like the idea of another Great...

Firewalls to Freedom

by Rebecca MacKinnon and Evgeny Morozov

1420 reviews

Afghanistan the Un-winnable: What America’s Allies are Saying

by Binoy Kampmark

627 reviews

The US presidential candidates are warbling about what strategies will best suit Afghanistan in a post-Bush world. Both Barack Obama and John McCain promise that the interminable conflict will be of "top priority" come 2009. Neither have...

On Jobs and Teacher Bills, Some Democrats Ignore Economics and Politics 101

by Robert Creamer

204 reviews

As of Thursday morning, Democratic leaders are having trouble lining up enough votes to pass to critical pieces of legislation before the Memorial Day Congressional break. One is a jobs bill that would provide continued aid to states whose...

Panicking over Minority Government: Australia’s Hung Parliament

by Binoy Kampmark

206 reviews

The use of the term 'hung parliament' says it all. States using the Westminster system regard it as a calamity and undeserved form of punishment. Suddenly, a major party with an insufficient number of votes to govern in their own right needs the...

Developing Countries and the Global Crisis

by Joseph E. Stiglitz

399 reviews

NEW YORK - This year is likely to be the worst for the global economy since World War II, with the World Bank estimating a decline of up to 2%. Even developing countries that did everything right - and had far better macroeconomic and regulatory...

Why Democratic Strategists Have Begun to Root for Mitt Romney

by Robert Creamer

36 reviews

It wasn't long ago that conventional wisdom among Democratic strategists handicapped Mitt Romney as President Obama's toughest potential Republican challenger. But lately there has been a big shift. In fact, it is becoming clearer and clearer...

Saudi Arabia’s Shia Stand Up

by Mai Yamani

510 reviews

BEIRUT - On February 24, violent confrontations between Shia pilgrims and the Saudi religious police and security forces occurred at the entrance to the Prophet Mohamed's Mosque in Medina. The timing and location of the clashes may have serious...

Four More Reasons Why Democrats Will Retain Control of House and Senate

by Robert Creamer

171 reviews

Over the last several weeks, the Pollster.com average of polls testing the generic choice of Republican versus Democrat for Congress has begun to close from a spread of almost 5% down to only 2.3% advantage to Republicans. If the present trend...

Jimmy Carter, James Baker, Zbigniew Brzezinski and Brent Scowcroft on Israel-Palestine Conflict

by Steve Clemons

335 reviews

Landrum Bolling, former President of the Lilly Endowment and Earlham College, has put together a collage of commentary from four outstanding American foreign policy giants. They are former President Jimmy Carter; former Secretary of State and...

Obama in Istanbul: Test for the West

by Nathan Gardels

449 reviews

ISTANBUL - "If we can show that a big Muslim nation can modernize itself with the help of friends," former German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer has argued on behalf of Turkey's admission to the European Union, "it demonstrates that a strong...

Goldstone: Discussed, but Not Read

by James J. Zogby

322 reviews

The Goldstone Report is back, taking center stage in a raging international debate. What is most troubling, is not the circuitous route the Report took on its way to the United Nations Security Council. Rather, it is the fact that those making...

Reporting the News from a Police State - Chapter 17: Desperately Seeking Solzhenitsyn

by Michael Johnson

642 reviews

Every journalist in Moscow wanted to be the first to find Alexander Solzhenitsyn after he won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1970. I intended to be that journalist and I was unconcerned about the consequences this publicity might have for...

Stratfor Challenges Narratives on Syria

by Sharmine Narwani

34 reviews

Since the first public protests broke out in Syria last March, the narratives about the Syrian crisis have stayed fairly true to the theme of all the Arab Revolts. An authoritarian ruler out to crush peaceful opposition to his regime opens fire...

Generation Jones and the New Era in Global Leadership

by Jonathan Pontell

413 reviews

U.S. President Barack Obama's trip to Europe marked the culmination of a generational shift in leadership among Western democracies. The generation yielding power -- the Baby Boomers -- are so strongly connected to the 1960's that they are often...

Another Robertson Outrage: Time for Accountability

by James J. Zogby

244 reviews

On Jan 13th, television evangelist Pat Robertson pontificated on the horrific earthquake that had struck the country of Haiti. Noting how many recent tragedies had befallen the Haitian people, Robertson told his TV audience that, "something...

The Crowd That Had the Party Should Pick Up the Tab

by Robert Creamer

136 reviews

You hear a lot these days about how there has to be "shared sacrifice" to revive the economy and get the federal deficit under control. The fact is that for the last two decades the middle class in America has already done plenty of sacrificing....

The curious story of Sarah Bernhardt’s leg

by Michael Johnson

641 reviews

Washington Just Lost the Middle East in a Big Way

by Sharmine Narwani

139 reviews

It's official. There is no longer any serious "cost" for defying the United States in the global arena. Unable to win wars or deliver diplomatic coups - and struggling to maintain our economic equilibrium - Washington has lost the fundamental...

Congratulations British Authorities for banning Geert Wilders from entering the United Kingdom

by Badrul Islam

502 reviews

BBC headlines reports" Banned Dutch MP held at Heathrow -A Dutch MP who called the Koran a "fascist book" is to be sent back to the Netherlands after attempting to defy a ban on entering the UK. We wish to congratulate the British Home Secretary...

Islamophobia Can Create Radicalization

by James J. Zogby

102 reviews

Let me state quite directly: Islamophobia and those who promote it are a greater threat to the United States of America than Anwar al Awlaqi and his rag-tag team of terrorists. On one level, al Awlaqi, from his cave hide-out in Yemen, can only...

Ehud Barak Betrayed his Party and the Nation

by Alon Ben-Meir

145 reviews

Ehud Barak's bolt from the Labor Party in order to remain in the governing coalition has solidified his role as Benjamin Netanyahu's enabler. For two years, Barak has led the Labor Party to irrelevance while facilitating the right-wing policies...

Take Action against the non-democratic developments in Russia

by Björn von Sydow. The article was translated into English from Swedish by Jeffrey Ganellan.

693 reviews

How Mitchell should deal with Hamas

by Alon Ben-Meir

557 reviews

The recent appointment of George Mitchell as special envoy to the Middle East is no doubt a positive sign of President Obama's commitment to the region, signalling that there will be immediate and direct American involvement in the Arab-Israeli...

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