The most marginalized and poorly served group of people in the United States is also the key to our future: young men. The WSJ reports that prospects for male twenty-somethings are bleak: The unemployment rate for males between 25 and 34 years old with high-school diplomas is 14.4%—up from 6.1% before the downturn four years […]

Stop the presses! Via Meadia has just received word that teenagers are both mean and rude. According to the New York Times, a new study shows that nearly half of student polled have experienced harassment of some form: Nearly half of 7th to 12th graders experienced sexual harassment in the last school year, according to […]

If they fail to oust President Obama in 2012, perhaps the Tea Partiers could seek political asylum in Germany. Germany has already passed a balanced budget amendment and now, gearing up for another election, the coalition government of Angela Merkel is planning on giving low- and middle-wage earners a tax cut. The WSJ reports: German […]

Last week’s re-elect Nicolas Sarkozy rally, also known as the G-20 economic summit in Cannes, sputtered to a predictably lame conclusion.  Many photos of world “leaders” arm in arm were snapped; nothing of substance was decided or done.  As usual there was plenty of speculation in advance that something earth shaking would transpire; the press […]

“You can’t stay young forever,” says writer John Helyar, “but nobody ever said anything about immature.”  Argentina seems to bent on proving his point; the most cosmopolitan and in some ways most European of Latin American countries is getting older, but its commitment to underdevelopment and economic failure appears undiminished with time.Having just elected its […]

The failure of China’s state owned CNOOC oil company to complete a deal to purchase BP’s interest in an Argentine oil company may signal a new level of international worry about Argentine policy.  As a Reuters dispatch on the failed transaction notes, China’s regulatory agencies failed to approve the $7 billion purchase.Given the thirst for […]

Via Meadia is and intends to remain a liberal arts-friendly site.  Proud holder of a BA in English lit, I continue to believe that the traditional western curriculum provides an extraordinarily rich and useful intellectual, political and moral basis for young people who want to understand and change our world.But many colleges have organized themselves […]

Expect another bout of panic driven neo-Physiocracy as more people read this Economist article on the inroads that machines are making in the job market: The evidence is irrefutable that computerised automation, networks and artificial intelligence (AI)—including machine-learning, language-translation, and speech- and pattern-recognition software—are beginning to render many jobs simply obsolete.This is unlike the job […]

Last night was opera night; leaving the safety and sophistication of glamorous Queens I ventured over to the neo-Assyrian art palace at Lincoln Center where the Metropolitan Opera put on one of the greats: Verdi’s youthful masterpiece Nabucco.  Loosely, very loosely, built on the story of the fall of the Temple and the Hebrew captivity […]

What seems like a small step to many evidently looks like a giant leap to the Castro brothers.  The Cuban dictatorship announced that it will allow citizens and residents to buy and sell residential property. According to the WSJ, Cuba will allow citizens to buy and sell their homes for the first time in decades, […]