International Jihadis Descend on Mali

Any possible intervention in Mali is weeks away, Xan Rice reports for the FT. Moreover, it is uncertain at this point who exactly would do the “intervening”, whether those forces will be prepared to face the jihadis, and what the situation on the ground in Mali really is. Under the French proposal, the European Union […]

Fight The Crisis! Telecommute!

Sandy’s devastating flood surge is the worst disaster in the 108 year history of the New York subway system, and it now looks as if much if not all of the system will be closed for the rest of the week and possibly longer.We can hope that it will take another 108 years till something […]

Plus ça change, Egyptian Style

It was the summer of 2000, and the situation for Egypt’s fledgling civil society community was looking dire. Saad Eddin Ibrahim, a prominent sociologist, had just been dragged from his home and jailed by longtime dictator Hosni Mubarak. The 61-year-old academic was held without formal charges for weeks and then prosecuted for a nebulous array […]

Which Nations Failed?

Why Nations Fail, by Professors Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson has deservedly gained right of entry to the pantheon of Big Books on economic development.Like the pantheon’s other occupants, most recently—Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs and Steel, and Ian Morris’s Why the West Rules for Now, Acemoglu and Robinson’s work tackles one of the biggest questions […]

Nature and Nature’s God

While the lights went out across Manhattan tonight, and the city that calls itself the capital of the world was cut off from the mainland as flood waters thundered through its streets, many people around the world watched the spectacle and were reminded just how fragile the busy world we humans build around us really […]

Making the Jobs of the Future Work

The NYT has a long and interesting piece on the rise of part-time work in retail: While there have always been part-time workers, especially at restaurants and retailers, employers today rely on them far more than before as they seek to cut costs and align staffing to customer traffic. This trend has frustrated millions of […]

Regulators Fight Cab Jobs of the Future

The taxi industry hasn’t changed much since the invention of the automobile, but that’s not for lack of interest in new ideas. As anyone can tell you who has tried to take a cab to glamorous Queens, there is plenty of room for improvement. Fortunately the past few years have seen the emergence a number […]

Nanotubes Rescue IT Revolution

Scientists at IBM’s T.J. Watson Research Center have made an important breakthrough: they’ve figured out how to use carbon nanotubes as a replacement for silicon in making the tiny transistors that are the building blocks of modern microchips. The New York Times Bits Blog explains why this matters: The I.B.M. advance is significant, scientists said, because the […]

Clinton Arrives in Algeria to Push Mali Invasion

AP: Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday sought Algeria’s assistance for any future military intervention in Mali, pressing North Africa’s most stable nation to provide intelligence — if not boots on the ground — to help rout the al-Qaida-linked militants across its southern border.Clinton, on the first stop of a five-day trip overseas, […]

Europe Needs to Frack to Save the Planet

One of the biggest advantages of America’s energy revolution also seems the most counterintuitive: It’s good for the environment. But fracking and other drilling techniques put cheap, clean natural gas on the market, allowing America to transition away from dirtier fuels like coal. As a result, American carbon dioxide production hit a 20-year low earlier […]

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